We're getting married!

March 21, 2023. The day I met him. It wasn’t in some grand, cinematic moment. It wasn’t even at a place that held sentimental meaning for us at the time. It was a grocery store in Colorado. I lived there then, spending my days as a snowboard instructor and soaking in the Aspen/Snowmass mountains. He had come to visit with a group of mutual friends. Before that day, we had never met, even though before I moved to Colorado, we had lived in the same town for years. I wasn’t at my best when I met him. I got a concussion days prior, I had just woken up, thrown together a random bag, and rushed over to meet everyone. That’s when he turned to me, holding out something greasy and golden-brown from the deli. “Want a chicken tender?” he asked. I stared at him, still groggy and half-dazed from my concussion. “No,” I said bluntly and walked away. That was the first impression I gave to the man who would change my life. He told me later that I scared him. Something changed when we got to the Airbnb up on the mountain. It didn’t take long for me to warm up to him. His easy laughter, his contagious energy. He was oblivious to my attempts at flirting, and I was terrible at it anyway, so I enlisted our friend Brandy to help. It became a running joke between us, two people so interested in each other yet so incapable of making it obvious. The ice finally broke over Shrek 2 of all things. We sat together on the couch, and he finally gathered the courage to make a move. It wasn’t grand or planned, it was just us, getting caught up in whatever this was. We spent that trip secretly flirting. I slipped him my number, and we’d text back and forth in hushed conversations, exchanging hidden glances when no one was looking. It was fun! And by the end of the week, I didn’t want it to end. I tried to convince him to delay his flight. Just one more day. But there I was, standing at the Aspen airport, saying goodbye. I thought that would be the end of it. I was wrong. Distance didn’t separate us. It only made us closer. Every night, we FaceTimed. We talked about everything. My days didn’t feel complete without those late-night conversations, his voice carrying me to sleep in my room in the mountains. I had planned to stay in Colorado after the winter season. But something bigger than my love for the mountains told me to go back. I had a gut feeling that this man, this person I had only spent a short time with, was going to change my life. So I called my mom, packed up everything, and she and I drove across the country back to Florida. The first night back in Florida, I was exhausted. But I knew he was out with friends and I had to see him. So I got myself together and went out. And then, there he was. That hug... God, that hug. I swear that all the air left my lungs, and my heart was pounding in my chest. From that moment on we were never apart. Slowly, he became a part of my home, a part of my space. He stayed over five nights a week, only leaving when I had work and he had to repack a bag. It didn’t take long for me to start dropping hints. Clearing out half the closet, half the dresser, little nudges that turned into a mutual decision. When he moved in, life just felt right. Our home became full of laughter, of playful chaos. He and Jameson, our dog, were constantly running around. He made the home feel alive. But more than that, he pushed me in ways I never imagined, because he believed in me. More than I sometimes believed in myself. He brought out the best version of me. And then, in the spring of 2024, we knew. This wasn’t just a fun love story. It wasn’t a fleeting, adventurous romance. It was it. So we went ring shopping.

I knew Alaina was the one I wanted to marry from the very beginning. The challenging part was finding the ring. Months earlier, we had gone and looked at rings together, which definitely helped set me up for success. But what no one tells you about looking at rings is how many decisions you still have to make after. After a lot of research (and second-guessing if the ring was perfect), I finally placed the order. It took over a month and a half for the ring to be made, and during that time, I just had to sit and wait, anxiously, hoping it would turn out as beautiful as the lady on the phone made it sound. Those weeks felt like a year. Honestly, waiting for the ring might have been more stressful than the actual proposal. While I waited, I spent a lot of time thinking about how I wanted to propose. Did I want it to be some big, elaborate plan? A trip? A public moment? Or should it be something more private, just us? After running through a million different scenarios, I finally had my idea. Now it was time to execute the plan. April 5, 2025, might go down as one of the most stressful days of my life. There’s so much more that goes into proposing than you think. I was even worried about how windy it was that day. All day, I could barely talk to Alaina. Not because I was worried she would say no, I knew she was my person. But because I wanted everything to be perfect for someone who deserves the world. We drove down to St. Augustine, barely talking because I was so nervous, but I had a plan. We parked and slowly walked toward River & Fort, taking my sweet time because I needed to stall a little. My brother (aka the cameraman) was still on his way. As we made our way through the crowds (there were so many people downtown, which only made my nerves worse), we went up to the rooftop. From there, we overlooked the exact spot by the water where I had asked her to be my girlfriend two years earlier. She kept glancing that way, making comments about how that was "our spot," and I did my best to play it cool and throw her off. I sipped my drink as slowly as humanly possible, stalling until I got the text from my brother saying he was there. Finally, he texted that he was parked. I casually asked Alaina if she was ready for dinner, and we made our way downstairs. While we were walking, I tried texting my brother to coordinate, but he wasn’t answering. I panicked and ran into the bathroom, calling him probably 50 times... no answer. I thought the whole plan was falling apart. As we walked out of the restaurant, still holding her hand, my phone finally rang. It was my brother. But I couldn’t answer right next to her, so I suggested we go for a walk by the water. As we strolled, I kept pointing out random boats, trying to distract her while secretly texting my brother with my phone down by my side. I spotted him... but he was standing right in the spot I needed. I frantically texted him to move back. Finally, we were standing in our spot. The place where almost exactly two years earlier, I had asked her to be my girlfriend. It only felt right that our story would continue where it started. I took both her hands, looked at her... and knew. This was my person. I said a few words (though honestly, it’s all a blur), dropped to one knee, and asked her to marry me. Thank gosh she said yes.