They fell in love on vacation but went their separate ways. Four years later, he called her out of the blue

(CNN) — Years after they’d broken up, Tom Giuliani found himself thinking about the role of timing in his relationship with Susan Hall.

Tom and Susan were on the same flight from the US to Ireland in the summer of 1989. But they never saw one another.

Then, Tom and Susan were staying in the same hotel in Dromoland, County Clare, on Ireland’s west coast. But they never crossed paths.

“It’s funny because the first thing I did when I arrived was take a walk, and everybody else went to bed – and now I know Sue also went for a walk,” Tom tells CNN Travel today.

But Tom and Susan walked in opposite directions, and so they remained strangers.

The two Americans were visiting Ireland via the same organized tour company. But they were on separate tours, to opposite coasts.

“I was on the west coast of Ireland, she was going to the east coast of Ireland,” says Tom.

While the tours were heading in different directions, both began with a stop off at Bunratty Castle, a 15th-century tower house in County Clare.

Inside the stone walls, the US visitors were treated to a banquet, accompanied by Irish musicians and interspersed with folk storytelling.

But Tom and Susan didn’t share a dinner table that evening.

“She had the early dinner, I had the late dinner,” says Tom.

The two kept almost – but not quite – meeting. And that was only the beginning.

Looking back four years later, Tom felt this series of almost-meetings – and how they’d eventually crossed paths, connected, reconnected and then dated – was all a bit “cosmic.”

But then he and Susan broke up. And while the split was amicable, with no ill-feelings, they hadn’t spoken since.

“Still, she was always in the back of my mind,” says Tom. “I dated those four years. But I didn’t forget her, at all.”

It was during one of these moments of nostalgia that Tom spontaneously decided to call Susan. It was late 1993, Susan’s birthday. Tom figured he’d pass on some birthday wishes, and see where she was at in life.

It was a bit daunting, keying those digits into his landline phone four years later, but Tom figured he had nothing to lose. Maybe she wouldn’t even pick up.

But she did. Tom’s heart skipped a beat when he heard Susan’s voice again.

“Hey,” he said into the phone. “How have you been?”

A trip to Ireland

Tom and Susan both joined the tour to Ireland in 1989 on the spur of the moment.

Back then, Tom was in his early 30s. He was laser-focused on building his career, but also dreamed of traveling the world, at one point joining an airline travel club to try to get flight deals.

“Every week they’d send you a telegram, which would list flights they had for cheap. And you could sign up and leave the next weekend. Then this trip popped up,” recalls Tom. “It was my first time in Europe. I’d never been before. And so that’s how I ended up in Ireland.”

As for Susan, she was a bit younger than Tom – in her 20s, still unsure what direction her life might take.

“I had just left a job,” Susan tells CNN Travel today. “And my mom and my older sister were hopping on this tour to Ireland, and I just decided to go with them – at the very last minute, probably with a week left or so.

“I had never really traveled that much before that. So it was very magical, to me, to go with them. That’s how I ended up going on the tour.”

That first night in Ireland, Susan’s tour party headed to Bunratty Castle for the early dinner. Afterward, they decamped to a nearby pub, Durty Nelly’s, a yellow, thatched-roof building in the shadow of the castle’s towers.

Inside, tourists sampling Guinness mixed with pub regulars, including an older man playing an accordion and singing.

Susan watched him play and, in between sips of her pint, cheered along with the music.

The evening – with the castle, the dinner, the pub, the music – felt like the perfect start to her vacation.

“I thought Ireland was so incredible,” says Susan. “It was so green and just beautiful. I thought the people were really friendly.”

When the accordion player finished a song, Susan took the opportunity to find the restroom. She was searching through the low-roofed building when she collided with a tall guy.

Susan remembers meeting his eyes and being struck by him right away.

This – of course – was Tom.

“I thought he was handsome,” recalls Susan. “Very cute.”

“She thought I was Irish,” says Tom.

“I did think he was Irish,” recalls Susan, laughing. “But I’d had a few drinks. We just spoke really briefly.”

Over the noise of the other pub revelers, Susan and Tom chatted about the banquet dinner at Bunratty Castle. Tom mentioned his group were heading there shortly, and Susan realized he was also an American tourist.

“I told him the dinner was fun,” recalls Susan. “And that was pretty much it.”

As Susan descended into the throngs of people in the pub – still hunting for the restroom – Tom watched her walk away.

