It’s (finally) happening!

In 2012, before Tinder and Bumble, Ben and Angela met the old fashioned way-- Facebook. They had many mutual friends, so when Ben sent Angela a friend request, it seemed innocent enough. But after a few weeks, Ben finally reached out, by sliding into Angela's DMs. After some friendly chit chat, Ben still wouldn't ask Angela for her phone number. Since it was the summer of 2012, and Carly Rae Jepsen's "Call Me Maybe" was heard constantly around the world, Angela took it upon herself to use the lyrics to get her number to Ben. Ben was completely oblivious of the "Call Me Maybe" phenomenon, but the ploy still worked. Ben texted Angela and after days of texting, he finally asked Angela out on a date. Ben took Angela to Lord's Park in Elgin, so they could feed Greta the Buffalo, since they previously talked about how much they both loved buffalo. Afterwards, they strolled around Elgin, stopping at a record store, where Angela picked up a copy of Sesame Streets "Born to Add" (A play on Springsteen's "Born to Run".) After that, they stopped at a bar to have some whiskey and ginger ales, then they got some PBRs and drank next to "the Boat" where Angela talked about her recent trip to Europe, and Ben used his inhaler, deeming himself a chick magnet. Their perfect first date ending with Angela and Ben watching "Tim and Eric's Billion Dollar Movie." And the rest is history!

April 2020, six weeks into the Coronavirus pandemic, Angela and Ben were still loving being together every second of every day. Ben had the ring for a couple months, and was stumped after originally planninng to propose at a concert or Cubs game. Angela's place of work, Lakeview Pantry, had started pre-packing boxes of food for clients at Wrigley Field. Angela wanted Ben, a diehard Cubs fans, to see as much behind-the-scenes action at Wrigley as possible, so she suggested they should volunteer for a shift to scope it out. That's when Ben knew how he'd pop the question. On April 27th, after finishing their volunteer shift, Angela and Ben took a little stroll around the ballpark. There was a gate open along the warning track, so Ben stepped on the gravel and asked Angela to step on the gravel with him. Angela hopped on quickly, saying "I don't want to get in trouble!" As Angela was already hopping off, Ben had gotten on his knee and asked, "Angela Cimarusti, will you marry me?" Stunned, Angela responded with, "Are you serious?!" Ben said, "Yes I'm serious! Will you marry me?!" After 8 amazing years together, Angela said, "Of course I'll marry you!!!"