Erin's Story:
Dan and I were friends in college, and that's...pretty much it. We always hung out together with the Concert Choir crowd and Dan was always invited to my birthday. I barely knew him, but I'll always remember him being the first to tune my beautiful new guitar I got one year. But I graduated and got a job in Wichita and Dan hung around Friends for a while, disappeared to Florida and then Nebraska for the summer. He had broken up with his girlfriend and seemed frustrated, so I found myself texting him just to encourage him a bit. We chatted on Facebook quite a bit, and he was always there if I needed him. It wasn't until mid-November 2009 that we found that we were missing something.
It started one Wednesday when I was bored. Dan was online and I wanted to go to the Donut Whole, so somehow we decided we'd meet there with his best friend, Michael Barrett. We played Scrabble and ate our donuts and it was rather enjoyable. And it started as a once a week thing, but then it progressed into twice a week thing as we'd get together (as friends) and go to a new little coffee shop waaay out East called Poetic Justice and play board games until midnight. We'd then go back to my apartment and sit in my car and talk until the wee hours of the morning about pretty much everything. One frosty fall evening, however, as we sat in Poetic Justice, Dan announced that he'd be moving to Iowa. Unexpectedly, I felt my eyes well up and I found myself quite distressed at losing my good friend. We talked about it on the coffee house couch, about reasons for staying, reasons for leaving, and other than his friends here, there wasn't anything holding him here. Midnight came and sadly, I drove him back to his car at my house. We weren't tired, so we decided to go on a walk around the river. We went around and about, over to the Indian and then in the unpaved areas by the tennis courts. We talked and talked. I got cold and took his arm and we walked back to my place. We went inside and talked on the couch, but it was incredibly late by that point and it was time for him to go home---and soon back to Iowa. I gave him a big hug---I had never given him a hug before---and he left. The next day he laid it out point blank: he didn't know why, but we should start dating, period. And after a little consideration, on December 3rd, I said yes. He called his mom that very day and told her I was a keeper, and decided to stay in Wichita from then on out.
We had talked about getting married from the get go, partly as a joke and partly real, so it wasn't a huge surprise (to us anyway!) that we were engaged February 20th, 2010. He had taken me up to see his mom and grandma in Oberlin, KS, and had reserved dinner for 4 at the best restaurant in the little town---The LandMark Inn, a restored Bank/Courthouse turned B&B/Restaurant. His Mom and Grandma left us and we took a small tour around the cute inn. We found a parlor on the 2nd floor with a fireplace, and it was there that Dan proposed and once again, I said yes! Still, like most of our relationship, it wasn't exactly planned, so he proposed with my own ring I was wearing, and it wasn't until the next day that we got an lovely $8 sterling silver ring at a giftshop in town. We didn't tell anyone until the next day, but all the family was absolutely thrilled.
And so here we are, only few months into our relationship and the wedding on the horizon. We promised to support and encourage each other in everything as boyfriend and girlfriend, and now as betrothed, we continue to so, just as we will as spouses. I am blessed to have Dan, and I thank God for him and the difference he's made in my life. We'll take many long walks around the river in the future, and I hope to always be at his arm, through good times and bad.