“She was obviously beautiful,” he says. “She’s 5 feet 9. Beautiful. She caught my attention.”

Over the next few days, as Susan toured the east coast of Ireland – admiring castles, craggy landscapes and beaches – she thought about Tom a little bit, half wondering if they might run into each other again.

“He definitely made an impression,” she says. “I thought he was really cute, handsome.”

And on the other side of the country, Tom, in between admiring “the greenest countryside and endless stone walls along the roads,” also found his thoughts turning to the woman he’d run into at the pub.

“I thought about Susan too,” says Tom. “But I never thought I’d run into her, because she said she was on the other coast.”

A second meeting

When her Irish tour concluded, Susan boarded a plane home to the US at Dublin Airport, along with her mother and sister.

After filling up half the aircraft in Dublin, the plane then stopped over at Shannon Airport to collect more passengers.

Among them: Tom.

“So that’s where we saw each other for the second time,” says Tom.

As he boarded the aircraft, Tom spotted a glimpse of Susan, already seated. Later, he got up to stretch his legs and walked past Susan, who was sitting with her mother and sister.

“He stopped for a minute to talk to us. And we made some small talk,” recalls Susan. “I was very surprised to see him and a little flustered too.”

A few hours later, the airplane halfway across the Atlantic, Tom and Susan ended up in the restroom line together. They talked a bit about their time in Ireland.

There was something between them, they both felt it. And as they chatted, Susan wondered if Tom might ask for her number.

“I was hoping he would and was disappointed when he didn’t,” she says. “I thought that was it.”

Tom wanted to ask Susan out. He almost did, there and then. But he worried he’d misread the signs, and he didn’t want to make the atmosphere on board awkward. So he said nothing.

As soon as he sat back down in his seat, Tom regretted this decision.

“But we’ll probably see each other in customs,” he thought to himself. “I’ll ask her out when I see her at JFK.”

As soon as the airplane landed in New York, Tom realized this was never going to happen. The airport arrivals area was huge, and packed with people.

“If you’ve ever been to JFK customs, that thing’s like three football fields long,” says Tom. “So, needless to say, I didn’t see her. So I didn’t ask her out.”

Swallowing his disappointment, Tom focused on getting through the customs line and getting to the bus stop. He was heading back to his home in Pennsylvania a couple of hours away.

“I guess I’ll never see her again,” he thought, as he grabbed his bag from the luggage carousel and exited the building.

After all, it was 1989. There was no option to look Susan up on social media – and he didn’t know her last name anyway.

Tom walked out of the building, he glanced around and spotted the bus stop. There was a bus that looked ready to leave. Tom started running, hopeful he might just make it.

“And as I was running to the bus, there she was – standing with her mom and sister, just getting ready to get on another bus,” says Tom.

Tom couldn’t believe it. And Susan, about to board, couldn’t believe it either.

Tom reached Susan just in time. Slightly breathless, he dug out a business card from his pocket and passed it to her.

“I said to myself, ‘if I saw you one more time, I’d give you my card,’” said Tom. “Call me.”

Susan – feeling slightly giddy in disbelief – took the card.

A first date

Back home in New Jersey, Susan played it cool and didn’t call Tom right away.

But while she was trying to project nonchalance, internally she was thrilled.

“I just remember being so excited,” she says today. “When he gave me his card, he didn’t really have time to talk to me because he had to catch the bus. And I was just like, ‘Oh my gosh.’ He went his way, I went mine. Eventually I called him a few weeks later.”

Tom and Susan lived around two hours from one another, in neighboring states. Talking on the phone, the two decided Tom would come to New Jersey, and they agreed to go to an Irish pub. It felt appropriate, given where they’d first met.

“I was very excited to call him and very nervous,” Susan recalls. “And then it was exciting seeing each other again. We each brought our Ireland photos and exchanged stories of our trips. We went to an Irish pub and played darts.”

From there, Tom and Susan started dating. Over the next few months, they saw one another pretty regularly. But then things started to dwindle.

While they both really liked one another, it was clear they were in different stages of life.

“I just wanted to go out and have fun. Tom was very focused on advancing in his career,” says Susan. “The timing was off.”

They went their separate ways.

Cut to late 1993, when Tom called Susan out of the blue, on her birthday.

