Austin. May, 2017. A man agrees to a date. He meets an unexpected stranger. Confusion ensues. That meeting ends with a question: How could I be so petty? The answer: An epiphany of grand proportions. 

As a break from my normal witty banter and storied dating career, I have a quaint and beautiful story about the most valuable lesson I've learned about romance.  

This is a short story, so not as long as you are normally used to, but I believe a lesson I learned that I can impart to you about the value of how you perceive others and how others perceive you. 

I had decided to go out with a lovely woman I met. Where did I meet her? You guessed it, online. And so, we decide to go to an arcade together. 

I arrive at said arcade only to find out that it was closed to do some event, such as a birthday party or a company event. 

At this point, I had learned the value of not giving out my phone number to people, until I knew them well. So instead, we communicated via OkCupid. 

However, she was driving and so if I messaged her via OkCupid she likely wouldn't get it until she arrived at the arcade anyway, so I just waited for her outside. 

A greeter is standing at the door next to me and we exchange pleasantries, introducing each other briefly, before I got back on my phone and tapped away, sending messages to friends and doing other things, while I waited. 

Up walks someone out of the corner of my eye. 

Before we get too far, there is something you should know about online dating profiles. Pictures are key. Having a good picture makes it possible for people to know 100% what you look like. 

I have since come up with a personal policy that I will not go out with anyone that does not have at least one full body picture so that I can get a full view of them and understand what they look like. Though this may sound overtly judgemental, the attraction is just that. I have no problem being friends with a person, but I don't want to waste my time or their's only to find out that I am not because I did not have full view of what that person looked like. 

Prior to this personal policy I had decided to meet up with her. Sadly her's were not fantastic at completely showcasing what her entire body looked like. This was neither a good nor a bad thing in this case, just a point of confusion for me, because I simply didn't know who I was looking for other than a few vague pictures. 

So, when someone walked up toward me out of the corner of my eye that looked similar to the pictures in question I went to greet them. We exchanged a few words and both quickly realized we were there to meet someone we had met online, though we were actually not there to meet each other. We excused each other and walked elsewhere to wait for our prospective dates. 

And now, we get to the crux of the matter. Before we continue forward, I want to be 100% transparent about my own internal thought processes at the time, no matter how ugly and embarrassing they truly were. Because the lesson I learned was so shockingly important and world-altering for me that the contrast of my own impression and what I found next would change my life.

She had clearly put a lot of effort into her appearance, but she was not the societal version of what a beautiful woman should look like, indeed if I were to be perfectly blunt, she repulsed me. 

So ugly was my thought pattern at the time that I thought the words "How could anyone find her attractive?" It is a horrible thought to have directed at someone who has put so much effort into their appearance. 

This is not a commentary on how she actually looked though. This is a commentary on how ugly and superficial my thought patterns were. What I did not expect was what came next. This whiplash I received was the kick in the ass that I needed to get out of such a toxic mindset. 

I turned around and walked back to lean against the wall and wait once more and the greeter stops me. His jaw is slack and he is absolutely starry-eyed. I to this day have never seen anyone with a first impression like his. It astounded me and stopped me dead in my tracks. "She is so beautiful," he said in a hushed whisper, clearly gobsmacked by the very site of this woman who not more than fifteen seconds before I had disparaged in the most horrible way within my own mind. 

"How could anyone find her attractive?"  my mind had said. And here I was faced with that answer in heavenly spades. 

Within a single sentence, he taught me a lesson so valuable it will stay with me for the rest of my life. Period. Full stop. And I, like him was also dumbstruck by her, but not in the same way. It was as if the world had gained new color and vibrancy that it had been missing. 

It does not matter who you are. It does not matter what you look like. It does not matter what walk of life you come from. It does not matter how you perceive yourself. No one else's opinions matter. In a single moment, in a breath, in a heartbeat, magic can happen. 

You have the ability to stop someone dead in their tracks and they will look at you like you are the most beautiful, handsome, awe-inspiringly person they have ever seen in their entire life. 

I was the beast of this story and it took a glimmer of truest and astounding beauty to change my life forever. What would have happened here if I had not had this experience? Would my morals evolve? Would I have been stuck in the same toxic mindset? Would I have decided to write this book? Who knows. Though this story was shorter when compared to many of the larger and more flamboyant events, sometimes history hinges upon the outcome of small meaningful events like this.  

- End of Episode -

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