We're getting MARRIED, again!

We met online. We talked on there for a little while before we met. She was new to Philly from New York and suggested I show her around. First impression, i felt Dariel was bossy. I never met someone so direct. I recall telling her I was going to hit her up later on in the day and she pressed me for not doing so. I wasn’t used to that. We finally met in person and she was very shy. Because of Dariel being a Chef, i didn’t want to take her to a recognizable restaurant. We ended up at Jones. It was also my first time there. Dariel ended up ordering like 3 or 4 appetizers and an entree. She then asked me what did want to order? That took me by surprise because i was used to ordering 1 appetizer. She explained she ordered like that because she likes to taste everything. We ended up sharing everything and had a good time.

Let’s talk about how I met the love of my life online (cringe). Back in the day there was a website named Downelink. I uploaded a few pictures ,a quick about me and started chatting . I messaged Crystal and quickly learned she lived all the way in Philadelphia. At the time I’ve never been to Philadelphia and it seemed silly to be pen pals with someone at a place I would never visit . Fast forward a few months & it was time for me to apply to college. I got accepted into the Art Institute of Philadelphia. What a coincidence! I didn’t know anyone in Philly. I reached out to her and asked her to show me around the city . We set up a date to go to Jones ; a great American comfort restaurant that used to be on 7th & Chestnut. She picked me up from my dorms and took me on one of the best dates I’ve ever been on. We talked about everything and she didn’t judge me when I ordered the entire left side of the menu . It felt like we had known each other for a while. We walked over to penns landing and BAM !! She kissed me in the rain it was so romantic. Real love Jones energy . I knew Crystal was the one for me when I came to the realization that I could be myself. She has always made space for me to be me .

At this point in our relationship, we had been together for 6 years. I had just returned from a 9 month deployment from Africa. While i was deployed I had planned on proposing when i got back. We had been talking about it for some time. When i got home, i had finally saved up money to put a deposit on a ring. I went to New York with one of her friends and we went shopping. We picked out a ring and i decided that I would propose while we were on vacation in Dominican Republic, I wanted Dariel to be surprised because this is something that we had been talking about for so long. We happened to be celebrating my birthday while we were out in DR, so I figured she wouldn’t be expecting it. The day of the flight to DR, we actually didn’t make the flight because Dariel's passport got destroyed by our cat. The airport wouldn’t let us fly. We had to get a same day replacement and fly out later that day. We got to DR and i had planned an elaborate set up in the hotel room, but that didn’t happen. We were spending time at the pool, drinking and partying and it was heavily on my mind. We went back to the room to use the restroom and I was excitedly nervous to ask, especially since i have been holding on to the ring i had for months waiting for the right moment. So i came out of the bathroom and Dariel was fixing her self in the mirror and i got on one knee and told her i loved her and asked her to be my wife. I think she thought i was drunk due to her reaction being delayed. Once she realized what was going on, she emphatically said yes!