Our Love Story

It's Valentine's Day. I'm feeling quite sappy.


Disneyland
Brent and I met in the winter of 2004.

My church youth group was headed up north for our annual winter camp, with that year's theme fittingly being "Purity". I was 17. I had seen Brent around. He was a new face, just started attending our church a few months earlier. He wore plaid button ups before they were popular. He played guitar. He had a nice car. Naturally, I had a crush on him, but I was realistic. I knew a girl like me would never get a guy like that.


I'm on the left.


Brent is on the right.

Some mutual friends introduced us at the camp since I was a student, he was a leader and I had never met him before. I was incredibly nervous, but he was sweet, easy to talk to and we clicked immediately. We talked all weekend about life and music. I wanted to learn everything about him, then he asked the one question I knew would ruin everything: How old are you? I felt my heart fall into my butt as I muttered my age. Turns out, he was 23. We didn't talk much after that.

A few months passed of silent stalking and superficial hellos. Every new thing I learned about him made me like him more, but he was a college graduate with a house and awesome career and I hadn't even finished high school yet. For my 18th birthday, one of my best friends gave me two concert tickets to see Relient K and Mae. Dermur (my friend. How he got that name is another story entirely) hated both bands, so the only catch was that he wouldn't go with me. I had asked a couple friends but everyone had flaked out so, the night before the show, I asked Brent out. I know I took him by surprise and he didn't answer right away, but eventually he decided he would come and we've been together since.


High school graduation

We faced a lot of opposition. I was told he was too good for me and he was told I was a rebel without a cause and he should steer clear. I was too young. He was too old. I didn't deserve to be with him and he certainly didn't deserve to get stuck with me. I've always been the kind of person to do what I want regardless of what other people want and I wanted to spend as much time with Brent as I could. We saw each other everyday for months, then, in August, he asked me to marry him.


He even wrote me a song!

We were married on Spring Break of 2006. It was my second semester of college and I had to finish lots of homework over the break to keep up my grades so I didn't lose my scholarships. Our honeymoon was super boring! We actually ended up coming home early so I could get more done. Poor Brent!

But that's how he is. He doesn't care where we are or what we're doing, as long as we're together. He plays along with my stupid schemes, like when I wanted a Groundhog's Day photo shoot.



Or when I wanted to stay up all night to beat Donkey Kong because that's how real pros do it.



We're the couple that plays video games until midnight just so we can reach an acceptable save point. We're the couple that reads out loud to each other because neither one of us can stand to let the other get farther along in the book. We're also the couple that's too cheap to spring for two books. We would rather order in pizza and watch Netflix than go out to dinner and a movie. We would rather help a friend paint their house on our anniversary than go on a date. He puts water on my nightstand for me every night and I make him Pop-Tarts at 10pm, because he wants them. He bakes and I change the oil in the cars. We are perfect together.


At a concert

Then, to make things even better, we had little Clara Mae. She has made us love more than we ever imagined possible.

We were married three years before we made the decision to add to our family and those three years were some of the best I've had. We learned how to communicate; how to fight. I learned that he thinks my farmer's market is owned by a cult and he learned that I hate Pee Wee Herman.



Then came Clara two years after that and we didn't have to argue over nursery colors or teethers because we knew each other so well by then. Brent is my very best friend. I just love him.





So that's our story. I know it isn't much, but it's ours. There will never be a movie about our story but I still think it is worth sharing.