It was the day after my twenty-second birthday when I strolled into a local bar with a couple of my best friends to celebrate. We ordered a round of drinks and toasted to the three greatest things that had happened that week: To my birthday! (A celebration of me!); to my break-up! (A celebration of my newly found freedom from a horrible relationship); and to Karaoke! (What would become a symbol of my new courage, new self, and new life).

I had never in my wildest dreams imagined that one day I would be standing up on a stage in front of a hundreds of people in a crowded bar singing Bon Jovi at the top of my lungs, but by some sick twist of fate, there I was. All five feet of me, topped off with a stolen cowboy hat, in the center of a group of guys who I'd just met moments earlier, singing Livin' on a Prayer.

My friends' mouths hung agape at my uncharacteristically uninhibited performance. But, however embarrassing the memory might have been the next morning; those four minutes of fame led me to one of the greatest finds of my life: Raul.

Later that night, he would walk me half a mile to my car to be sure that I made it there safely. He didn't even wait the customary three-day period to call me after I'd given him my phone number. And when I didn't answer the phone, and ran into him later that very night, he didn't think twice before confessing that he "Really, really" wanted to take me out.

There he was in a t-shirt, cargo shorts, and flip flops and I immediately assumed: "Student." He may not have donned the telling frat-boy polo shirt and cheesy, politician-in-the-making grin, but even though he was undoubtedly more reserved than the rest of the guys in his group, his distinctive laid-back attitude virtually screamed COLLEGE!

It wasn't more than a week later that Raul confessed that he had something to tell me. Fantastic! I thought. After only a couple of dates, I was preparing myself for the worst-case scenarios: Did he have an STD? Was he an ex-convict ready to cut me up into tiny pieces in his apartment? Or worse, was he just not that into me?

You can imagine my relief when he uttered, "I have a daughter." STDs, for obvious reasons, I ca not deal with. Being dead would be slightly easier to handle; however, it would also mean meeting my ultimate (and untimely) demise. And, after surviving the break-up of a relationship just weeks prior, including hauling all of my personal belongings out of the horrid ex's apartment

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