So there was this new nurse on my unit, right? Before I've even meet her, another nurse comes at me with a hot tip that she's single. Thanks tita Phoebe but why would you even tell me that?

Maybe a week later, I'm around Kristen for the first time. We don't share any patients, but I'm nearby. She's with another nurse and I overhear them talking about restaurants that I like and I think "oh, we have similar taste in food. that's cool."

Later on in the shift, I overhear her talking about Harry Potter with another nurse and I think "ok she's into nerdy stuff, me too".

At some point in my eavesdropping, I realize she is also into board games and "ok this is happening now."

So I wait til she's alone and I muster up some courage to talk to her. I ask her some inane question about what kind of board games she likes to play and that's how we started talking.

The next day I trick her into adding me on Facebook (with some story about putting together a Harry Potter trivia team), and the day after that I slide in her DMs. The week after that, we went on four dates.

Riding off of the momentum of those four dates, I proposed sixteen months later!

I was minding my own business, working in a new unit when I spotted a guy who looked like my friend Nelson. This guy randomly started talking to me about board games and eventually figured out that I'm a big Harry Potter nerd. He used this info against me, stalked me on the unit, and invited me to a Harry Potter Trivia night with his friends - so I gave him my fb. Eventually we started talking and when there was a lull in our conversation he blurted out "Hey, so...are you single?"

Sometime in 2019, Kris dragged me out of bed to go to the Houston Arboretum and we took pictures next to this neat tree. There was nothing particularly special about that day except that I wanted to sleep, and she wanted us to go for a walk in the park. She won that tug of war.

I decided months later that that tree was where I wanted to propose. Great! I'll just walk around the arboretum and look for it. My memory of that day is pretty hazy from sleep deprivation, but it'll be fine.

I couldn't find it. I looked for months. I'd sneak off to the arboretum while she's at work and I'd walk around for hours cocking my head at every tree that MIGHT just be the tree that I saw in a dream once. I have photo evidence it exists but it's not helping. God damnit why is it suddenly so frustrating that trees all look the same?

"Whatever," I think to myself. "I bought the ring already and the return policy is almost up so let's just propose already. I'll look for it with her. Maybe she'll remember where it is."

So we go to the Houston Arboretum together for the first time in a year and she found it in less than twenty minutes. I proposed on the spot.

The morning of started off like any other - an ass-kicking workout with Jethrina by Rose. Jeremy and I were looking for our first apartment together. Jeremy could tell I was getting overwhelmed with the options and suggested that we take a break after touring and walk around the Houston Arboretum. He invited our friend Chris Ly (our best man!) to hang out with us and I even joked if he was ok with me third wheeling. We walked around the arboretum and tried to find this tree Jer and I had found a year earlier on one of our dates. I found it within 5 mins, and within another 5 mins we were engaged!

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