My story...Part 3 of 4

My brother hooked me up with a posh apartment in Mission Valley living with some sweet LDS girls and I had so much fun living life. San Diego has an awesome LDS single scene--dances, BBQs, beach bonfires, activities almost every night, so so fun!

My roommates Lindsay (hair stylist) & Karen (beautician-wax guru) before going out to a boatdance...I think we were supposed to dress up as famous people. They were Charlie's Angels, not sure what I was, but I am wearing bell bottoms.

*note* dating German only a month+beautiful city lights at night=lots of kissing

I should add that my sense of style only improved a little. I was not making very much money, so instead of thrift store shopping, I got my clothes on clearance or at Ross. I worked at Papyrus paper store in Fashion Valley Mall, one of the swankiest malls in San Diego. Since I had no car I rollerbladed to work and I'm sure those fancy schmancy shoppers thought I had no class as I skated past. I worked right next door to Mont Blanc (who pays $500 bucks for a pen???) and across the way there was the beautiful Tiffany's. I LOVED going on break, I fell in love with Forever 21 & Charlotte Russe, oh and the food sold around the mall was DELISH! Needless to say, I wasn't doing a good job at saving money, actually I was getting into debt. San Diego is such an expensive town and there were so many fun things to do. And well, not much of it was free.

And now on to the reason why I started writing these posts...

Although life was fun, I was realizing that things were too expensive and I wasn't going to be able to accomplish my goals living this way. I was considering packing up and heading back home to live with mom. On my birthday in March, I went on an overnight Bear Mountain snowtrip where I was shocked to see guys going down the mountain with no shirts and girls snowboarding in bikinis (that just doesn't happen in Utah). That Sunday, March 18, 2001, I went to church as usual with a sunburned face from snowboarding and in the same red shirt I have on in the picture above (red hair, red face, red shirt, what was I thinking?). After the closing prayer of sacrament meeting, the bishop stood up as usual from the pulpit and asked the congregation if there was anyone new or visiting today. I was sitting in the back and up in the front on the left side I saw a tall dark-haired guy stand up and say,

"Heyloww, myy nayme izzz Hairrrrmawwn and I am vizzitin today wit my frrriendzz. I ammm frrrom Arrrhentina. Haappy to beee heere." He said it with such a thick latino accent (think Inigo Montoya from Princess Bride) and I thought, "oh cool, maybe he's from an area where I served my mission. I've got to go talk to him." The meeting ended and I started making my way through the crowd to say hello to this guy. I greeted him with my signature missionary handshake and my best Argentina Spanish. We exchanged some small talk and I found out he was from Mendoza (not in my mission) and I distinctly remember thinking as he was talking & smiling at me, "He's cute, probably 18 or 19 years old. Oh well, nice kid."

For some reason, I thought when he said he was 'vizzzitin' he meant visiting from Argentina and that he'd be going back. During the following week I saw him at a couple of the ward activities and I wondered how much longer he'd be 'visiting', but didn't think much more about him.

Yes, German had braces when I met him, he was 22 in this photo, doesn't he look like a teenager still? And no, this is NOT our engagement picture, just a pic his mom wanted us to do shortly after we got engaged.

Almost every Friday night SDSU institute held dances and they were loads of fun! I love dancing to fast songs, still do, but growing up I NEVER ever got asked to dance during slow songs. So at the San Diego dances, out of habit, I walked out to the foyer to hangout and 'wait' with the other folks who didn't want to dance the slow songs or at least didn't get asked. One time as I was walking toward the door, I walked past German. He was slow dancing with some girl and he waved and smiled at me. I smiled back and thought, "uh, awkard...hey maybe he'll come talk to me or ask me to dance later." He didn't.

That Sunday there was an evening devotional speaker at the institute building. I went and guess who was there. After it was over, people munched and mingled and German came to talk to me. I asked him when he was going back to Argentina. And then in perfect English with no accent he said, "I don't know, why?" He explained to me that the girls he had come to church with dared him to speak with a thick accent, so he did. He actually grew up in the States and now lived with his family in south San Diego. We chatted a little more and I found out he had recently returned from serving his mission in Carlsbad just up north. (ohhh, so he's not 18?) My roommates were REALLY into the TV show Friends. They invited people over to our complex clubhouse every week to watch the episode together and even though I wasn't a big fan of the show, I went to just hang out and meet people. I invited him to come that week (I think it was on Thursdays) if he wanted to. He then asked me for my phone number and said he'd come.

He didn't come and he didn't call.

Meanwhile I was getting more into debt (I bought a piece of junk Mazda B2200 truck and gas prices were atrocious). I decided I could only afford to live in my apartment another month or so and either move somewhere else cheaper or head back to Utah. On Friday, April 13th, 2001 the phone rang in my apartment (good ol' fashioned landline). My roommate was sick and I didn't feel like going out to the institute dance, so I had decided to just stay home with her and watch TV.

"Hello?" I answered. Some guy on the other line asked, "Hi, is Sara home?" "Um, yeah, this is she." I replied.

"Hey Sara! This is German. I met you at church a few weeks ago." Silence...I had no idea who he could be.

"Do you remember me? I'm that guy from Argentina."

"OHHH yes, of course, how are you?" I asked.

"Good good, hey I was wondering...do you know if there is an institute dance tonight?"

My mind raced...Wait, did he just ask me if there WAS a dance? Or does he want to know if I was GOING? Or did he ask IF I wanted to go? Hmmm. "Yes, I think so." I said.

"Oh good because I was thinking of going, but I wanted to make sure there was one tonight and I remembered I still had your number written down and I thought you might know and...Are you going?"

I told him about my roommate being sick and since I'm such a good friend I said, "I haven't decided yet, I didn't want to go by myself."

"OH, do you want me to come pick you up and we can go together?" Phew, he picked up on my cue.

Heck ya I did...

Happy Anniversary sweetheart, so glad you finally called me.

Part 4 will be placed on hold for a couple of days because my house is a disaster zone AND I have a hot date tonight...

This is the first photo we have together. It was taken about 10 days after our first date out on his mom's back patio, which coincidentally is where he proposed. We are drinking mate and eating empanandas. Some things never change.