February 11th. That’s when my wife and I went on our first date. It began with a misunderstanding.
In Maria’s defence, I have a speaking style that is sometimes — um, most times — halting. So the misunderstanding rests squarely on my shoulders.
I thought I’d asked her to go see the movie After Hours, and Maria thought I meant doing something together “after hours,” as in after work.
What followed after we realized we got our lines crossed and decided to ditch the movie is I fell head over heels in love, with a prefix. Three letters — mis — a split second of serendipity that has since been tick-tocking every day of our lives.
How grateful that my invitation went mis-understood, mis-interpreted, mis-construed, mis-heard, and that we chose to go to a Mexican restaurant instead, trading in a scripted dialogue for unscripted conversation that removed any doubt we had a spark worth pursuing.
We’ve been eating Mexican on February 11th ever since — for the last 37 years.