Y’all know I love the Missed Connections illustrations based on the craigslist category of the same name, so I’m sure you won’t be surprised that I have never forgotten this little incident. This happened four years or so ago, when I lived in New York, and I’ve never forgotten it and just had to share it with you.

So here’s the story. This guy, Patrick, sees “the girl of his dreams” on the subway, fails to make a move, and decides to create a website– NYgirlofmydreams.com– with the above illustration to try to find her.

The site and illustration went viral, ending up almost immediately on the cover of the AM New York and Metro, the free papers that are handed out as you head onto the subway in the morning, meaning that pretty much everyone in New York was following this story and wondering if they knew the girl. A terrific example of crowdsourcing, the case was cracked pretty quickly when a staffer for BlackBook magazine recognized the girl as one of their interns.

Speculation swirled as people wondered if this was a publicity stunt by either BlackBook or Vimeo, which Patrick worked for, or both, but I like to believe that it was sincere. (And if it was a publicity stunt, it was freaking brilliant, so I guess I’m fine with that too.)

You can search if you’re curious for the end of the story, there are gossip accounts out there, but I prefer Patrick’s ending that he posted on the site: he said he was going to stop updating the world because unlike romantic comedies, we would have to imagine our own ending to the story.

And why not? Isn’t it enough inspiration just to know that someone would go to such lengths to find a potential missed connection, and moreover, that we clearly still believe in fate and romance as a society, if the whole city would be interested enough to become totally obsessed with the story and trying to set them up?

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