David and I met nearly 10 years ago when we were both attending Colorado State University which is in my home town of Pueblo. We were both raised in Colorado and our parents still live in Colorado. David and I knew each other through our classes together but we hadn't ever really socialized with one another, until David was talking to a mutual friend of ours who gave him my phone number. The friend and I had recently gone on a Art History study trip together, she was telling him about the trip, and about how I had just shaved my head, in support of my Aunt who was going through cancer treatment. He was intrigued by this and told her that he would like to have my phone number to see if we could go on a date sometime. When Neely told me that he was going to call, I remember thinking how I had admired him in our classes, especially our pottery classes (which was his major), and that I though he was very talented and always willing to lend a hand or some advice. I told her it was fine to give him my number, and he called the next night to ask me to go on a date. We talked for nearly two hours on that first call, and I knew that things would go well on the date. It was very close to his birthday, and he was planning to go home for the weekend to celebrate with his family, but neither of us wanted to wait until the following weekend to go out, so I invited him to a lecture that I was attending earlier in that week. We went to the lecture, at our local library, and then out to a coffee shop afterwords. We hit it off right away, our conversation wandered and looped back on itself, just like it does when you're talking to a friend that you've known for years. We ended up sitting and talking until they closed the coffee shop! We both knew after that, that we wanted to keep seeing one another.
I was a year ahead of David in school, we were both pursuing our Bachelors degrees in Fine Art, a common interest that has been a very significant part of our individual lives and our relationship.
We both knew that we wanted to pursue a Masters degree, so right out of the gate we started applying to schools. As luck would have it we came across Savannah College of Art and Design, which had both of the degree programs that we were interested in. We applied and were accepted on the same day! The admissions councilor dubbed us the dynamic duo!
So off to Savannah we went, for another two years in school. David studying Animation, and me, Illustration.
We loved our time in Savannah together, we developed a love of cooking together in our tiny little attic apartment, in our even smaller kitchen. We would work side-by-side on our projects, and helped each other as much as we could (much like we have worked on planning this wedding together). We got a cat, and started to feel that we were our own little family. We collected friends along the way, and grew in our love for one another.
When we finished our degrees, I got a job right out of school, at Carter's the children's clothing company, so we moved to Atlanta where the company is headquartered. David moved right along with me, even though he didn't have a job prospect yet. It took him nearly a year of applying to positions, phone conversations, knocking on doors and literally walking into places offering to work for free to get his foot in the door. And finally it worked! That year was tough, for both of us, and it put some strain on our relationship. But I grew in my admiration of him, simply because he refused to give up on his passion, he didn't give up, he got up every morning, and worked as hard as he could to get where he wanted to go, all the while, taking care of the house, of me (and the cat). He is now a character artist at HiRez studios in Alpharetta. We both love our jobs and feel so lucky to have the ability to do what we love to do every day.
Just as we did in Savannah, we have built a life here in Atlanta, we have collected friends, who we consider to be our extended family, we even call them our "Atlanta Family". We love everything that the city has to offer, and we have settled into a very nice little life here. We love to travel together. We go home to Colorado as often as we can. We take weekend trips here and there, sometimes to the Blue Ridge Mountians in north Georgia, we love to get away and get back to our roots, since we miss Colorado so dearly. We also go back to Savannah as often as we can, although we have lived in Atlanta longer now (4.5 years), than we lived in Savannah (2.5 years), it still feels like home in a way, since it was the first place that we lived together. We love going to Tybee beach, which was our primary escape when we were in grad school. We also go there once a year with our "Atlanta Family" for an end of Summer Labor day weekend at the beach. We have built this group of friends around us as an extension of our family, all of whom we look to for support and inspiration. We admire each of their relationships for different reasons, and we learn from them how to build a lasting relationship for ourselves.
Of course, as with many relationships that have an extended courtship like ours, there were many times that our family and friends asked us when we would marry. We were both content with spending our lives together, regardless of our marital status. We both knew that we wanted to get our education and establish ourselves in our careers before we decided to make such an important decision as getting married. So we gave it the time we needed, we talked about the plans for our future together and agreed that we would know when the time was right. I did put two stipulations on the proposal, that it could not be on a holiday (or my birthday), and that he would not be able to pull-off making it a surprise, since we had been dating so long that I would simply know that it was coming.
In December of 2012, David and I were home in Colorado, visiting our families for Christmas, as we have every year since we moved away. David came to visit my family (where i was staying), on Christmas day. I did notice that he was acting a bit strange, but didn't think a lot of it, as we sat a chatted with my family. At a certain point he told me, "we need to get everyone together", he said that he needed to ask me something, and he proposed marriage with my family around us. He said that he felt that it was there where we had started out, and that he wanted to share that moment with me and them. He figured that proposing on a holiday was the only way that he could pull off the surprise, since I wouldn't be expecting it!
Nearly two years later, we will be married.
On September 19th of this year we celebrated 8 years together.
We recognize how important it is that we have had such strong examples of lasting relationships in our lives, that our parents (grandparents in my case, who raised me and are my parents), laid a solid foundation for us, and gave us the best example of what real partnership looks like. We also recognize the couples that we have built friendships with, as we grow with them, and learn from them, we have seen our time with them has made us a better and stronger couple.
