I was a new transfer student at JPCatholic. She was a senior and the Head Residential Assistant. Impressive, I know. I first saw her at orientation and immediately thought she was the most beautiful woman I'd ever seen. But about a month and a half went by before I saw her again. Trust me, there was consistent looking and asking around for her name or any information about her. Creepy? I didn't think so. But finally, on October 17th, just two days after her birthday, I met her in person, despite being absolutely terrified to do so. We chatted. I thought I crushed it but if you ask her, I made no lasting impression. Another two weeks went by without a sign of her, all while I actively tried to "bump" into her everyday. On the last day of the second week, in prayer, I said to God, "if you will it, Lord, that I am prepared for a good, healthy and serious relationship, then let me find Nancy, have the courage to ask her out, and let her be a good Catholic woman." Giving myself this last day to find out if God deemed me ready for a relationship, I went to the classroom buildings to hang around and hope she came out of class, even though I had no class that day. Turns out neither did she. After several hours at the school, I thought it wasn't meant to be. Head hung low and staring at my feet, I started walking back to my apartment, defeated. "Okay God, I guess I wasn't ready,” I said. So with a deep breath and sad acceptance that God just wanted me to continue to grow and prepare myself as a single man, I picked up my head and there she was, walking towards me! My jaw dropped and panic quickly took over. God surely has a sense of humor! Fortunately, I was able to collect myself and here we are, excitedly awaiting our wedding day!

I was on the phone with my Grandma, heading to adoration in a rush, since I was late. A man was walking towards me on the side walk. As he approached he smiled and waved as if he knew me. I didn't recognize him but I assumed he was probably a new student and knew me because I was an RA. I smiled and waved back. As we were passing each other he said, in a halfway whisper since I was on the phone, "Are you busy?". I thought to myself, 'well duh, I'm on the phone,' but figured he more than likely had a quick question about the school that I could answer easily, so I pulled the phone away from my mouth slightly, let my Grandma continue to talk, and said, "What's up?". His question was quick, but not about the school. "I was wondering if I could take you out this weekend?" he asked. Maybe it was the fact that I felt rushed to get to adoration or maybe it was because I was still halfway listening to my Grandma, but for some crazy reason it completely didn't register with me that he was asking me on a date. A vague picture of a group of college kids having fun around a bonfire popped into my head and I thought that's what he meant - completely logical right? "Sure!" I answered. (If you're wondering, no I don't normally agree to keeping company with strange men, even if they are as handsome as Matthew is. Looking back I'm sure God put all these distractions in my way at this moment because otherwise I would've definitely said no). We parted ways, and briefly a prayer I had been saying for a few months to St. Raphael to find a faithful, Catholic man of God popped into my head. That was all I thought of the interaction until later that evening, as I was telling my best friend about a "funny thing that happened to me" that day. Matthew messaged me with the details and despite "stranger- danger" I decided to go, because although I didn't know why (yet), something felt very different about this stranger. Turns out, it was the best date ever! Except, of course, 10/10/2020 ;)

We went to Busch Gardens' Christmas Town. The whole park was decked out in Christmas lights and decorations and playing all the classic Christmas music (including the ones about Christ Himself)! If you don't know Busch Gardens, it's a theme park and each section is designed to be a different part of the world (Ireland, France, Italy, etc), with amazing food, architecture, music, stores, & experiences to fit that section's nationality. It really was very well done and such an amazing experience! After we had walked around the park looking at lights, having fun with the activities, listening to a pianist play Christmas music while we ate, and riding a Christmas train suspended around the entire park, we went to see "Italy" which was the last section we hadn't seen. In "Italy" there was a massive waterfall of white lights strung over a tall building and flowing into a river of blue lights at the bottom surrounded by a forest of fir trees. Not very many people were there, it was a more secluded part of the park and only soft instrumental music was playing. Arm in arm we stood there looking at the lights when we noticed a family trying to take a family selfie. We offered to take a picture for the whole family and in return the mom offered to take one for us. As we were posing for the picture Matthew got down on one knee and popped the question! I said, "YES!!!" of course!! After that the night was a blur of kisses, hugs, laughter and more kisses, all wrapped up by the most delicious cup of hot chocolate. The entire experience couldn't have been more perfect, and turns out Matthew had tipped the mom off and she got the whole thing on video!