Our Story

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Our Story

We met in January 2005, on one of the first days of the semester. I was sitting at lunch in the dorm's cafeteria when Jeff and a friend joined me. Jeff had been living off-campus and had just moved back on campus. That first day at lunch, we talked about only the most romantic of topics: the poor nature of the cafeteria's vegetarian offerings and the hopeful demise of one of my most-disliked professors. Lunch became a regular, daily occurrence thereafter. Jeff made a regular game of trying to make me snort tomato soup out my nose; succeeding on more than one occasion. Our daily lunchtime conversations were always the highlight of my day, and something that I always looked forward to.

We started hanging out socially shortly after meeting. One memorable night, I returned from an evening out to find Jeff and several other friends in the dorm lounge. I insisted that Jeff join me on what was quickly dubbed "the English Major couch" (due to the presence of one or two other English majors in addition to us), and while playing Cranium with others, I complimented Jeff on his "pretty eyes" and our mutual ability to completely kick butt at the board game. He spelled "garage" backwards with great speed, a skill that greatly impressed me.

After a few other evenings of shameless flirting and an innocent good time, in addition to frequent long talks at Jeff's hall desk job, we eventually started dating. Unfortunately, the semester ended shortly thereafter. I returned home to Kansas City, he to St. Louis.

The majority of the summer was spent tearing up I-70; we calculated that on our "long-distance" relationship we actually spent more time together than apart. We'd stay at each others' houses for days at a time, showing one another around our respective cities. My first visit to St. Louis, Jeff took me to the City Museum, the St. Louis Arch, and to a Cardinals game. Not only did I get hooked on Jeff, I developed another passion: Cards baseball. Attending games became a regular part of my visits to St. Louis. When Jeff visited me in Kansas City, we took in events like the Renaissance Festival. Even though I had to work almost every day that Jeff was visiting, we still found time to show him around Kansas City as he showed me around St. Louis.

Jeff attended UMSL for the Fall 2005 semester, so we were still separated the majority of the time; Highway 63 became the often-traversed road. We visited each other almost every weekend; Jeff usually came up to Kirksville, though I would often go to St. Louis or we'd meet at my parents' house in Kansas City. On the weekend before my 20th birthday I was in St. Louis for Jeff's grand birthday weekend plans. After receiving roses and attending the symphony earlier in the weekend, Jeff took me to a Cards game. He even put my name on the scoreboard! That night, September 10th (though actually in the wee hours of the 11th), we were sitting on the kitchen floor of Jeff's house, talking, when Jeff blurted out all of a sudden "will you marry me?" I ignored him at first, thinking he was joking. Later, I commented that I'd almost answered Jeff's earlier question, to which he replied, "I meant it." I exclaimed, "Yes!" We then celebrated with wine and lots of twirling and giggling. Jeff said that he was sorry he didn't have a ring for me, and even though I insisted I didn't want or need one, he said he wanted to do things right.

A few weeks later, in late October, Jeff came up to Kirksville and we went on our first-ever camping trip at Thousand Hills. Jeff had been acting kind of odd, but I didn't really put too much stock in it. That night, sitting next to the camp fire, Jeff said he was going to go put on gloves, and retreated to the tent. It was really cold, and even though I'd never known Jeff to wear gloves, I didn't think much of it. A minute later he returned, saying "I couldn't find any gloves, but I did find this." He then got down on one knee next to the camp fire, opened a little purple leather box, and said, "You know I like to do things right. Will you marry me?" I didn't even notice the ring immediately, though a split-second later I saw it, and began gasping and shrieking, "oh my god oh my god oh my god" over and over. The 1/2-carat round-cut solitaire has never looked sparklier than it did that first night by the campfire. After much more shrieking and near-hyperventilating (all on my part), Jeff took out a bottle of champagne, specially and secretly packed for this moment. We drank Dirt Cheap's finest champagne out of plastic cups and celebrated...our engagement really truly seemed official now!

We had originally planned to get married this summer (summer 2006), but with the season fast-approaching we ran out of time to pull a decent wedding together, and have now decided to wait until late spring 2007, allowing me more time to plan the perfect wedding, and for us to have more time to enjoy one another's company before the stressors of marriage set in.

Now, Jeff is again attending Truman with me, and we're enjoying working, and attending classes together. In our free time, we can often be found hanging out and watching movies, visiting Thousand Hills, or readying for our upcoming wedding.

It may not be the most dramatic way two people have ever met and fallen in love, but I am sure glad that it happened. I couldn't imagine life without Jeff, and am so excited that he wants to spend the rest of his with me.