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Hannah and Bart met on Valentine's Day in 2012, but romance was not to be (yet). They were both working in the Obama White House and became fast friends, sharing many laughs and building a community of friends who became family.

Their friendship grew until the spring of 2020 when Bart sent "the email." Seemingly out of the blue (to Hannah), Bart courageously laid it all out on the line. "The timing is never right. I’ve wanted to write an email like this for a while – who knew it would take a pandemic to finally muster up the courage. Maybe it was watching you make fun of me in front of my closest friends for my birthday, or perhaps the full-conversation texts that followed, I’m not sure. Regardless: I want to be more than your friend. ... So here we are. I want to say more, but am aware that this message itself is a risk. What do you say?"

A wooing trip to Washington DC ensued, and soon Hannah and Bart knew they wanted to be together. In one whirlwind of a year, they took on a cross country move, four job transitions, countless temporary homes, a presidential campaign, and a global pandemic. They realized that even through these transitions, the constant was their shared vision and values for the life they wanted to build -- together.

In the fall of 2021, Bart lured Hannah to the top of Mt. Tamalpais by claiming a friend needed help finding a rare bird. Hannah took the bait and was dutifully searching for the bird when Bart took a knee and proposed in the same place they had first said they loved each other. Bart proposed with a beautiful 1920's era heirloom ring that had been his grandmother's.