Heartbreaking Missed Connection Will Give You The Feels

Author image for Ada Elder
Ada Elder
Feb 26, 2020 11:00 AM EST

Five years ago a Boston missed connection went viral. Not because it was funny. Not because of anyone famous. But because it was a beautifully written and gut-wrenching story of immense sadness, redemption, and magic. A Boston man penned the Craigslist advertisement in 2015, titling its lengthy contents "I met you in the rain on the last day of 1972." The flair for the poetic doesn't end there.

What follows is a redemption arc that we thought only occurred in movies and romance novels. A chance meeting that left a suicidal veteran with hope for the first time in a long time. It's a touching read, and we highly recommend you start it prepared: armed with tissues, waterproof mascara, and a whole lot of love for all the people around you. 

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  • 01
    Text - reply Posted: 8 days ago I met you in prohibited ? the rain on the last day of 1972 - m4w (Old State House) Massachusett : Massachusetts I met you in the rain on the last day of 1972, the same day I resolved to kill myself. One week prior, at the behest of Richard Nixon and Henry Kissinger, I'd flown four B-52 sorties over Hanoi. I dropped forty-eight bombs. How many homes I destroyed, how many lives I ended, I'll never know. But in the eyes of my superiors, I had served my country honora
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  • 02
    Text - returning, that I would retrieve the Smith & Wesson Model 15 from the closet and give myself the discharge I deserved. I walked for hours. I looped around the Fenway before snaking back past Symphony Hall and up to Trinity Church. Then I roamed through the Common, scaled the hill with its golden dome, and meandered into that charming labyrinth divided by Hanover Street. By the time I reached the waterfront, a charcoal sky had opened and a drizzle became a shower. That shower soon gave way
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  • 03
    Text - And then I saw you. You'd taken shelter under the balcony of the Old State House. You were wearing a teal ball gown, which appeared to me both regal and ridiculous. Your brown hair was matted to the right side of your face, and a galaxy of freckles dusted your shoulders. I'd never seen anything so beautiful. When I joined you under the balcony, you looked at me with your big green eyes, and I could tell that you'd
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  • 04
    Text - been crying. I asked if you were okay. You said you'd been better. I asked if you'd like to have a cup of coffee. You said only if I would join you. Before I could smile, you snatched my hand and led me on a dash through Downtown Crossing and into Neisner's. We sat at the counter of that five and dime and talked like old friends. We laughed as easily as we lamented, and you confessed over pecan pie that you were engaged to a man you didn't love, a banker from some line of Boston nobility.
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  • 05
    Text - For my part, I shared more of myself than I could have imagined possible at that time. I didn't mention Vietnam, but I got the sense that you could see there was a war waging inside me. Still, your eyes offered no pity, and I loved you for it. After an hour or so, I excused myself to use the restroom. I remember consulting my reflection in the mirror. Wondering if I should kiss you, if I should tell you what I'd done from the cockpit of that bomber a week before, if I should return to the
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  • 06
    Text - On the way back to the counter, my heart thumped in my chest like an angry judge's gavel, and a future future -- flickered in my mind. But when I reached the our stools, you were gone. No phone number. No note. Nothing. As strangely as our union had begun, so too had it ended. I was devastated. I went back to Neisner's every day for a year, but I never saw you again. Ironically, the torture of your abandonment seemed to swallow my self-loathing, and the prospect of suicide was suddenly le
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  • 07
    Text - I'm an old man now, and only recently did I recount this story to someone for the first time, a friend from the VFW. He suggested I look for you on Facebook. I told him I didn't know anything about Facebook, and all I knew about you was your first name and that you had lived in Boston once. And even if by some miracle I happened upon your profile, I'm not sure I would recognize you. Time is cruel that way. This same friend has a particularly sentimental daughter. She's the one who led me
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  • 08
    Text - me, after a million what-ifs and a lifetime of lost sleep, that our connection wasn't missed at all. You see, in these intervening forty-two years I've lived a good life. I've loved a good woman. I've raised a good man. I've seen the world. And I've forgiven myself. And you were the source of all of it. You breathed your spirit into my lungs one rainy afternoon, and you can't possibly imagine my gratitude.
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  • 09
    Text - I have hard days, too. My wife passed four years ago. My son, the year after. I cry a lot. Sometimes from the loneliness, sometimes I don't know why. Sometimes I can still smell the smoke over Hanoi. And then, a few dozen times a year, I'll receive a gift. The sky will glower, and the clouds will hide the sun, and the rain will begin to fall. And I'll remember. So wherever you've been, wherever you are, and wherever you're going, know this: you're with me still.
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missed connections wholesome craigslist heartwarming romantic sappy emo
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