How I Met Your Father

Every day, in living rooms and cars around the world, children ask, "Mommy, how did you meet Daddy?" Of course, this is after the idea that Mom and Dad have not always been Mom and Dad has sunk in. Which usually takes a few years and several conversations and a great deal of confusion. I mean, after all, our entire existence is tied to theirs, right?

Riiiiiiiight. 

Anywho....

Well, I'm recording this for posterity, and for my children. And for all those people who have asked to hear our {crazy, weird, ironic} story.




When I was a single mom, I hung out at church with the "Mid-Singles" instead of the "Young Singles." Even though I was only 30, I felt more at home with the middies because when you're a single mom and small business owner, you don't necessarily have a lot in common with fresh-faced recent college grads who still have their first "real" job.

So that fateful afternoon, I was at a Mid-Singles social with my four-year-old son Sandy. You know: cookout, volleyball, the usual schtick. A bunch of parents and kids of varying ages and some never-marrieds. I have two distinct memories from that day:

1. There was a tacky guy there who brought a date.

Seriously? A date? To a singles function? How tacky! If you already have a boyfriend/girlfriend, please don't bring them to a singles function. We singletons are not interested in your already-coupled-up bliss, thank you very much. Go to some restaurant with low lighting and a wine list and leave the rest of us alone. It also relieves the desire to make fun of you behind your back. And hate you just a little.

2. There was a really obnoxious kid. 

I'll say it at the outset: I suck at volleyball. And baseball. And tennis. And just about all sports. But (occasionally) it doesn't stop me from playing. For whatever reason, this day, I played. And I sucked.

Status quo: Intact.

I took a break from playing to go get a drink. While pouring my diet Coke, a kid sidled up to me. Maybe 3 - 4 years out of diapers. But old enough to know better.

Him: "You aren't very good at volleyball, are you?"
Me: "No, not really."
Him: "Well .... maybe you shouldn't play."

Me: (silently) "Who is this obnoxious child, and what crappy parent does he belong to?"

Fast forward a couple of months to August.

A girlfriend of mine holds her birthday dinner at Joe's Crab Shack. I have Braves tix for Sandy and me that afternoon. She assures me that it's OK to bring Sandy to the dinner, so that's cool. I planned to go home and shower and change after the game because to me Braves game = tanning opportunity. I was wearing no makeup and a tank top and shorts. But the game ran long and leaving Turner Field quickly is ... well ... impossible. So I ended up going directly to dinner, sweat and all.

As I stand outside the restaurant talking to a (different) girlfriend, Sandy suddenly bolts into the parking lot towards another kid and his dad.

Sandy: "Ian!"
Ian: "Sandy!"

Herb and Ian (left side), Sandy and me (center)

What the heck? I turn to my friend and ask her who the dad is. Our kids apparently know each other, so ... um ... if I'm supposed to know the dad, I'd really like to find out before I embarrass myself.

Name doesn't ring a bell, so I'm pretty sure we don't know each other. But it's obvious the kids do. All through that dinner, I'm talking to my friends trying to figure out who the good-looking dad is and where Sandy and Ian may have met. Little do I know, Ian's-dad is at the other end of the table asking his friends about me.

And the rest is history. I married the tacky guy, and the obnoxious kid is my son.

Next to the word "Irony" in the dictionary, there is this picture:

Ian, Jordan, Herb, Joshua, me, Sandy - 12 years later