Susan was pretty thrown when she heard his voice again. But it was good to hear from him, nice to speak with him.

They talked for a little while. Then, Tom asked Susan if she’d be interested in meeting up sometime. Susan hesitated.

“I was seeing someone else at the time,” says Susan. “I was in the process of breaking off that relationship. The timing just wasn’t great.”

She said no.

But in the weeks that followed, Susan – now officially single – found herself regretting turning Tom down.

“I was like, ‘Oh, I really liked that guy. I really messed that up,” she says.

Susan confided in her mother, who’d always liked Tom – she’d never quite forgotten the joy on Susan’s face when Tom found her at the JFK bus stop.

‘My mom said, ‘Listen, just call him. He’s either going to say yes or no, you have nothing to lose, just call him and see what happens.’”

So eventually, Susan called Tom. She invited him to join her as her date at a friend’s black tie New Year’s Eve party.

Tom said yes.

“I was thrilled,” he says today.

“I was thrilled Tom agreed to go with me,” says Susan. “He picked me up at my family home. I walked down the stairs and he was standing there in black tie looking incredibly handsome.”

“She looked stunning coming down the stairs,” recalls Tom. “I knew I was a goner.”

The party was hosted by one of Susan’s colleagues. When Susan turned up with Tom, her coworkers told he was a “definite keeper.”

“We had a really great time at the party,” says Susan. “We started dating from there.”

Timing aligned

For Susan and Tom, timing seemed to have finally aligned.

“After we started dating the second time, I figured she had to be the one,” says Tom.

“We were definitely soulmates,” says Susan. “But also, timing has to be there, too. So once the timing was there, we really realized that, ‘This is the person.’”

A few months later, in the spring of 1994, Tom and Susan returned to Europe together.

“We started out in London and drove to Scotland,” Susan recalls.

She had a feeling Tom might propose on the trip. And she was right.

“I had the ring ready,” says Tom. “I was waiting for the perfect opportunity.”

In Scotland, the couple stayed at Culcreuch Castle, near Loch Lomond. At the time, the castle doubled as a hotel. It was a little reminiscent of Bunratty Castle, and Tom decided it was the perfect spot for the proposal.

“He arranged for the ring to be put on top of my dessert after dinner at the castle,” recalls Susan. “The staff was so lovely, they played Marvin Gaye for us.”

Tom and Susan planned their wedding celebrations for June 1995.

“But we didn’t want to wait and ended up eloping to Las Vegas on November 22, 1994,” says Susan. “It was crazy and super fun. We ended up having a vow renewal and reception at our original reception spot in June of 1995.”

A year later, Tom and Susan – who took Tom’s name, becoming Susan Giuliani – welcomed a son, Evan. And in 1999, their daughter Paige was born.

“We were so excited to start a family together,” says Susan.

When their kids were 10 and 12, Tom and Susan returned to Ireland. They called into Durty Nelly’s, the place they’d met 20 years previously and told the manager their story.

Susan couldn’t believe it when she realized the same accordion player was still there, still playing.

“We were so excited to share with our children where we first met,” says Susan.

35 years later

Today, Susan and Tom are retired and living in New Jersey, focused on family and travels. They’re currently planning an extended trip to Ireland next year and intend to once again return to the site of their first meeting.

In the meantime, they’re making travel plans for their 30th wedding anniversary this year – they’ll be heading on a river cruise followed by a transatlantic cruise.

Susan will chronicle the trip on her social media account. She started posting regularly in 2022, under the handle @suzanhall.overfiftygenx. For Susan, Instagram and Tiktok have become unexpected creative outlets.

“It has really given me an opportunity to express myself and talk about the things I enjoy,” she says. “I’ve monetized my account and feel incredibly proud of what I have accomplished with it.”

Occasionally Tom helps Susan film her posts. She calls him her “biggest cheerleader and best friend.”

It’s for this, and many other reasons, that Susan and Tom are thankful timing eventually aligned for them. They can’t imagine a world in which they didn’t cross paths in Ireland, didn’t spot one another in JFK airport, didn’t reconnect four years later.

“The timing of getting out of customs at the right time to see Susan…It’s the cosmos at work…” reflects Tom.

“I believe that things happen for a reason,” says Susan. “And the timing has to be right – somebody could be your soulmate, could be the right person for you. But if you’re not at a place in your life for you to receive that, or see that, then you might just miss your soulmate.”

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