Our Story
(In Cole’s words)
The Beginning
Like all great heterosexual love stories, our journey begins with the musical Godspell.
I was a first-semester sophomore at Chapman University when I was offered the role of music director for a student-run production of Godspell set to open the following spring. I jumped at the chance and soon found myself at the piano in front of a cast of 12 strangers. One of those strangers caught my eye, and apparently, I caught hers, too.
(Either that or she’s just attracted to power.)
The First Date
Truthfully, I’m not sure Anna and I ever “dated.” We seemed to go straight from barely knowing each other to wanting to spend nearly all of our time together. Nevertheless, whenever I’m asked about our first date, I usually default to one particular occasion where we went out and got some chicken nuggets. She ate hers with a fork and a knife. We persisted.
The Early Years
I know all of my college roommates will vouch for me when I say that Anna and I were nearly inseparable from the start. Whether it was a Saturday morning IHOP run, a lazy afternoon at Irvine Regional Park (more on that later), or an 80’s-themed bounce house party, there was never an activity that wasn’t significantly improved by doing it together.
I knew we had something good going when, years ago, one of my friends said to me, “I just want to find my Anna.”
The Proposal
After four and a half years of a honeymoon phase that never wore off, I figured it was probably time to lock things down before she realized how much of a better deal I was getting than she was. In December 2019, I somehow managed to get her to Irvine Regional Park (told you I’d come back to it) using what can only be described as the most confounding, plot-hole-ridden backstory that has ever been told. The important thing: she still didn’t see it coming, as evidenced by this photo.
Whatever proposal speech I had planned on giving quickly went out the window in the rush of the moment. In fact, neither of us has any memory of what was said. Now that I think about it, maybe we should just say I DID give that speech.
Today
These days, we pretty much do the same things we’ve been doing for the last 7 years: riding our bikes, watching trashy reality TV, watching super intellectual TV and pretending we prefer it, dancing in the kitchen, brushing our teeth together, and frequenting Disneyland though we have no children.
And, every now and then when we have a long drive, we listen through the cast album of Godspell.