I think we all have that place that we remember going to so often when we were kids.
I have a few.
I used to go to this McDonalds PlayPlace at least once a week.
I’d make new friends each time.
I’d wonder if the girl I was supposed to marry was ever going to walk into that same PlayPlace and our parents would get along.
And we’d be each other soulmates.
The universe would’ve set us up right then and there.
We would’ve made Cory and Topanga jealous.
We would’ve had a better story than Romeo and Juliet.
We definitely would’ve been a lot better off than that one couple in, “The Notebook”.
I would play the Nintendo 64 just waiting for her to grab the second remote.
If anybody joined me and played 2nd player I would finish whenever the turn was up and run back into the playpen just to see if maybe dream girl had already run right past me.
Maybe she was always looking for me too?
Maybe she was just down the street at the Burger King and I would’ve never known.
I swear to you that if I ever went anywhere else for dinner I would start thinking about my girl getting to the McDonalds that one specific day.
Even when I got older, I took my first girlfriend on a date to that McDonalds.
Sure, it had to do a little bit with money too, but it mostly had to feel right.
There was no way that I would be looking for this girl so often at this same location and this girl not be the one at that McDonalds.
I had it pictured.
We’d visit that McDonalds with our future kids and tell them about how we met.
I’d then tell my girl and my kids about how it was all a part of my plan.
I’d meet her, we’d make the connection, we’d meet there every other week just to catch up. I’d walk to her house and ask to take her out for a McFlurry.
I’d have money from mowing the lawn that same morning and I’d clean my shoes even from the bottom so she knew I was balling.
I’d pay for the ice cream with spare change and she’d make me feel like the man when I also bought a large order of french fries.
Maybe in an alternate universe that went down.
Maybe.
My parents met at a McDonalds.
They met working there.
It might not seem romantic to the average person.
But dammit.
That was the dream.