I was depressed after my return from Germany and almost wished I hadn't gone. I spent $2800 for a new bicycle to replace my old $2500 one because the Postal Service lost it. Weeks later, I had put together a new bicycle, and on that same day, my old one showed up at my door with stamps from all over the world. The U.S. Postal Service had lost it for over three months and then gave it back to me and refused to refund any postage or give any compensation for parts I couldn't return. So rather than try to return new parts I sold my old red/white/blue Trek 5500 and kept my new grey Trek 5900. This was a climbing machine with a super-wide gear range (I put a triple crankset on it) and a weight of 15.9 pounds.
Work was getting worse. It was hard enough to supervise four people for up to 75 hours a week but I had to do the work too. One day I had to monitor 25 chatrooms simultaneously for eight hours with no breaks, while, at the same time typing reports, answering stupid questions from 'distinguished' visitors and answering questions from my boss. My system crashed twice and I had to change workstations...messages were backed up, they put me at another workstation with a huge monitor that was so large the letters were pixelized and I could barely read them. As I tried to catch up, my boss asked me two questions I couldn't answer, freaked out and had me removed from my position and then I was counselled for not doing my job. Screw them!
The date with Seko?
It went fantastic. We met at a coffee shop, then drove around and got lost looking for a Sushi place to eat. Seko was a violinist for the Virginia Symphony, a few days shy of 35, lived in Virginia Beach with her two dogs, Kai (Yorkshire Terrier) and Ringo (Lab mix). She was beautiful, intelligent, and so comfortable to talk to. I made her laugh so much she had to put a napkin over her mouth to avoid spewing on the table. It went very, very well. She'd been worth the wait. The one good thing that came from my return to the U.S. And then she disappeared...again.
She re-appeared online two weeks later. It was her birthday so I asked her if I could take her out to eat. She said yes, we had our first kiss and then it was as if we were shot out of a cannon. We were together. She was crazy about me and I was nuts over her. It was as if God had given me that special someone I'd been looking for all those years. Work sucked, I was tired, but when I thought of Seko I saw sunshine and heard beautiful music. I was falling in love.
