Ask Mr. Smartypants

I met my wife 10 years ago today. In 1999 I was working at the weekly newspaper in Kingstree, knocking down close to $350 a week and living the good life, when I got promoted to the company’s daily paper in Aiken. My boss in Kingstree, Vickie, predicted I would date and marry the Aiken paper’s advertising director, Angela Nalley.
It was sort of a romantic promotion to go along with the career one, the idea that I could woo and win a successful, mature, professional woman. Vickie had, that Christmas, gifted me with an ant farm so I would, “have something to focus on at work while I stared off into space.” Kingstree was the kind of place where she heard how much I had drunk at the bar the previous night before I even oozed into the office each morning. Point is, she knew me well enough that had she predicted I would chase after but be rejected by a cross-eyed and thrice divorced Waffle House waitress named Mercedes LeSabre, it would have been more in line with how she viewed me.
Off I went to Aiken, having found a spacious home in the ghetto of that generally lovely city for $250 a month. On August 9, 1999, I reported to work as the cops reporter, and at the first opportunity, snuck up to the front lobby to look at the pictures of the executives and evaluate my bride-to-be.
“Hubba hubba,” I thought. The picture was of a lovely blonde, and I immediately began prowling the building for her.
I couldn’t ask anyone where Angela’s office lay because journalists never acknowledge the existence of advertising or the need for advertising revenue. We believe our paychecks come directly from God.
Still, Aiken is not a huge paper and I should have been able to conclude my stalking of Angela swiftly. No such luck.
Not by lunch or by quitting time, or on Tuesday or Wednesday or anytime in my first week did I find the gal in the photo.
Through the weekend, I puzzled over Angela’s absence, a bit heartsick, but Monday morning I walked in the door and there she was, just back from vacation.
Angela was getting a Diet Coke out of the vending machine, wearing a sort of peach-colored dress with matching jacket (I’ve since learned the color was coral).
I introduced myself and we went outside and smoked together, because back then we were cigarette-enslaved wretches.
I started trying to ask Angela out almost immediately, but in a cowardly manner. Afraid of rejection, I would say weasely things like, “So, what are you getting up to after work?” or, “I would love to go out for a drink tonight, but I just don’t know the town very well.” These pathetic offerings received the lukewarm response they deserved.
I finally found the nerve to say, “Would you like to go out with me for a drink this evening,” on Sept. 2, and she answered, “Great, I’ll ask John Lowery to come too.”
So we had a chaperone on our first date, ditching him once we realized things were going well.
I have the visible emotional range of a statue, but I am the romantic in our marriage. I remember all the dates and remind Angela of them each year, and smiling, she says, “That’s today?”
Yes, baby, that’s today, and just so you know, I was heartbroken when you finally got rid of the coral dress and jacket, but not because I’m a romantic. You just looked smokin’ in it.