I continued spending most of my days skating through down town, burning my fingers on buffalo wing grease and playing the corners for pocket change. The first day at TGIF sucked, I had coleslaw and dishwasher duty. I spent the first week dreading my job hoping for some abrupt change of pace to override these feelings of mediocrity. Then she walked in. That one girl I saw a few weeks ago was leaning over the cooks counter to place an order. She cracked a joke, smiled and made eye contact. I must admit I felt that she was way out of my league. She had every guy in that place wrapped around her finger. Then here I am... the only thing I owned was a skateboard I stole from my freind. I had a shaved head, plugs, I was timid and was way to easy to pass by. Later down the road my wife would say she wasn't even that attracted to me at first. I wasnt her type...hmmm ok, lol. She had it all man, she was gorgeous, funny, she had tattoos!!, big boobs, nice butt and she was so approachable. Everything that matters to a man. By walking over and saying "hey" she made every part of my body tingle, it was like a fire started in my bones and my heart trying to put it out by beating faster. It was hard to be confident wearing those cattle poop scooping gloves and being elbow deep in coleslaw but I managed to make basic conversation. We chatted a bit, she asked "where ya from" and I responded "from an indian reservation up north, u?" "I'm from washington state but I was living in orange county. I just moved down here because of the MTV show Real World San Diego!" I then answered "awesome...".
This was going to be a hard catch for me, she had her pick of any guy in there and I didn't have much to offer. So I started to strategize first i have to get to know her. I started hanging out with the guys she was friends with. She was a waitress and I was a busser so I figured that I could start to bus only her tables to make small talk....brand recognition. Some call this stalking but I call it persistence. Once we got to a comfortable acquaintance level. I made my move. I approached her " Hey Lacey can I ask a favor, do you have a minute?" " not right now I am taking a phone order, give me one sec..." She said " no stress" I replied. The thing was I didn't have a good question to ask, so if she gave me her undivided attention I would have to make it good. So I panicked and went with plan b... I wrote my number on a piece of paper and with one hand I held it up to her. I made eye contact and a mouthed the words "call me". She could have just ignored that paper but I was hoping I had charmed her enough to get her curiosity sparked. After all I had spent that whole day dropping bits of info about me like how I was awesome, I knew stuff and I had cool friends. There is a total art to selling yourself and I nailed it!
And wouldn't you know she called that night. I still remember the voicemail "Hey Paul this is Lacey from work, sorry I couldn't talk earlier. I tried finding you but you took off. You said you had a favor to ask so I figured it had to be about sex, drugs or rock and roll...just kidding!! give me a call back" When I called back I came clean and said it was my brilliant attempt to hang out with her. She said she was at her aunt's with her cat and she had to stay in that night. I said "if it makes it easier just bring your cat with you and she can stay in my place?" From that night we never left each others side. She moved in shortly after, I quit Hooters and A few months later we tattooed each others names on our ring fingers. We have been together for 8 yrs and will be married for 7 in March. We have a 4 yr old child and I am so glad she decided to see the potential in me. Stay tuned for her version of the story!! lol.
