We met in July 2022, at an aggressively average restaurant in Norwich, Connecticut. It was half way between our apartments. Manni likes to affectionately remind me that I was underdressed. I like to affectionately remind him that he was the one who chose the mediocre restaurant. Luckily, the conversation was anything but average and led to a second date. It was on this second date that we both started to feel the future we could have together. As we sat on the shore beneath a canopy of swaying leaves, picnic packed away, we sank into a comfortable pattern of speech that ebbed with the waves, punctuated by bursts of laughter and lulls of happy silence. This pattern has come to fill our lives, our home. It grew and expanded and deepened into a gentle, kind, strong love and friendship that brought us to October 11, 2024. At the top of a mountain hike in Upstate New York, Manni called out to me and asked me to hike back to him. I hike with a purpose, so I admit, I was a little annoyed. But that annoyance washed away when I turned around and he was holding the most beautiful handmade ring box and asked me to marry him. It was an immediate and easy yes. We both say: through every long week, every late night laughing together, every disagreement, every decision, every hangry afternoon, every calm Saturday brunch, every moment, it is an immediate and easy yes. Sitting down to write this, it was incredibly hard for us to summarize our three years together. Three years of growing next to each other, individually and intertwined, knitting our lives together into the reality we now hold so dearly. There have been countless Chinese food dates, two moves, a kitten, weddings, losses. We have become parts of each others’ families, which we are both so grateful for, and become friends with each others’ friends. What we both kept coming back to is just how lucky we feel to have found our best friend, who we’re also in love with. Every day is better together and we are so happy and excited to have y’all with us to celebrate the next chapter in our story. Thank you and see you soon!