It all started on a Thursday in May of 2006. After a bittersweet final day of high school, Matt met some of his friends for what promised to be the “ultimate” high school party. With well over a hundred guests in attendance, ORPD had the party busted by sunset. After a brief stint hiding in a creek, Matt and his friends regrouped at Krystal to figure out a plan. Thankfully for everyone, Matt’s friend Brittany was able to find another place to hang out.

When Matt pulled up to the house, all seemed perfect. Aside from a few cars out front and some lights on inside, it didn’t look like a party from the street. When Matt’s crew walked in, there were maybe 15 others hanging out inside. It was a small group of “older” Oak Ridgers celebrating a birthday.

Among them was one particularly cute girl who immediately caught Matt’s eye – Christina Bishop. She had been a cheerleader at Oak Ridge while Matt was on the drumline, so Matt had seen her on many Friday nights when they both were in high school. He’d certainly never actually had the chance to meet her, though. He was wondering how he would manage to introduce himself tonight, when a solution suddenly presented itself. Matt’s friend Logan began talking to Christina, clearly having met her before. Matt used this excuse to strike up a conversation, but he coyly cut it short to (hopefully) keep her longing for a deeper conversation later in the night.

That conversation didn’t happen that night, however. Just a few minutes later, the party came together for a toast to the birthday boy. As the group repeatedly chanted his name, “CHUNG,” in unison, ORPD busted down the door. The party ended in a frenzied scramble, as the police isolated and later interviewed each guest. Those who had already been to college – including Christina – were deemed “experienced and responsible” enough to head out on their own. Those who were younger – including Matt – had their parents called. Matt’s dad made the trek across town to pick up Matt and his friends.

A few weeks later, Matt was browsing the hot, new social media platform at the time – Facebook – when he stumbled across Christina’s profile. At that point, only those with an official college (.edu) email address could have a profile, so Matt was new to the network. He requested to be Christina’s Facebook friend, hoping they would one day meet again. She accepted a few weeks later, and his heart fluttered.

A decade later, Matt was finishing his first year out of graduate school and decided to plan a trip to the Pacific Northwest. He applied to give a talk at a conference in Portland in June of 2016. He’d dreamed of going to Portland for a long time, and he was excited to finally make his trip to the hipster Mecca. In chatting about it, his friend Michael convinced him to come out a week early to see Seattle and check out a small boutique indie festival held on a mountain in Central Oregon. He went for it.

Part of the planning process for Matt naturally involved checking out what concerts were happening in Seattle in the week he’d spend there. One concert that caught his eye was a show by New Zealand legends The Flight of the Concords. So, he RSVP’d that he’d be attending on the Facebook event.

A few weeks later, Christina was checking out the RSVP list of the concert she had already purchased tickets to. She was surprised to see that her Facebook friend Matthew J. McMayonnaise was also planning on attending the event. He didn’t even live in Seattle!

Being the natural social butterfly that she is, Christina reached out to Matt and asked him about it. He told her about his trip to Seattle/Portland, and she was quick to respond with a “list of all the best things to do in her favorite city in the world.” While most people might have found such an exhaustive list overwhelming, Matt found it exhilarating. Though Christina didn’t know it at the time, planning trips is one of Matt’s favorite activities!

Furthermore, it just so happened that Matt was staying in Capitol Hill, less than a mile from Christina’s apartment. They made tentative plans to meet up during the week he’d be in town. He was there from Monday through Friday. Since he’d be spending the previous weekend camping in the woods, he told her he could meet up any day except Monday. They decided they’d talk after the festival to figure out an exact date.

Matt and his two friends had a fantastic but exhausting weekend at the festival. After the excruciating drive home on Monday morning, Matt was thankful to get back to his friend’s place around lunchtime. After a nap on the couch, he awoke to find that Christina had texted him. Naturally, she wanted to get a drink that very night. Matt sighed. “Any day but Monday,” he thought, rolling his eyes as hard as he could. He was too tired, but his friends convinced him to go.

Christina responded immediately. “Meet me at Linda’s. After sunset. I’ll be in the darkest corner of the bar.”

“Why on Earth would anyone want to meet in the darkest corner of one of the darkest bars in Seattle?” Matt wondered to himself. “It must be exceedingly hip,” he concluded, so he agreed to the terms.

When he arrived, not only was she in the darkest corner of one of the darkest bars in Seattle, but Christina was also wearing sunglasses, and it was well past sunset. Christina immediately launched into the story of her weekend. While Matt was off galivanting around a forest in Central Oregon, Christina had spent her weekend hiking at Mt. Rainier – the 14,000+ foot volcano that towers over Seattle. On the trek over snowfields to base camp, she went snow blind. This is how Matt was able to charm her with his sparkling personality.

They had so much fun that first night, that they ended up hanging out every night all week – except for Wednesday, when Matt skipped the Flight of the Concords’ concert to hang out with a former high school teacher. By the end of the week, they both knew they had something special.

