We met on a dating site, which Joey had mostly forgotten he was signed up for. I had just signed up for a second time after a long break (my first try was just as terrible as you'd imagine online dating would be). The fact that he spoke German caught my eye. So I asked him how he learned, and the rest, as they say, is history. =)
The MVP of this story isn't actually Joey (though he of course did an excellent job, too). We made a date to go hiking at Mohonk Preserve with Joey's brother and future sister-in-law, Rick and Devin. Joey cleared the hike destination with them before we went, but when we got there we realized that when Devin said she'd done the hike before, she meant the 1-2ish mile version that starts at the Mohonk House. We, on the other hand, meant the roughly 8 mile version that starts in the preserve. We were a little worried because Devin has a pretty serious medical condition that can cause her excruciating pain, but Devin took the risk and powered through like a champ, climbing over and under rocks and maneuvering through the Lemon Squeeze, an extremely steep and narrow passage through a crack in the cliff face. I spent the whole hike thinking, "Wow they were really serious about wanting to get out and hike more." Little did I know there was a reason for Devin's dedication! At the top of the Lemon Squeeze, as I whined about taking pictures too close to the edge of the cliff, Joey got down on one knee and asked me to be his wife. Rick and Devin got the whole thing on camera, so you can watch it by copying and pasting the link below into your browser: https://youtu.be/j-xNwFQfQiQ