Oh goodness, where do I even start?

It was March 2020, the beginning of the covid lockdowns and restrictions. I'm talking about the whole "stay at home, only leave the house if you're an essential worker" time of the year. It was such a scary time with so much uncertainty and not knowing when any sense of normalcy would return.

I remember I had just turned 22 years old. It was such a strange birthday to have to celebrate in almost total isolation from everyone. I couldn't do anything with friends or extended family, but luckily I had my Mom, Dad, and sister to spend it with me.

That day, after a sweet birthday wish, I was in conversation with one of my closest friends, Lindsey, talking about who knows what. She had brought up the idea of downloading Tinder again since they had opened their match settings due to the covid lockdowns. There was free access to setting your location to wherever you wanted, increasing your chances to match with someone from any country. I had used Tinder before but never really had any success, and in all honesty I wouldn't recommend it either. Much to my opposition for it, I decided to give it a try because I thought meeting people from different countries would be a really neat idea, and what else was there to do right?

I had set my location to Norway first just to see if I could talk to some of the locals and see if they knew of any neat spots to check out. I had told myself that after all of the lockdowns and restrictions ended, IF they ended (none of us knew what would happen back then) but my plan was to visit Norway someday. I had been to Disney World the year prior and when we visited Epcot, I just completely fell in love with the Norway pavilion and knew that I wanted to learn as much as I could about the country and its culture.

I know that I had matched with a few guys, but obviously the conversations were nothing special considering I don't remember anything that was talked about, but then came Jørgen.

It was only a day or two after I had the app that we matched, I don't remember the exact day but I know that it was extremely close to my birthday. I'm almost certain that he greeted me with a line from Star Wars or something related to it. We were already off to a good start.

I made him wait to get my social media since I'm pretty particular with who I let into my personal life but he made his way in pretty quickly.

About a week or so later he insisted on video chatting because I told him that I had a soft voice that made me sound like a little kid, and of course he wanted proof. Hearing his voice for the first time and seeing him, even just through a phone screen, was a really neat feeling. I loved hearing that little Norwegian accent of his every time he called.

We talked non stop. He made me laugh and smile constantly with the stories he would tell me about his days or just with the effort that he would make specifically to put a grin on my face. He would call me just to talk to me, but I also started to realize that I was becoming his go to when he needed someone for support. Little did he know that he was playing the same role for me, too.

Months passed and Jørgen and I still talked every day. We never ran out of things to talk to each other about. As thrilling as it was getting to know Jørgen and being able to talk to him so frequently, it posed an issue.

I started to develop serious feelings for him.

In October of 2020, we told each other how we felt towards one another, and lucky enough for us, everything we felt was reciprocated from the other. There was just one issue. Jørgen and I were 3,800+ miles apart, in the midst of a global pandemic.

We realised how difficult of a situation that we were in. It led to so much tension and frustration because all we wanted to do was see each other in person and be with one another, especially since the feelings just kept growing.

Obviously, that didn't stop us.

Over a year had passed and we were still in contact as frequently as ever. There were times where we wanted to call it quits because all just felt so hopeless, but we held onto hope, and I thank God that we did, because once September of 2021 came around, our luck was about to change.

Norway had opened its borders under certain circumstances, and this gave me the opportunity to finally meet the man of my dreams (not trying to be cheesy but there's truly no better way to say it)

There was a LOT that I had to go through in order to do this though, and the biggest obstacle was not all of the covid protocol, it was my parents (for obvious good reason, they only had my best interest in mind and wanted to keep me safe. I mean come on, this is a pretty crazy proposition.)

I made the decision that I was going to go and fly to Jørgen regardless. I had to take the chance. If I didn't at least try, I would spend the rest of my life wondering what could have been.

My parents weren't happy, and they were very concerned, but after asking Jørgen many questions and seeing that he had an answer for every single one of them, they knew there was no changing my mind and decided to support me, which felt so rewarding.

October 8, 2021, my Mom drove me to the Newark airport in New Jersey, where I was to board a flight to Denmark and then from there, fly to Norway. The strangest part of everything was that I was not anxious whatsoever. The only part that was scary for me was going through TSA, only because I knew there was no turning back, and being an anxious girl in general, I tend to always look for an escape route, but I made it, I was determined to see Jørgen and wasn't going to let anything stop me. Plus, after that, I was totally fine.

I was way too excited to sleep on any of my flights, and besides, after lots of experience, I've learned that I'm unable to sleep on planes anyway, so that's fun.

I just had one thing on my mind, and that was getting to Jørgen.

I arrived in Trondheim, Norway on the morning of October 9, 2021. I remember walking into the airport and going down a hallway, and there were lots of screens and areas set up for covid testing, which I had to get done, but not until after I saw him for the first time.

Right in front of me, Jørgen was standing there, waving to me, just as excited as I was. My heart was doing jumping jacks. All I wanted to do was run up and hug him, but I had to follow the masses into the tent and get tested to make sure that I was not bringing a case of coronavirus into the country. It was about a half hour wait of pure butterflies in my stomach and the urge to just bolt out of the tent's flapped door and hug that boy.

After what felt like an eternity, that was exactly what I did. I could have held onto him forever. I waited, WE waited so long for this moment, and it was finally here. I was where I was supposed to be.

Jørgen made all the effort to make things as comfortable as possible for me. He brought me a peanut butter and jelly sandwich to eat at the airport incase I got hungry, and when we got back to his apartment, he had chocolate bars as well as the famous plush bear from Ikea, Djungelskog, waiting for me in his room. He made me macaroni and cheese for dinner, and made sure I settled in okay with zero issues.

That same day, he asked me to be his girlfriend. It was a no brainer obviously, we had waited for this day for so long.

What an incredible feeling it is to see how far we have come. We have beat so many obstacles and challenges together, and I could not have asked for a better person to do that with.

Du og jeg elsking.