How We Met
They say timing is everything; and the story of how Kevin and I met is just about that. It goes back to high school. It was fall of sophomore year, Kevin was on the football team and did cross country so our paths never crossed. We actually first met during the PSAT our school has; Kevin still says he doesn’t remember it. I was sitting across the table from him and one of our mutual friends introduced us. I can’t say it was love at first sight, but it was the moment that would eventually start our six year relationship.
Kevin and I didn’t cross paths again until we had class gym class together junior year. Kevin and I shared the same group of friends in gym class, so we talked during class. I never really thought much of our friendship back then, but he always made me laugh. Senior year of high school is when Kevin and I became good friends. We had several classes together, so I saw a lot of him throughout the day. By mid-school year I could tell that Kevin was developing some feelings for me. He would always wait for me before gym class started to talk about our AP Government class, wait for me after class to walk to AP Gov. Kevin has always known that I am very ticklish so he would always greet me with a poke to the side just to see me jump and say “hi”. By the end of the year Kevin still ho hadn’t asked me out so I decided to leave my phone number in his yearbook and see where that led.
A couple months later in the middle of my first semester of college, I received a random text from Kevin saying “hi”. We ended up talking all day and eventually would text daily, talking about school, what we’ve been up to. It was always so easy to talk to him, so it wasn’t long until we became friends again. Kevin went to a military college in Charleston and I was in school in Pittsburgh, so by the time Kevin and I actually made arrangements to see each other over Christmas Break that year I was nervous. We both knew that we had feelings for each other, but we also didn’t want to start a relationship in the middle of the school year being 10 hours apart. Kevin and I would talk daily for two years before we finally decided to it was time to try date again at the end of our sophomore year. I can remember how nervous both of us were getting dinner. We spent the whole week planning it, yet when the day came. It was like nothing had ever changed. I was greeted with a poke and the rest is history.
From the beginning of our relationship, we have been long distance. Even over the summer when we first started dating, I was going back and forth from Pittsburgh working at my internship and traveling home to see Kevin. Distance has never been easy; it takes a lot of work and both of us are busy in our studies. We text every day and FaceTime once a week. Coordinating our schedules to see each other is always a task because Kevin is in a military college and I am in nursing school, but somehow we always find a way to make it work. Our relationship has always been about timing, how to make it work, how to let all the pieces come together…. and in the end it was the best choice we made.
how they asked
Kevin and I had been talking engagement since summer of 2015. Kevin is ROTC army and I am going to be starting my nursing career after college, so it meant that both of us would be separated for another year or so while our careers are beginning. We both decided that an early engagement would be help give the both of us something to look forward to while we were apart after college.
Fast forward to February of 2016, Kevin had been asking me when we wanted to see each other. I am the one usually planning these trips, but this time he asked if he could plan the trip to make up for the recent Valentine’s Day we had both missed. I had some suspicion about it, but didn’t think anything of it because I always thought our engagement would be back at home with our families in New Jersey. Kevin knew there were two things that I wanted for our engagement: 1) I wanted my grandmother’s engagement ring that was passed onto me 2) that I wanted both of our families to be apart of our big day. Our families mean a lot to the both of us and we agreed that it was something they should have the chance of being apart of. So I boarded the plan Friday after class to Charleston, still unsure of what was going to happen. He met me at the airport that night, like he always did and we went to our hotel. I noticed that he was a little jumpy, but he chalked it up to excitement of not seeing me for two months and too much caffeine. I dismissed my suspicions and let the weekend unfold the way the Kevin had planned it to be.
Saturday Kevin had planned the morning at an old plantation out of the city and a dinner at nice restaurant. He knew I love looking at old houses and had asked me other times I had visited. We walked around the plantation looking at the things, and true to our nature we ended up finishing early. I asked if we could go downtown to get some cookies at a good place on King Street to pass the time before dinner and just walk around like we usually do. Kevin suggested that we go get a quick lunch nearby to hold us over until dinner instead. Knowing my love for southern BBQ, it was an easy argument to win. After lunch, I wanted to go downtown to walk around, but Kevin kept finding ways to distract us and pass the time. Finally at 6 pm, he drove downtown so that we could walk around. He suggested we walk along The Battery, a walkway along the bay in Charleston that connects to the park. Being in Pittsburgh where I never see the ocean, I always ask to go by the water to enjoy it when I visit him so walking along The Battery has become a tradition every time I visit. We stopped along a random place along the walkway and looked onto the water. I noticed Kevin was looking around behind me, finally he stopped looking and looked back at me. “I wanna tell you the real reason we are here”…….
Its true what they say that the moment you get engaged you will not remember everything he said. You will be so full of emotion and excited meant that that is all you become aware of. The next thing I know is that my family and his family come out from behind the trees taking photos of us and saying congratulations. We all took some photos and went out to dinner together just enjoying the evening. After dinner, our families sat around outside hotel with us and just talked. Everyone enjoyed the fact that they were there to witness and be apart of our special moment. I finally learned the whole plan my fiance had created for months. He had asked my family’s permission over thanksgiving break, he chose the place and the date over Christmas, and worked with everyone in our families to make sure that they could all fly down to Charleston on the same weekend. He was avoiding downtown all day because that was where our families were all day. He wanted to wait to go to The Battery until the perfect moment that the sun was going to set.
I couldn’t have asked for a better weekend in the end!
