“How many miles do you think you’ve swiped on your phone?” That’s a question I saw on the internet years ago that sent my mind into a spiral. 5 miles? 100? But I digress - all I know is that there was a ½ inch swipe that I made on my iPhone screen one Sunday evening in 2019 that was the best decision I’ve ever made.



Marley and I met back in January of 2019 after “matching” (swiping right) with each other on Bumble. If you’re not familiar, Bumble is the app where the girl has to message the guy first in order to open up the conversation. Not going to lie, I had gotten *very* used to the “silent-ghosting” situation where I matched with someone only to never receive a message from them. When Marley messaged me I was quite surprised, if not shocked.



I still remember her pictures: sitting on a beach house staircase hugging her dog Stevie, paddle boarding through the water with sunglasses on, sitting on the sidewalks of New York with a big aperol spritz in front of her. I remember feeling butterflies during that initial conversation and each time a new message popped up from Marley, I’d do another flip through her pictures to (1) double check I wasn’t dreaming and (2) to get another look at her blonde hair, blue eyes, and incredible smile.



Later that week, we met for our first date at a wine bar called Anfora in the West Village - each of our favorite neighborhoods in the city. We sat at the bar, drank a lot of wine, laughed hard with (and at) each other, talked about our upbringings (Marley taught me some Southern phrases I’d never heard before) and discussed our love for family, friends, travel, and New York. We then made our way (stumbled) around the corner to a pub where we shared Old Fashioneds and french fries (things haven’t changed) - we may have been over-served and started discussing socio-political issues, but that’s neither here nor there.



As the night wound down, I offered to walk Marley back to her apartment. I was met with many adamant “NO!s” but eventually got my way (first (and last) time.) We held hands on the walk back and before I could express my “intentions” as Marley puts it (of which there were none), Marley stopped on her apartment stoop, faced me, and we shared our first kiss.



In the past 4.5 years, we’ve lived 8 avenues apart, we’ve lived in our parents’ houses for months at a time (#pandemic2020), Marley survived with my 2 roommates and me for 4 months, and now we’ve lived together in our apartment in Chelsea for almost 3 years.



Since that first evening in the West Village, we’ve grown our love for travel, wine, beer, food, adventure and each other and we can’t think of a better way to tie all of those things together than to get married in Italy surrounded by our closest family and friends.



Proposing to Marley in June 2022 was the best day of my life - I can’t wait to have a new best day.

Vediamo in Italia!