We're getting married!

Joe had recently graduated from the Bridgeport Police Academy and was doing his FTO program. He was riding with senior Officer Doug Bepko when a call of an unresponsive female came over the radio. Officer Bepko looked at Joe and said “Cmon kid you need to knock this one off the list”. Little did Joe know that at this same time Sam was precepting for Paramedic school. When he arrived at the call, he saw a beautiful dark haired Paramedic administering Narcan to a very overdosed woman. The two locked eyes and said to each other “hey don’t I know you?”, feeling as if they had met somewhere before. As they continued to look at each other with feelings of surprise and intrigue of how they knew one another, the very overdosed woman came out of her stupor with a loud zombie like moan back to life. The two were quickly brought back to reality and would converse more outside after treating the woman. They would come to realize that they had overlapping circles of friends and had seen each other while out in Black Rock. Fate would intervene again that same day causing these two to meet a second time at Saint Vincent’s Hospital. Here Sam would tell Joe that she was also a bartender and invited him to come down and see her one night while she was working. Phone numbers were exchanged, and the flame of romance was sparked.

One of the most special and meaningful places for Sam is her grandparents’ home in Cape Cod. She spent many summers there growing up and continues to vacation there every year. This vacation home was her grandfather Charlies favorite place, he took great pride and care in opening the house every season to spend time with his family. Charlie was an architect and designed the blueprints for the additions to the house including the dock in the backyard. Unfortunately, Charlie passed in 2020, knowing how much both Charlie and the Cape house meant to Sam a plan was made. Joe would enlist the help of Sam’s mother Liz to execute his grand plan. It had become custom for Sam and Joe to have a date night while on vacation in the Cape, a fancy dinner, cocktails and maybe some mini golf. Prior to going out Liz suggested that she get some pictures of the two love birds before dinner. This is when the grand plan went into effect, tucked inside Joe’s sock under his pant leg was the ring box to hide it from being seen. Joe suggested that the two take a picture on the dock to get the water in the background. One of Sam and Joe’s signature funny photo poses is the “prom pose.” While posing for the picture Joe would sneakily pull the ring box from its hiding spot and drop down to one knee behind Sam. Once Sam turned around, she immediately burst into tears and said “YES!”