Marlo Nishimoto tells her single girlfriends to keep an open mind: That guy you think isn't your type, she tells them, might be the love of your life.

That's what happened to her.

Dating Lee O'Connor broke some of her cardinal rules, particularly, "Don't date younger men." (O'Connor is two years younger than her.)

"That was a taboo of mine," said Nishimoto, 37, director of sales with The Lodge & Beach Village at Moloka'i Ranch and student at Leeward Community College. "That was breaking everything I believed in."

The couple met on May 14, 2004, at The Shack in Mililani.

Nishimoto, who was recently divorced and raising two teenagers, went there with a perpetually single girlfriend for dinner. O'Connor was sitting at a nearby table with his buddy.

The two made eye contact and O'Connor winked at her.

"I wanted to let her know that I saw her, that I'm here," said O'Connor, 35, who works for the military's Joint Intelligence Center Pacific. "We'd go from there."

He even walked over to Nishimoto and her girlfriend to ask for napkins.

"I was being coy," O'Connor said, laughing. "I chose that table for a reason."

The restaurant was starting to get crowded, and a group of obnoxious guys started hovering around the two women.

So they ditched their table and headed straight to O'Connor's.

"He looked safe," Nishimoto said. "And he looked like he wasn't somebody who had ulterior motives. He wasn't there to pick anybody up."

The foursome spent a few hours talking and laughing. By the end of the night, O'Connor asked Nishimoto for her phone number.

And he didn't wait the standard three days to call her. The next day, O'Connor called and asked her out to dinner.

They planned to meet at Big Island Steak House in Aloha Tower Marketplace after work.

But that day, Nishimoto realized she wasn't going to get out of the office in time. So she left messages on O'Connor's voice mail at home and on his cell, asking to reschedule.

O'Connor never got the message. He waited at the restaurant for an hour and a half before heading home.

"I was sure I was stood up," he said. "I just thought, 'Well, I'll just chalk that up to experience. No big deal.' "

Once he got home, he checked his messages and realized she had called to cancel. Relieved, he called her back. She suggested they meet for pau-hana drinks at Hooters later that week.

When they met for chicken wings and beer, the connection was instant.

"It felt like this was a friend I had gotten together with," Nishimoto said. "There was a moment when I thought, 'Wow, this could be something.' This was definitely something different."

They were exclusive right from the start, talking on the phone for hours and seeing each other whenever they could.

Within a few months, they decided to live together with her kids.

That was about the time O'Connor started thinking about marriage. But he decided to wait before popping the question.

"(Marriage) is a long-term commitment," he said. "I didn't want that decision to be muddled with puppy love."

Instead, he waited until November 2005 — near the day of their monthly anniversary and after asking for the blessing of her two children — to propose.

After giving her roses and a heartfelt card, O'Connor took Nishimoto to Assaggio in Mililani.

She had a feeling he might propose and, just after dinner, went into the restroom, looked in the mirror and asked herself, "Do you have respect for the essence of who he is?"

"I did," Nishimoto said. "I knew this was right."

The couple was married on Nov. 18 at the Luana Hills Country Club, with about 75 guests.

They love to travel — Vietnam, Cambodia, Egypt and Italy are on their list — and discuss current events.

They describe their marriage as "effortless."

"We compliment each other," O'Connor said. "Like Jack Johnson says, 'Life is better when we are together.' "

Reach Catherine E. Toth at ctoth@honoluluadvertiser.com.