I am not one to mourn someone's death as much as celebrate their lives. I tend to forget the date they died but never forget their birthday. That is when I have a special celebration of memories. I do this on my Mom and Dad's birthday and the birth dates of other family members and friends that have died.

Today I celebrate David Hallal. We definitely had a unique relationship. I heard about David before I met him. He was a travel agency franchise owner in Cleveland, Ohio and was engaged to the franchise's trainer, Kristi. I was working in the marketing & preferred supplier deparments at the franchise headquarters. The company had a rule that said the trainer couldn't be married to a franchisee. No nepotism. This was ridiculous as the CEO's wife was a Senior Vice President in the company. In any case that was the "rule". Consequently, Kristi decided to quit her job and move to Cleveland and help David run his agency. That was the plan BUT after having no success replacing Kristi the announcement was made that her fiance' was going to be the new trainer and they would live here in Florida.

My first thought at hearing this was, how is he qualified? Did he get the necessary skills by osmosis from sleeping with Kristi? It seemed strange. Turned out that David had been a teacher before purchasing his franchise and was on the franchise advisory board and was a qualified choice. Kristi was happy because she could stay in Florida.

I had been teaching some of the Travel Agent classes so when David came onboard we met and I was given additional workshops to teach. It was a busy time being split with 3 areas of responsibility working as a trainer, marketing and with our preferred suppliers. As the next 10 years went by my job and responsibilities constantly evolved but I was always involved as a trainer and prepared curriculium for workshops and training programs.

David and I tagged teamed many classes. Although he was my boss, in the classroom we were an amazing team. Our reviews always referred to Batman and Robin or the dynamic duo. If one of us was down the other could pull them up. Sometimes you are blessed to find a professional partner to work with and everything clicks. We enjoyed that unique chemistry in the classroom.

Our friendship grew as a result of the trust we had in each other professionally. Personally our characters were very different. To this day I am amazed at some of the things he did.

We were there for each other during good times and bad. David Hallal became best friends with David Logan and the 3 of us enjoyed movies and fun together. I loved going to watch the 2 Davids play racquetball together. Sunday mornings the 3 of us shared brunch after they enjoyed yet another game of what I called pinball racquetball. Those guys hustled around the court!

After the franchise was sold David moved back to Cleveland and started his GNC Franchises and was once again very successful. Although David and Kristi never married (she went on to a fantastic job for ASTA in DC)David was always the lady's man. I can't explain it. I never could, but ladies were drawn to him like flies to sugar. Thankfully, I never had that type of relationship with David. I saw how he was with his ladies and was glad we never had that type of chemistry.

We were friends the kind of special friendship that doesn't expire because of geography or even death. We were always there for each other. We were each other's cheerleader. Happy birthday David. I am glad you were born and that our life journeys crossed.