We first met in Van, Texas in May 2019 at staff training for Sky Ranch—a Christian summer camp—where we both were receiving training to be camp counselors for Sky’s day camp that summer. Despite both being in the same relatively small group of day camp workers within the many Sky Ranch staff, we did not meet until the two-week training program was almost finished. On the day we met, all of the Texas A&M students who were day camp counselors had arranged to take pictures together. After the last picture was over, I (Anders) noticed there was one person in the group whom I had not met, and, to be friendly and to better get to know other Aggies, I decided to introduce myself. The decision also might have had something to do with the fact that the person also happened to be a pretty girl …

The two of us hit it off practically immediately. We both quickly became interested in each other and both felt there was something special between us. There wasn’t enough time to become certain enough in the mutual attraction, however, because staff training ended only two or three days later. Counselors could either work the whole summer or the first or second half of the summer. We were both scheduled to only work the second half of the summer (thanks be to God it was the same half!), which meant we would be apart for about five weeks.

Reuniting and beginning to interact again as we arrived in Dallas (the day camp was in DFW, not at Sky Ranch’s main Texas location in Van) to join our camp team for the second half of the summer reinforced that what we had felt at staff training had not been a fluke. I (Anders) was very wary of acting on a hunch that a woman was interested in me, for fear of the pain and awkwardness of being wrong, but even with a cautious mindset and determined not to make assumptions, I could see the signals that we took a particular interest in each other. Happening to end up *by chance* doing camp paperwork one evening at a picnic bench together alone and then watching Fourth of July fireworks in a field together was strong evidence. Me pitching a Saturday morning trip to IHOP in the staff Groupme, Claire being the only one to accept the offer, and the two of us going to IHOP alone made it more obvious still.

I felt there was so much obvious—yet unspoken—going on between us that I had to initiate a conversation to tell Claire I would like to take her on a date. After staff dinner one evening, we had this conversation. (This conversation happened on July 10. Huh, seems like a good date…) Fantastically, we found we felt the same way about each other! Sky Ranch had a policy against counselors starting to date during the summer, so we agreed we wanted to honor that policy and decided to go on a date the exact day our work for the summer ended. After that evening, we worked one *very long* month, hanging out together in groups of friends and impatiently looking forward to going on our first date. Finally, on August 10, 2019, we got to go on a date to an Italian restaurant in Tyler, Texas. It was extremely fortunate that we were both students at the same university, so after the first date, dating normally and seeing each other often was perfectly practical! And, well… the rest, as they say, is history. We spent three—sometimes personally challenging—semesters, many months of a pandemic, and summer 2020 in Virginia together, and through the ups and downs, it has all been a joy and a gift from God. I graduated in December, and on February 7, having taken Claire back to Dallas for the weekend, I proposed to her in the same spot where we watched the fireworks during that special summer. Claire graduated May 19, and forever begins July 10!