Tonight I took Allison to the Mission Inn Festival of Lights. The evening didn’t start out that way, though. She was scheduled to work a normal 12-hour shift at the hospital.
Around 4:45 PM, my phone rang. It was Allison. I was surprised to see her number on my caller ID. I picked it up and she told me she was being sent home. She had discharged all her patients and the unit census was light.
We quickly scrambled to try and figure out how we could meet up to spend some time together. She wanted to go home first and shower and then we would meet somewhere in between. We settled on the Tyler Galleria in Riverside, CA — a location that was well known to us as we had frequently met there while we were in the early days of our dating.
Due to traffic, she arrived there about half an hour before me. But she used the opportunity to peruse the mall. We ended up having dinner at The Cheesecake Factory before moving on for the rest of our night. I figured that I had a few hours before I would need to send her back home as she and another shift the next day.
I told her to come with me and off we drove. I took side streets up the back ways and parked a few blocks away from the Mission Inn, a large expensive hotel in downtown Riverside that annually hosts a “Festival of Lights.” She had never been and I was excited to show her what it was all about.
The place was packed. It was hard to walk around anywhere. There were a multitude of shops and sellers along the way. We saw a Gingerbread House that was selling gingerbread and hot chocolate, to name a few things. We also walked through the Inn and took in all the lights.
At the end of our walk, as we were heading back to the car, Allison said to me, “You still have your date juice.” As if she was surprised that I could still plan a date.
I scoffed. Of course I still have my “date juice.” I’m just that good.
