Zeb and Christelle met on October 19, 2013, at the Hester Street Fair on the Lower East Side. Christelle was selling ice cream sandwiches out of cart for a small artisanal ice cream sandwich shop called MELTBAKERY -her very first job- and right beside her, Zebadiah was working his first day selling paletta’s (Mexican popsicles) for a small business called, LANEWYORKINA. For 9 hours straight, they laughed, sold their treats, and got to know one another uncovering the eerie number of coincidences that shaped this encounter. The first strange fact we learned was that Zeb did not work for LANEWYORKINA. A friend of his from City College, a brilliant Jazz pianist, the late Dylan Maida, called Zeb one day and asked if he would cover his shift at work. To which Zeb obviously replies, “I don’t work at your job, how would I cover for you?!” Dylan assured Zeb it was fine, handed him an apron with $200 cash in it and sent him on his way. The second coincidence they discovered was that not only were they both second year students at the same university in adjacent social circles but that they both lived in Harlem just blocks from one another. Whats more!? The previous night the couple rode on opposite ends of the same train car to their respective nights out. At the end of their shift, Zeb casually says to Christelle that if she should “ever want to grab dinner she should give him a ring” before coolly strutting away. Behind them, a vintage jewelry seller—mid-twenties, clearly more seasoned in these matters—whispered delighted ooooh's to Christelle. Christelle turned to her, frowning: "Why didn't he just ask me out?" The jeweler could only offer a knowing smile. As fate would have it, the two were set to work the same shift the very next day at an alternate location, the Highline Park. As the sun began to set on their evening shift, Christelle (begrudgingly the initiate) asked Zeb to have dinner with her at the nearby 14th street Artichoke Pizza. It was then the two had their very first date. From then on, they would go a one date per week, which they would arrange the logistics for every Wednesday. Christelle (famously shy at the time having never been on such formal dates) for months, did not contribute much to the conversation. Fast forward to the summer of 2020, the couple crafted their first home together out of a small but perfect closet-less railroad apartment in Ridgewood, Queens. Four years after that on September 19th, 2024, in front of a small group of their closest friends and family, Zeb proposed to Christelle in the exact spot they had met for the first time 10 (almost 11-) years earlier. Ice cream and pizza remain dietary staples of their relationship. On October 11th, 2026 at a hall they've come to frequent since living in their first home, Zeb and Christelle, in front of the many many loved ones they've collected along the way, will say I DO!