#gettingwiser

The stars, unknowingly, aligned for the bride and groom as they both walked about with their separate groups of friends at a Friday night football game at Painter Stadium. They were only 11 years old, and while Luke was a student at Lock Haven Catholic School and Megan attended Central Mountain Middle School - their paths had not yet crossed. As the night and the football game went on, the temperature continued to drop. Megan was sitting on the bleachers, talking with a friend, and must have been becoming visibly colder and colder. Luke must have noticed, because he defied the odds of any preteen boy acting like a gentleman and approached Megan - who he had seen around at other events, but had never met before. "Do you want to wear my sweatshirt?" he offered. Megan accepted, not knowing that 14 years later the two of them would be standing at the altar, saying "I do". The two didn't have many interactions after that until the following summer at Rachael William's 6th grade graduation party, when their friendship really began. Rachael still gets credit for officially introducing the bride and groom all those years ago.

It was a Thursday night and Megan was at a soccer game with friends at Central Mountain Middle School when she received a text from Jonny Wise, Luke's cousin and best friend. The text said: "hey it's Luke, will you be my girlfriend?" Megan knew that Luke didn't have a cellphone of his own and she and Luke weren't very close at the time, in fact, besides having some mutual friends and sitting next to each other in some classes - they didn't really know each other much at all. Megan and Jonny, however, were very good friends - so, she chalked it up to Jonny playing a prank on her. Megan texted back, urging Jonny to stop joking around. Luke texted again: "it is Luke, but I need to give Jonny his phone back. Yes or no?". Megan texted back: "yes." ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ The next day at school, Megan and Luke sat in their seats that faced one another across the table in Mr. McCormick's 7th grade English class. Megan tore a piece of paper from her notebook and scribbled "are we really dating?", crumpled it up and quickly tossed it across the table to Luke. Luke opened up the ball of paper, and with bright red cheeks, looked up at Megan and shook his head yes. Both of them smiled. Unfortunately, they did not smile as discretely as they had thought, because Mr. McCormick quickly interrupted with a loud - "If you two love birds want to pass notes during my class, why don't you share it with everyone?" Awkward and embarrassing, just like every 12 year old wants their relationship to start.

It was the 4th of July, Luke and Megan were packed and ready for their flight to LA the next day for a vacation Luke had planned and surprised Megan with back in April for her 24th birthday. About a week before, Luke had mentioned that the two of them should find a place in D.C. to watch 4th of July fireworks together, the night before their trip. Megan said 'okay' but plans were never officially made. A couple of days went by and Luke would mention the fireworks plan here and there. When the two woke up on the 4th, it was a rainy and ugly day. Megan was somewhat relieved because she wanted to make sure everything was packed and taken care of before they left for their trip, so she assumed the fireworks were a no-go. However, Luke was acting strange. He kept bringing up the fireworks, and Megan kept countering his request with various reasons - ugly weather, bad traffic, preparing for their trip. Luke wasn't giving up, though, and when he began acting strange and pacing around the house looking for things to do Megan assumed he was upset with her and gave in. The two headed out of the apartment and into the car, with absolutely no idea in mind of where they could even go to see fireworks at this point, it was so last minute. They drove and drove and it seemed like they were both getting increasingly annoyed because they had no plan and seemed to be driving around, aimlessly...

The mood lifted when they drove into a residential neighborhood, following sounds that they thought were fireworks. It turns out, it was just a couple of families outside of their homes setting off bottle rockets, sparklers and smoke bombs for their young children. Luke and Megan were parked alongside the streets watching the 'fireworks', laughing hysterically at what their 4th of July had turned into. Eventually, they gave up and decided to drive back home. Megan had thought it was strange that Luke was so adamant about going to see the fireworks for no real reason, but was satisfied with the strange new memory they had made together. During the drive home, they heard REAL fireworks and could see them in the distance - probably miles and miles away. But, they were real fireworks so Luke quickly pulled off the highway and down a little dirt road alongside a chainlink fence and parked the car to see the fireworks over the horizon. He told Megan to get out of the car to watch, and being the paranoid person she is, she said absolutely not. It was dark and it was sketchy. Luke seemed to get annoyed, again, so Megan (with attitude) got out of the car. When she slammed the car door and turned around, Luke was down on one knee with a box in his hand and said "this is not at all what I had planned..." Many tears, laughs, hugs & kisses later - Megan and Luke were finally engaged to be married, with the most perfect engagement story to highlight their, at the time, 12 year-long relationship.

Thank you for being a part of our big day. ♡