As a wedding photographer, I love love stories. I love to hear about them and the excitement of it all. So often I’m asked about me and Steven and our story (it was quite the fast whirlwind!), so here I am, sharing our story from the moment I actually noticed him, to when we said “I do!”
Of course this would happen to me. Of course. I would fall in love with a guy who is preparing to move a thousand miles away. Not long after we met, Steven had shared with me that he was planning on moving in March or April to go “live” in Kentucky for at least 6 months. And by “live” I mean he was planning on staying in a tent and rock climbing from now until November. He had been saving up for it and he was super psyched. I loved that about him, that he was so passionate about rock climbing and that he had such an unusual plan for his immediate future. This picture above is one of the first photos we have of us, and it was taken the night before he left for Kentucky.
I was SO sad. But, remember how he didn’t have a phone? Well all this time we had been passing notes to each other and handing them off when we saw each other at work. Before he left for Kentucky, Steven surprised me with two journals. One for each of us to write to each other in while he was gone. Cue alllll the feels. I LOVED it! I was so excited about the fact that even though he would be gone and wouldn’t have a phone, that we could still keep each other in the loop while he was gone. I wrote endlessly in that journal he gave me, and we still have both of those journals side by side on our shelf. It’s so sweet to go back and read them all these years later!
Fast forward about a month or so I think and it was my birthday. My mom successfully planned a surprise gathering for my birthday (I think my first ever surprise party!) and it was so fun! The sweetest, and probably the most emotional part, was when my mom gifted me an album. Except it was blank inside. She told me to flip to the end, and there was this photo of me and Steven and I totally lost it. I started crying at my own birthday party! haha. It really hit me just how much I missed him and wished he could’ve been there with me. Later that evening I got a call from Steven and he was at a friend’s house or something. All I remember was that he said he was somewhere in Michigan visiting a friend (and I felt like that was kind of weird), and it was SO noisy in the background, but he wanted to call and wish me a happy birthday.
Friends, then more weird things started to happen, and I didn’t even realize just how weird they were. My brother asked if he could borrow my car while I was at work on Sunday so he could do something at the bank…. banks aren’t open on Sundays, but he had a really solid story so I went with it. Maybe it wasn’t the bank, but it was something that isn’t typical of a Sunday. Then on Sunday I got a message from Steven asking if we could push our Skype chat later into that evening because something had come up, which worked for me because then I could see my friend after work. Then while I was at work, my coworker came into the kitchen after she was outside for a minute (it was almost 10pm) and said she could see someone parked on the street, but she didn’t recognize the car. Kris, another coworker went outside and almost immediately came back in and said the car wasn’t there anymore, and that we should go do something else. Okay, no big deal.
But then? I got a phone call from Steven. He told me to step outside for a minute so I could have some privacy because he wanted to talk to me about something. So I did. As soon I stood outside the front door I saw a smidge of a silver car… Steven drove a silver car…. and then I walked a little closer, and realized that HE HAD COME HOME!
I literally couldn’t say anything. He stepped out of the car and came up to me, and I was still holding the dang phone up to my ear! I think that’s the biggest hug we’ve ever shared and I was SO incredibly surprised and happy! Turns out, he was never in Michigan, he had called me while he was in Boston visiting a friend on his way home, haha. And! My brother knew he was coming home and surprising me which is why he REALLY needed my car that day, so Steven could pick me up from work when my shift ended! Kris had gone outside and realized Steven was here and tried to tell my other coworker when I wasn’t looking who it was. They both really held it together in the moment! haha.
I think that was when we fully realized that we just didn’t want to live our lives without each other. I still get emotional thinking about that moment, because that whole weekend plays like a montage in my head!
Stay tuned for next week’s installment in this series! We only have three more left! 🙂
Linda is a Boston-based photographer specializing in weddings and creating family legacies. You can see more of her work online at lindabarryphotography.com, on Instagram, or on Facebook. If you want to reach out directly: linda@lindabarryphotography.com. To sign up for the monthly newsletter full of encouragement and real life, click here!
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