This was published on our wedding website in 2017. I’ve pulled it from the archives to share it here. Maybe you’ll get a laugh, or just enjoy getting to know the old “us” a bit more. These days feel oh, so long ago.
xo,
Kate
Kate: I was a junior in college, aloof, proud, working too much, and emotional as all get out in late August of 2015. I was leading a team of five-ish project managers and we desperately needed a web designer.
Adam: So desperate, in fact, that I didn’t go through the “normal” hiring process. All Kate wanted to see was my resume. It was my stunning good looks...
In that season, the Agency took over most hours of my life (another story for another day). It was through a mutual connection, that I ran into this scrawny brown-haired soccer player in the Sweeting Four elevator early one September day.
Whoa, whoa, whoa, I think Kate’s memory might be slipping! You see, I wasn’t “scrawny”. Rather, I had the perfect body for a runner; toned and extremely athletic.
He was cordial, professional, and kind. I was wearing a pencil skirt and heels with my clipboard. There was instant respect. Most of our clients had immediate web needs, and so I claimed Adam, hired him on the spot, and we began working together immediately. Our first emails our laughable. I tried to set professional boundaries, he pushed them. But we needed each other.
To be honest, it felt really good to be needed for my skills! The agency gave me the opportunity to learn about freelance work in a very safe, but professional work environment.
Adam was on the soccer team, so naturally I began going to the school soccer games. I looked through all his Facebook pictures and assumed he was dating the cute blonde girl in his profile picture—it was his older sister.
We ended up working many-a-night together in our fourth floor Communications department, bonding over Guatemalan coffee & quality graphic design like nerds.
Ever since the day we met, Kate could always see herself with me. I, on the other hand, was a little slow to recognize my feelings for her.
September turned into October, and we both had other love interests, and time moved on. Adam never liked me. I was his boss, his co-worker, his business partner. I was dating someone else at the time, and so he kept his distance. We were co-workers, maybe friends, nothing more.
True! I never saw Kate as anything more than a good friend. I mean, it’s not that I never considered dating her, but when I did consider it she was with another guy!
Late that fall I spilled black coffee all over my MacBook Air—Adam waited with me for hours at Apple and I remembered how nice this guy was. Respect grew. Another conversation in our coffee shop, Joes, and my logical mind went crazy. He was kind, logical, respectful, curious, interesting, knew how to hold his tongue, and had the best smile.
The next six months were a blur; we were barely friends, but we were co-workers. Between tens of client meetings, hundreds of phone calls, and many a dream and failed dream, we grew to know each others joys, frustrations, likes, and sorrows.
By mid spring, boys were so out of the picture that I boldly claimed I was going to Grad School and getting married at 30. Our business slowed as summer came along with a hip surgery for me and a full time internship at the Christian Alliance for Orphans. We both lived in Chicago for most of that summer, but I only saw him when I ran into him at Starbucks. Somewhere, deep down and unknown to myself, the Lord was preparing my heart to do more than just respect Adam.
And somewhere, deep down, I liked this girl. I was just too oblivious to see it!
It wasn’t until August, 2016 that I realized it. Who was I kidding. After quitting our business the first week of School, my mind, and heart, were telling me that Adam and I should be dating. In my time with the Lord, I quietly started praying about this man.
Instead of crashing my way into his world, I slowly starting putting myself into what I’ll call, "the right place at the right time.” I changed my work schedule and started working out every day an hour before he got out of practice, so I could “run into him” as he left the gym and eat dinner with him every now and then. And after team dinner, he always ended up doing homework in our on-campus coffee shop, Joe’s. Our first child might as well be named Joe, that’s how much time we spent up there. More often than not, I would intentionally end up casually reading or writing, always nonchalant and uninterested, a seat or two away from him. We always ended up at the same table.
In other words, Kate was after me. She was ever so subtly following me so that I might notice her more and more. She knew my schedule and all of my go-to spots, so she would put herself in “the right place at the right time” hoping that I might initiate a conversation with her. And eventually… it worked!
