Statues Of Love

THE STORY OF THE BEAUTIFUL WEXFORD LOST LOVE- AT THE BEGINNING 

In the Summer of 1994  I joined  by letter post a dating site run by a lady hoping to meet a lady to fall in love with forever.Always a romantic dreamer.In those days the process was offline and manual. The requirement was to complete a manual questionnaire and send it to the lady who in turn would attempt to match me with a prospective date. She sent to myself a list of four potential dates.There were no mobile phones available at this time so each person would provide their home address and landline phone number. No photographs were provided either.

On my list of four dates provided were the names of three ladies with Dublin addresses and one lady with a County Wexford address.I possessed only a very limited knowledge of County Wexford and it's beauty at this point. However I knew of the Riverbank Hotel at the edge of Wexford Bridge from visiting a nearby business on a few occasions as part of my job at the time.I have pleasant memories of eating a very nice lunch on my lunch breaks including beautiful seafood chowder and looking out over the lovely River Slaney.

In those days before the advent of any motorway it was approximately a two hour journey for myself. I remember thinking it would be an adventure for myself even if the Wexford lady was to only want to meet me on the date for a brief time . I liked her name too. I remember reading correspondence from the Wexford lady that she was very loyal so that gave me some hope that she was nice. So I was happy to meet her first. If things  went well I would be happy to only meet her and forget about the other possible dates.I would be loyal for her also.

We arranged to meet at the car park of the Riverbank Hotel at 3 O'Clock on a Sunday. She wasn't able to meet before this time for a reason unknown to myself. I travelled down and made sure I was early. She duly crossed Wexford Bridge in her small red car and arrived at the agreed time. When we met we would have shaken hands as I was used to doing this as part of my job. When I saw her for the first time I was so impressed. She had beautiful fair hair when I met her and such beautiful blue eyes.She also had such a beautiful smile.She wore if I remember correctly a lovely green/brown flowing long summer dress.I was so glad at this point I had made the journey.Given her striking beauty I was surprised why she would want to meet myself coming from Dublin when I was sure she would easily have lots of potential suitors in County Wexford.We then entered the Riverbank Hotel for a chat and light refreshments.I thought it would be maybe for an hour of so but we were still together chatting as of circa 5pm. I ordered and bought dinner for both of us. At circa 7pm we were still in conversation which was nice but surprising to myself. She didn't seem to be in any rush to leave .Unfortunately I had to travel back to Dublin to attend work the next day. In the car park I  asked her if I could meet her again and she said Yes. I was thrilled and happy .We said goodbye until the next time.

As part of our conversations I remember her telling me that she had suffered bad experiences but she didn't expand on this.She told me she would tell me some day. I guess I wanted to be her knight in shining armour. It wouldn't have made any difference to myself what she would have told me. My mind was made up and she had flew fast into my heart.

She was slightly older than myself.She liked dancing such as jiving , country music and the songs of Patsy Cline. Sadly I was never to get the chance to dance with her. Whenever I hear any Patsy Cline song I am reminded of her like so many other things such as numerous road signs for Wexford/Rosslare and Wexford buses that pass nearby where I live now.

I was so happy that she wanted to meet with me again. The journey home to Dublin was such a happy journey for me. In the following days I felt so happy and wasn't remotely interested in meeting any other prospective dates. Having met her I  knew she was the lady I wanted to spend my life with forever.I knew she was very special.

In 1994 Ireland was competing successfully in the World Cup.The country was euphoric when this was happening. I was happy for Ireland but felt euphoric for a different reason.