part i

we met in autumn
exchanging smiles and stories
we never looked back

I’m not one to pay attention, but it was impossible not to when she was around.

We met in the Fall. I was walking, reading whatever blather I had in hand. She was riding her bicycle toward me on the same sidewalk, soaking in the hues of the North Carolina autumn. Fate dictated the physics of our collision as well as the metaphysics of our relationship. This was the first time I met her, and the first of many times that she drew me out of my own world and into one that mattered more — a world shared with her.