A few months later, they met for a weekend in Knoxville. In addition to tailgating for the UT-Florida game together, they talked a lot that weekend about the possibility of dating long distance – and they ultimately decided to go for it.

With over 2,200 miles between them, dating long distance was very tough. They were able to meet up every 3ish weeks, but that just made them miss each other even more. They had to come up with a more permanent solution.

Luckily, Matt doesn’t have a real job, so he was able to spend the following summer working from Seattle. He moved in with Christina near the end of May, and they spent that summer enjoying everything the Pacific Northwest has to offer. They went camping on Ruby Beach where the Hoh Rainforest meets the Pacific Ocean, hiked in the Cascade Mountains, camped at two music festivals at The Gorge in Central Washington, saw concerts and drank beer in Portland for a weekend, had bonfires at Golden Gardens Beach in North Seattle, drank beer and ate pancakes topped with pulled pork and Jack Daniels-infused Canadian maple syrup in Vancouver, and even spent 15 days in Iceland. It was the summer of a lifetime.

As summer came to a close, Matt had to fly back to Little Rock for the upcoming fall semester. Christina soon followed. She moved to Little Rock over Labor Day weekend, and their status as a “long distance” couple ended forever. While Matt spent that year looking for a new job in a city more amenable to both their interests, they made sure to explore the greater Arkansas region as much as they’d explored the Pacific Northwest. They attended a craft beer festival and a Valentine’s Day Moon Taxi concert in Fayetteville, “floated” the Buffalo National River (and only capsized 3 times), ate lunch overlooking the Arkansas Grand Canyon, spent a handful of weekends eating ribs and Cornish game hens in the grungiest parts of Memphis, made multiple road trips to New Orleans and Austin, and explored the spas and the National Park in Hot Springs.

In the end, Matt was offered a job near Philadelphia, and the two moved in July of 2018. Within two days, Christina had a job at one of Philly’s top companies. The city itself was a bit of an adjustment, and they were forced to make the most of an unplanned living situation for the first year, but they adapted well, as they always do. A year later, they bought a home in South Philly (and adopted a street cat named Cosmo), and together they grew one step closer to becoming “true Philadelphians.”

To anyone who knows Christina, her love for Australia is obvious. In addition to spending a semester studying abroad at Macquarie Uni in Sydney, she’s traveled back to Australia several other times. While, like Christina, Matt also loves to travel, he has had fewer opportunities to do so. When she first learned that one of Matt’s friends had fallen in love with an Aussie girl and moved across the globe to be with her, Christina jumped at the opportunity. “Let’s just go see Spenser and Steen,” Christina insisted, as if it was just a drive across town. “It doesn’t feel so far once you’ve done it before,” she guaranteed. Matt was hesitant, but his love for his bro, Spenser, was too strong to deny. It also helped that Christina’s best mate, Steen, just happened to live only 45 minutes away from Spenser. So, in June of 2018, they began planning their trip to Aus.

Matt knew from the moment that they purchased their flights that it would be a special trip. Christina’s love for Australia made it the perfect place for him to pop the question. He reached out to Spenser and his now-fiancée, Dani, to start planning the proposal. Together, they helped Matt pick the perfect place to ask the question of a lifetime.

Toward the end of the holiday – just as Christina had given up hope that Matt would ask – they took a trip to the world’s largest sand-only island, Fraser Island. It’s an incredibly unique place, with rainforests, swamps, and a crystal-clear lake that are all fed entirely by rainwater. They spent three days camping along the 123-km (76-mile) sand beach that makes up the eastern edge of the island, cautiously avoiding the deadly packs of adorable dingoes that covered the island and overall enjoying the disconnect from society.

Their next-to-last morning on the island, the four of them drove down the beach to Eli Creek. Parking at the mouth of the creek, they carried their innertubes upstream and dropped in. Christina wondered why Matt was acting so skittish about falling in the water, but she chalked it up to his newfound fear of the jellyfish that littered the island’s beaches. After the first few trips floating down the creek, Spenser and Dani said they were going to sit the next one out and insisted Matt and Christina do another round without them. Matt and Christina made their way back to the top, and Matt somehow seemed even more nervous than before. Yet, somehow, Christina still had no idea what was coming.

As they rounded the final turn near the bottom of the creek, Christina was surprised to see Spenser and Dani waiting under the boardwalk, recording the moment. As she turned around, she was greeted with the graceful sight of Matt (intentionally) falling out of his tube. After what felt to him like an eternity, he managed to disentangle the mesh netting of his swim trunks’ pocket from the corner of the ring box he’d been concealing. He managed to get to one knee, presented the box, and asked her to marry him. She was shocked, and she could only muster one word: “What?” Matt obliged, asking again. Luckily for him, she managed a second word this time: “Yes!”

Matt and Christina are excited to spend the rest of their lives together. They already have travel plans for many more destinations around the globe, and they’re excited about what the future holds. They thank each and every one of you for being such an important part of their lives. Your love and support means so much to them, and they’re excited to have you join them to celebrate their love.

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Matt & Christina

And all of our plans went out the window. Here we are, quarantined with our street cat.