Be Still my Beating... Really?

Today's annoyingly saccharine prompt wants me to tell 5 ways to "win my heart." Bleah. How cheesy can you get? Really. Besides, does anyone really know until it happens? Of course not. So my version of this will be a brief discussion of how I got together with Brett. For more details, see the tab at the top of this blog "The Saga of Red and the Transformed Nonconformist". It needs to be updated, but the early stuff is there.

For me to have interest in any man, he must first and foremost be smart. I have a high intelligence and do not suffer fools easily. Besides, I have seen guys who were interested in me lose interest as soon as I show myself to be a nerd. So, 1. SMART.

My feelings for Brett really spiked the night that things came crashing down around me as I prepared to move from my home in Delaware. We still had never met face to face, but were emailing regularly. When I came home in crisis and sent him an email about it, he answered, "I'm here if you need to talk," and we emailed (I wasn't foolish enough to give my phone number to a stranger!) all night. 2. BE THERE FOR ME.

I was not one to let religion stop me from dating someone, but the fact that we both had a similar understanding of the Bible - and that he had a theological education - made discussions about religion easy to have, and interesting. Although I wouldn't say that categorically, sharing a common religion is a key to "win my heart," a valuable part of our current relationship is 3. SHARED FAITH.

Some people (my BFF, for one) cannot abide liars. I would hope we all hold ourselves in high enough esteem to steer clear of those who habitually deceive us. If I'm honest, though, Brett "won my heart" through deception. Not malicious lies, but let's just say he's very quick with google. I had posted an Audrey Hepburn quote from a favorite movie, and he responded with a suitable quote from the same movie, making me think he was familiar with it. I was impressed. Months later, after we'd met and were happily dating, he informed me he had never seen that movie, but did a quick search for my quote, and found a good response! This was just one time he showed that he could 4. FAKE IT.

I should perhaps have mentioned this first. Although it isn't the most important, the immediate, first thing I notice about a person is their attitude. Granted, it's a perception that may be wrong - you may not be angry, but merely frustrated in the moment. Still, if I spend an afternoon with you, I can get a pretty good idea of your general attitude towards life. NOTE: I am not talking about a mood. Do you feel the world owes you something? Is everything someone else's fault? Are you rude to the wait staff? I cannot stress enough how vital to winning my heart was Brett's 5. POSITIVE ATTITUDE.

There you have it. I hope by not addressing this topic as a bullet list, and by sort of flipping the script to put the item at the end of the description worked for you, because it was an entertaining exercise for me!