In October of 2019, I was super excited for a girl’s night out at the Miranda Lambert concert! I missed all of the opening bands but made it in time for Miranda. I found my friends and immediately noticed the tall, good-looking guy near us. Of course, I started gossiping with my friends about this new instant crush of mine. They all tried to convince me to make the first move, but my nerves got the best of me, especially since this new-found crush was in a group with two other girls. Thankfully a friend had my back and stepped up to be my wing-woman. This friend of mine must have been a little rusty because the concert ended, and this guy walked away without asking for my number or learning each other’s name. Oh well, his loss – plus I had the rest of girl’s night out to enjoy! After that concert, I decided to try my hand at online dating. At the time, I was working nights at Dispatch so meeting someone the old-fashioned way proved to be difficult. Right before Thanksgiving, I matched with John! We talked for a couple weeks and then finally decided to meet in person for lunch the day after my birthday celebration. I remember being so excited and bragging about it to my friends while dancing the night away at the Windbreak. I even took a picture of the outfit I was thinking of wearing to get their opinions. To this day I still have that picture on my phone (why? Well, I never delete anything apparently). John asked me to meet him at Lucky’s 13 since I had never been there before. It was obvious we were both nervous as there was some awkward silence, but no worries I filled it with plenty of random nonsense that probably made me look extra weird – great first impression, right!?. After lunch we continued to talk, but it started to fizzle out. I love to tease John now and say he ghosted me after this, but in all honesty, he was a true gentleman and let me down easy saying there was someone else he was interested in. Ouch – but, again, his loss! Roughly a year later, after many horrible dates, I was about ready to delete the online dating profiles for good. But then, in January 2021, I stumbled upon John’s profile again knowing full well there was no way I was going to match with him again - I mean, c’mon, I totally tanked our first date, but I swiped yes anyway. To my surprise, I instantly got the “you have matched” alert, so what would any “ghosted” girl do? I messaged him right away and said “I take it that other girl didn’t work out”. I must have hit a sore spot with John because all he said back was “nope” but somehow it was just enough for us to start talking again. We talked for a couple weeks and then decided to exchange Snap accounts, eventually leading to another “first date”. This time, John chose Rookies. Rookies must have had better lighting this time around because I didn’t get “ghosted” again and a month later we officially started dating. The funniest part about “Our Story” is that a month into dating we were talking about the concerts we had been to. We started talking about the Miranda Lambert concert and it dawned on us then that we had met at that concert! I asked John why he never asked for my number that night and the truth came out. My wing-woman tried to sell me with all my baggage. She told John that I was recently divorced, with a baby, and had just totaled two vehicles just a few hours before (hence the reason I missed the opening bands – plus I was still wearing my hospital bracelet!). If roles were reversed, I would have avoided me, too! If you ask me, John and I are the epitome of the saying “third time’s a charm.” Our story is unique, funny, and a little bit chaotic, but I wouldn’t have it any other way! John and I cannot wait to celebrate our crazy love story surrounded by all of our friends and family - see you all December 7th, 2024!