By Jae-Ha Kim
Chicago Sun-Times
March 12, 2000
The night Mike Ostrowski met Carol Robinson, he was busy flirting with her young blond friend.
The Chicago-based writer and researcher for Playboy magazine also is a stand-up comic on the side. He was in Arizona for a few gigs when he recognized the blond, who had been to the club the night before, playing pool.
“I was such a typical male, looking at the gorgeous young thing first,” says Mike. “When this woman showed up with Carol, I was more attracted to her at first. But Carol was gorgeous, too. And the more I talked to Carol, the more I realized that she was more my type. Besides being beautiful, she was very intelligent, poised and funny. I also liked that she was close to my age.”
That night, they exchanged phone numbers. His friend warned him, “She won’t call.” And he wasn’t so sure that he would see her again. But she returned to the club, and the two felt a friendship developing.
Now both 44, Carol and Mike didn’t start dating right away. First there was the distance thing. Plus, Mike’s ex-girlfriend had committed suicide the year before, and he wasn’t sure he was ready to begin a new relationship.
When he returned to Chicago, they talked on the phone and sent each other cards.
In June 1995 – three months after they met – Mike flew back to Tempe to help celebrate Carol’s 40th birthday.
“I knew that I liked her because that was the whole purpose of my trip – to spend time with her,” Mike says. “My 40th was in September, and I brought her out to Chicago.”
After that, he began making regular trips to Tempe.
Almost a year to the day after they met, they were at a shopping mall in Arizona. They walked into a jewelry store and began browsing rings.
“I said, `I shouldn’t be premature, but since we’re looking at rings, I should ask if you’re going to marry me before I buy it,’ ” he says, laughing. “I got down on one knee and proposed. No one even blinked an eye. They didn’t seem to notice.”
Carol did. She said yes.
During a quiet dinner later that night, he proposed again . . . just to be sure.
“We got married on May 30, 1997, and she moved from Tempe cross-country with her youngest daughter Alicia (and a cat) immediately after that,” says Mike. “We have had many ups and downs since then, but we will celebrate our third anniversary soon, and I hope we will have many more years together.”
As for that blond friend of hers who caught his attention. . . .
“I think her name is Jenny,” he says, laughing. “But I’m not positive.”
