Even though they grew up less than a mile apart from each other on Bainbridge Island, it wasn't until Elisa invited David to drink vodka out of a bowl in her college dorm room that they ever talked. But the two quickly became friends that year, spending most meals and weekends together. To their mutual friends -- and probably even vague acquaintances -- the future was obvious. But it took a year before that friendship become something more. When Elisa left for Argentina for a semester, they talked over Skype every week. And when she returned, what had been a romantic experiment became the beginning of a nearly decade's long relationship. The two have hardly left each other's side since, through the good, bad, beautiful, hard and weird. They paddled on Elisa's second home, Lake Temagami. They drank Coke at 8 AM out of a vending machine on the Gulf Coast because they didn't have coffee. They worked 12 hour shifts in wineries in Walla Walla and New Zealand, wearing their wine-stained hands like a badge. They ate the best meals of their life in southeast Asia, trying not to then throw them up on the winding bus rides. They floated down a river in northern Canada under the northern lights, once mistaking a wild horse for the biggest bear they'd ever seen. Now they cook meals, tend to their garden, and walk their dog Finn in central Seattle. When they can, they still escape to the woods in their canoe. And if they drink vodka now, they do it out of a glass.