Their first “date” was a 20-mile run in Phoenix, Arizona.

Though living 2,000 miles apart at the time, Megan and Dylan found themselves in Phoenix in February 2020, both in need of getting in a longer run in preparation for the Olympic Trials Marathon later that month.

They “met” each other through the Olympic Trials website and later through their shared love of their cats on Instagram messaging. It wasn’t long before they were messaging each other at all hours of the day to try to extend the conversation.

What Megan didn’t know was that on the night of the Super Bowl, Dylan told his friends about Megan, and while it sounded crazy at the time that he’d never formally met her, he knew she was the one. Or at least he felt as though he was willing to drop everything to pursue Megan.

Megan reached out to Dylan about where a good place to run in Phoenix was, and unsurprisingly, Dylan woke up at 4 am to drive to meet her.

But, Dylan showed up at the wrong place; however, 30 minutes later, he showed up, and fortunately, Megan was still there.

Over the next 2 hours, which felt like 10 minutes, the two didn’t take a breath learning about each other and each other's family.

Later, they agreed to meet and run again the next day before Megan returned home.

Over the following weeks, the two stayed in contact, both not knowing where this would go, but determined to not let what felt like a spark die out.

They met again at the Olympic Marathon Trials in Atlanta and shared their first kiss in the lobby of the Omni in Atlanta, Georgia. The kiss lasted just a hair too long as they got approached/scolded by a manager of the hotel. Oh well, they thought.

Hours, or perhaps it was a day, unfolded, desperate and anxious to make the two an item, Dylan asked Megan to be his girlfriend. She said yes! Now they just needed to figure out how they were going to make a relationship work that currently spanned several states.

Following the Marathon, the two spent the next week together exploring Flagstaff and Sedona and simply having a good time enjoying each other's company. Megan later returned home, and although they had no plan to figure out the long-distance thing, they weren’t dissuaded by it either.

But then COVID happened. In the blink of an eye, the world turned upside down, and that posed potential travel options for seeing each other. Scared by hearing news of airlines and possible highway closures, Megan took an incredible leap of faith by moving to Flagstaff, Arizona.

And remember, at this point, they had only been dating for a handful of weeks! They hardly knew each other, but the reward outweighed the risk.

Like any relationship, but especially one that was thrown into COVID quarantines, it took some time to continue to get to know each other. The two had many differences, but they also had a lot in common. While their personalities were far from similar to each other, this opposition filled in a lot of gaps, and because of this, they made a pretty darn good team.

Megan is smart, hard-working, calculated, and organized.

Dylan is creative, free-flowing, and spontaneous.

You can see where they could clash, but in time they have learned to work off each other's strengths and weaknesses, creating a bond of love that will undoubtedly last forever.

And so here they are today, with 4.5 years and a lifetime ahead of them to create beautiful memories and shape a life worth living.