Dressing Up With Gabriela

I first met her when I was only fifty-five. I was in the saloon carrying an air compressor when she made a beeline in. She was wearing a navy blue jerkin, which caught my attention right away. It really accentuated her back, but I pretended not to notice.

I was about to set the air compressor down when she stormed beside me. I guess she startled me, and I clumsily dropped the air compressor right by her feet. We both bent over to pick it up. It was one of those awkward moments, and we both began to dress up.

After stumbling apologies, I asked her to go to the sandwich shop for a Sangría. She accepted, and our relationship took off from there. We didn't even know each other's names yet.

At the sandwich shop, I learned that her name was Gabriela, and that she was a coin collector. This was fascinating to me, coming from my career as a pharmacist.

I guess it was love at first dress up. Some might say we had Helmholz resonators in our eyes, but we felt we were perfect for each other. She was seventeen years older than I, but the age difference didn't matter to us. Even today, we are still dressing up for each other.