I promised in my journaling or prayers not to tell anyone that I liked him. Normally when I tell people things, it messes them up. God works that way; when we take things into our own hands he says no, so this had to be true open-handedness to whatever He had. But he is a good father who has good gifts.
It was in our on campus coffee shop, Joe's, was where I fell in love with this boy. We were in a five way discussion about sexuality or parenting or oversees missions. And he was wearing his dirty gray TOMS, and I knew his mind was my favorite.
It was an early 2am morning that I told one of my roommates, Leah, that I really liked Adam and thought we were supposed to be together. That was it. This was the first real admittance to a human other than my journal.
One late night in Joe’s Adam me, “Hey what are you doing on October 12th?” Nothing I said, except it’s my birthday.” My heart was pounding out of my chest with anticipating. “Great!" He said. "Want to come to an NF concert with me?” I laughed because Christian Rap is not my thing. Take me to Jazz, Opera, or Taylor Swift before Christian Rap. Still, I said, “Ya that sounds awesome!” Very nonchalant, so not to as show that I was too interested. And the night before my birthday I finally called him and made him answer the question I had been dying to know: “ADAM, Is this a date?” He quickly replied, “No, no it’s not.” My hopes that I had held so closely fell to the ground. That night I let go of him in my heart; and realized if we never did end up together that I would still be okay.
In my defense, I wanted it to be a date, but I had invited other friends to go to the concert as well so it wasn’t the right setting for a “first date”.
The next night, on my 21st birthday, we walked a long walk down to North Street Beach pier and asked all the hard questions of life about our families and churches and hurts and pasts and bad and good and ugly. We were honest, we laughed, I dug my hands deep into the pockets of my jacket and stared at the city next to this boy who was an incredible listener and I pinched myself.
Six days later was our “Fall Break,” and I managed my way out of some work shifts so I could go “to see my friend Leah” who happened to live 10 minutes from Adam in Grand Rapids. We walked through apple orchards awkwardly and I asked about birth control. He asked if I wanted to be a stay at home mom. We drank Cider and went to the eye doctor and I called my friend Christy and told her we were going to date. The next day I told him I had free concert tickets to a Ben Rector concert at the Chicago theater and asked if he wanted to go on a first date with me. He said yes.
The concert was a smashing success, and to Adam’s credit he did pick the restaurant we went to before him. We shared hummus and pitas talked about his time in Guatemala and how complex oversees missions are and how we both love business-as-mission and new things.
I grabbed his arm on the way back from the concert and we walked, arm-in-arm, back through the Chicago skyline.
I don’t remember how the next ten days went. We both knew we were supposed to be together. We also knew we had a lot of our own junk to work through. In God’s grace he put people in each of our lives to be there through many a hard conversation. We both thought we might not make it. But we did.
In the next months crush turned to love turned to sacrifice and deep care for the other.
I went home to meet his family.
He told me he loved me.
He came to my home for Christmas and spent Saint Nick’s day with my family.
I told my mom I was going to marry him.
We found a church home at Calvary Memorial in Oak Park.
Friend dinners in my apartment taught us to bask in the goodness of others.
He kissed me on his 21st birthday in March. And he told me he wanted to marry me then too.
We disagreed on small things and learned to compromise.
We started to share coffee to get .50 refills. Sorry Joe’s.
We spent long evenings together in my apartment elevator lounge talking much to late and kissing far too much.
We realized we are incredible type A. Scheduled fun is the best kind.
We found knownness and honesty in each other.
We became each others closest friends.
I broke up with him for twelve hours in May because I was emotional.
He bought a ring and asked my parents.
We found the same dreams, hopes, joys, and Christ in each other.
On August sixth, after a long summer of putting marriage to the side, and not talking about kids or jobs or parenting, we wrote long, long letters, and made tens of lists of goals and philosophies, and we decided to get married. And a week later we decided not to wait.
On the first of September, 2017, on a casual walk through our favorite homes in Oak Park, IL, he pulled me into a church courtyard and asked me to be his wife forever. It felt fake, like he should be asking someone else instead of me. But this is real, this is us, and the Lord is redeeming our pride and making something more beautiful.
Loved reading the story of the two of you! ❤️