An Affair of the Heart

Chapter 1: The Beginning

If you search for it and want to find it, if your heart is open to receive it, if you believe it when it is in front of you, there is magic everywhere. It hides in the most simple, ordinary, everyday experiences of life. Like a precious treasure, it waits to be discovered!

It all began in a seemingly ordinary way in a typically ordinary setting. Lunch with a business colleague, which happens hundreds of times a day in cities and restaurants across the country and around the world. Although in Washington, DC, the capitol of the United States, lunch would never be ordinary. One of the most cosmopolitan and sophisticated cities in the world, it possesses an aura unmatched by any other city. 

On that day, I had a feeling my lunch companion and wherever we would be having lunch, would also be something special. This expectation proved to be true. The day was full of unexpected, exciting, and delightful surprises. An exciting journey of self-discovery began that day, and it changed how I see myself and my place in the world around me.

The plan was to meet at 1:00 pm at the street level exit of the Farragut East Metro Stop in downtown Washington, DC. I arrived at the location ten minutes early. As any woman does when she will be meeting an attractive man, I wanted a few minutes to check my hair, powder my nose, refresh my lipstick, make sure nothing from breakfast was stuck in my teeth. Make sure I had calmed down from the rush of morning meetings and was looking my best for this second, "first impression". Having met this man only once before, feeling confident in my appearance and arriving on time was high on my priority list.

My job at the time required travel to Washington, DC on a regular basis throughout the year. From one appointment to the next, I usually walked or took a cab to get around the city. However, on this particular February morning, my business appointments were several miles outside of downtown DC proper, in Arlington and Alexandria, VA. To save dollars in my expense account, I decided to use the Metro rail system instead of a cab. Big oops!

Being unfamiliar with the Red, Blue, Orange, or any of the Metro lines, I had missed the station stop for my first appointment of the day. This triggered a disastrous domino effect, causing me to be unprofessionally late for every meeting on my morning schedule. It was awkward and embarrassing. It is one thing to explain being late once, but quite another to explain arriving late for every appointment after that. To compensate, I allowed plenty of time to get back into the city, determined not to be late for my lunch date.

I was excited at the prospect of seeing Alex again. We had met when he and several Air Force colleagues had come to Ohio on a fact-finding mission. They were tasked with planning a conference of Latin American Air Chiefs, to coincide with the 100th Anniversary of Inventing Flight. To celebrate the achievements of native Daytonians, Orville and Wilbur Wright, who discovered flight and changed our world forever.

As the manager assigned to the government market, it was my responsibility to organize the appropriate meetings to facilitate the purpose of their trip. This would involve escorting them throughout the day, hosting breakfast and lunch, and introducing them to local organizations they needed to meet with to discuss the requirements of their conference. It would be a full day of continuous activity with meetings, discussions, site tours, and social chit-chat.

My contact with Alex began with his phone call into my office three months earlier. He was asking for assistance to find lodging, meeting sites, and venues for several social events. Several times a week after that first contact, we exchanged phone calls and e-mails, coordinating details and finalizing the itinerary for their one-day trip into my city. Pleasant and easy to work with, Alex impressed me with his manner of speaking, his vocabulary, his command of language, and his obvious intelligence. 

 Rich with melodic tones, Alex's voice carried the underlying nuance of a slight accent I could not quite identify. I thought he must be bi-lingual and English was probably not the only language of his childhood.