David and I met in Naperville when we were both in high school on the summer park district swim team at our neighborhood pool (HEBT), we worked together as lifeguards and as swim coaches and spent entirely too much time together. Funnily enough I actually chickened out of a blind date arrangement a friend of ours tried to set us up on, ( I was too nervous). Soon enough though we found our mutual love of Monty python and silliness and more than ten years later I'm glad I that one missed opportunity didn't keep me from finding my best friend :) ~ mae

One snowy February day, David cajoled me out of the house for one of his lovely walks**, our favorite Arlington amble took us past the Iwo Jima memorial with a beautiful snowy view of the Lincoln memorial across the Potomac river. We were all alone and suddenly he very looked very suspicious and said he wanted to talk about something, I think I blacked out for the rest, all I remember is the funny feeling of walking home with my ring on my hand beneath my gloves. (** read as: forced marches)