On May 14th, 2022, Whiskey Myers was playing a concert at the Walmart AMP in Rogers. Three of my friends (Taylor and Whitney Aldridge and Dyanah Rippeto) and I had pit tickets for this concert. We got there well before the gates opened and ended up waiting in line next to an AMP employee in charge of the speaker system and microphone. In between his announcements, he would make small talk with us since we were standing next to him. It came up that I was living in Bentonville at the time, but worked in Rogers as an interior designer. This man's jaw dropped and his face lit up as he said the following: "You're not going to believe this! I have a nephew who is 6' -10" tall that is graduating from the interior design program at the University of Arkansas today, and he's straight!" My immediate follow-up question was to clarify if he was actually graduating with an interior design degree or if his degree was in architecture since people can sometimes confuse the two professions. He assured me that he was graduating with his interior design degree, and I thought the conversation would end there. Luckily, my friends harassed this man to try and get him to tell me his nephew's name so that I could find and meet him. The employee, who we had now come to know as Ray, would not give in and would only tell us his nephew's childhood nickname: Hoot, like what an owl says. Eventually, the gates opened and we enjoyed the concert. We got to the front of the barricade and were extremely close to the stage! As we were leaving the venue, we passed Ray walking out of the gates and my friends still persisted and asked him to tell us his nephew's name. He didn't give in though, and I thought that would be the end of the whole experience. Wrong! Taylor, Whitney, and Dyanah spent the next two weeks bullying me into trying to figure out who Ray's tall nephew was. I have never been one to put myself out there in any capacity, so the idea of possibly figuring out who this guy was terrified me. I also wasn't looking for a relationship at this time, so I didn't have that as a goal in mind. On May 27th, I was actually sitting in the waiting room at a doctor's office thinking about this whole situation when I thought to myself, "What is the worst thing that could happen if you find this guy and reach out to him?" I essentially had to give myself a pep talk and remind myself that it would not be the end of the world if this guy read my message and didn't respond. Once I had gotten over that, I tried to think of any connections I could possibly have with this guy. I ended up reaching out to an old coworker whose boyfriend at the time was an architecture student at the U of A. After texting back and forth, a screenshot of Houston's Instagram profile was sent. I looked through it and had an immediate gut feeling that this was Ray's nephew. I looked him up, requested to follow him, and he accepted and followed me back. It took me another day to work up the nerve to send him a message. On May 28th, I FaceTimed my sister, Abbie, while she was in Denver so that she could proofread the message I wanted to send. After she'd approved, I sent him a DM on Instagram and he responded almost immediately. We messaged back on forth on Instagram and via text message for about a month before we finally met in person. I remember being so nervous and having the biggest smile on my face when I finally got to see Houston and give him the biggest hug! It was on the night we first spent time together that Houston revealed that Ray is NOT his uncle and that he is NOT 6' -10" tall. He's actually only 6' -8" tall. I was mortified! Imagine getting a DM from a random girl that says she met your fake uncle at a concert who was telling her all about you! I'm so glad Houston wasn't phased by this and responded to my message. We have been inseparable ever since and are so excited to spend the rest of our lives together!