A MATCH MADE IN HEAVEN (#1): Many thanks to all my friends for their loving comments about our 18th Anniversary. I should have said thank you sooner, but I have been working 8 hours a day on a documentary and just finished a revised Director’s Cut yesterday. I hope to be able to share it with you soon. In doing my research, I came to love the man’s stories as much as his songs.
In that spirit, I would like to share the first month of our relationship. Here is the first story: I had a previous ad on match.com and met some wonderful people. I was working the night shift as a reservation agent for Continental Airlines so I would have health insurance, golf money, and free travel. My life style of working nights and traveling whenever I could just didn’t match the people I was dating.
So I decided to be honest and wrote a different kind of ad, listing the 10 most important things I was looking for in a mate. We don’t remember them all, but here are some. “You could be my match if: 1. You like to travel; 2. You have been some place in the world where you saw a sunrise or a sunset that made you realize that God was in Heaven and all was right with the world; 3. You like to swim in the Gulf of Mexico; 4. You appreciate art; 5. You are kind to animals; 6. You are in good shape and can take a long hike. 7. You like all kinds of music. (I forgot the next two.) 10. You don’t have Lee Press On Nails.
While I was in Africa on a one man safari in South Africa, Cathy was working at her co-op art gallery in Sanibel. Things were slow, so she was on the computer. She saw a pop-up ad for match.com and thought, “What the heck?” She liked my eyes, and decided to respond.
When I got home this was waiting for me. “Hi, I’m Cathy. I’m an artist. I work in Sanibel and I love the beach. My parents were medical missionaries in Nepal for 15 years. I’ve been to the base camp of Mt. Everest, so I’ve seen those sun rises and sunsets. I have a dog, Maddie, who uses her right paw to pop her tennis ball up in the air and catch it in her mouth. Come visit us.” She didn’t include a photo.
My response: “I don’t know how they did it, but I know my friends are playing a trick on me!”
