May 13, 1977.
I was a singer in the “guitar Mass choir” at my parish (I was also in the “Adult choir”, but that’s irrelevant to the story). We were also a social group, and Friday evenings were when we would get together to hang out.
This particular Friday the Thirteenth, we were meeting up in the church parking lot, when Shiela mentioned that Eve was going to be bringing a new girl to join us. Apparently her family had moved to the parish a few months before, and her mom had asked the priest who was kind of the de-facto official advisor of the group if there were any youth-oriented social activities he could suggest for her. The priest arranged for Eve to bring the girl (actually a 22-year old woman, but there were very few members who were teenagers – I myself was three days out from my twenty-first birthday).
Eve pulled up in her car, and opened the door for the prettiest girl I had ever seen. She happened to be totally blind, and, for a change, I was confident and charming, instead of being shy and somewhat dorky. She was accepted immediately by the group as a whole, but I latched onto her, and stayed with her throughout the evening. She let me drive her home, gave me her number, let me meet her mother and sister, and accepted my invitation to attend the spring concert I would be singing in the next Sunday at the university I was attending. She also agreed to let me drive her to the audition to the Parks and Rec production of Fiddler on the Roof that she needed to be at on Monday (she landed the role of Hodel).
By the end of Monday evening, she was (at least in my head) officially my girlfriend, and by the following Friday evening she was (also in my head) officially the girl I was going to marry. There were steps both forward and back in that particular pursuit, but five and a half years later she finally accepted my proposal (New Year’s Eve, 1982), and six and a half years after we met, we tied the knot.
Happy Fortieth Anniversary, kaylasmom! Friday the Thirteenth has always been my lucky day!