We met as Freshmen in high school, but never really knew each other until Sophomore year. I spent my whole first semester of Sophomore year trying to get him to like me. I finally convinced him to take me to Starbucks one Saturday (I brought my fake baby for an early childhood class, so I should have known he was a keeper for dealing with that). After many trips to Starbucks, coming up with fake questions to text him for honors Bio, and many failed attempts at flirting later, he finally arrived at my house with flowers asking me to date him. Not it's five years later and I can't wait to be his wife.

Sophomore year of college Joey told me he had a strong desire to study abroad in Argentina for a whole semester. I remember being so upset at him for wanting to leave and so upset with myself for being upset at him. I dreaded the day that he was to leave. Three months into his stay he convinced me to come visit him. Two months later I was on a plane to South America all alone - I had never flown before - it was terrifying. However, I remember feeling at home in a foreign country the moment I found him at the Cordoba airport. It was the best I had felt in months. I knew that I loved him, but being faced with that challenge proved that he was the one I never wanted to say goodbye to again. Those six months were the hardest thing we've ever done, but those hard times showed me that he was the one I wanted to be with. No matter how hard it got, we never gave up on each other. Even in Argentina he showed me that he wanted to be in my life.

We were headed up to Chatanoga, Tennessee for formal weekend with his fraternity. He told me he wanted to go hiking on Friday, so we left early that Friday morning. We got to the place where he wanted to hike, but to our luck it was closed for a hunting event. Luckily, Joey had a back up plan. He drove us to Signal Mountain where we would finally get to hike after almost six hours in the car. After a few wrong turns and a few miles later, we stumbled across a rock that overlook the Tennessee river as the sun was preparing to set. As we sat down Joey handed me a book titled "The Story of Us". It was filled with pictures and cheesy things from our relationship. On the last page Joey had written me a note that ended with "Will you marry me?" - this question I had been waiting for him to ask. We spent the rest of our weekend with his wonderful fraternity celebrating in Chattanooga.