We met the good, old-fashioned way - on a dating app. A few texts back and forth ensued, and then the first date at a speakeasy bar hidden behind a lingerie shop in Providence. Mae knew Ben was pretty special when he let her nerd out about all of her PhD research topics with genuine interest. Ben liked Mae's obvious commitment to her family and her love of travel (and skiing!). Good conversation over good negronis was a solid start to the relationship.

We had just flown to Colorado from the Caribbean on Christmas Day 2021. Everything that could have gone wrong with our travel plans did; a canceled flight, a looming snow storm, the possibility of sleeping in the airport after over 14 hours of travel. But Ben was determined to get us to our destination! Mae had no idea what he was planning, and was less than thrilled to run through airports and shovel out a snowed-in car at midnight once in Colorado. On December 26th, Ben woke a jet-lagged Mae at 7am, gave her borrowed clothes from his sister's closet (because none of the luggage made it), and told her he had a reservation for lunch at a restaurant that could only be reached by a 1-mile snowshoe hike. Plus, it was snowing horizontally. Mae was not happy. We battled the altitude and huffed our way up to the restaurant. When it came into view, Mae started to make a bee-line towards it, but Ben said, "why don't we go to this beautiful Aspen grove over here for a minute?" Mae almost left him in the snow, but relented. As she was looking at the winter landscape, Ben asked her to turn around and was down on one knee rummaging in his backpack. Mae thought he was messing with hiking gear, but instead he pulled out a ring box. Ben asked Mae to continue to go on adventures with him for the rest of their lives, and Mae said, "YES!" The forced uphill trek was undoubtedly worth it.