Rach's Side of the Story: I met Ted in a greek mythology class at Elon University, but that wasn't the beginning of our relationship. As fate would have it Ted and I met again on a study abroad to Germany, Poland, and the Czech Republic. Once we were finished with school we lived in Pensacola, FL together. Ted and I love hanging out, playing board games, chilling on the couch, and trying out fun new restaurants. The adventure began in North Carolina and now we are back in Goldsboro, NC and are excited to spend our lives together.

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Ted's Side of the Story: I met Rach on a study abroad trip we took together to Europe in 2022.

Short version of the story: I saw a cute girl so I started talking to her and then everything else came from there.

Long version of the story: It was January in Berlin on the short Holocaust study abroad trip co-run by one of my mentors at Elon, Rich Landesberg. I had been waiting to take this trip my senior year since learning about the trip during my freshman year. Rich was also the faculty mentor for the broadcast news station at Elon University, thus a few of us from the news organization were trying to go on the trip but only me and one other were selected and able to go, thus I already had a friend I knew going into the trip. (I later found out that Rach thought my friend and I were a couple.)

During this trip, my friend and I had ended up forming a group of 4 and we became the group that invited the other groups to go get dinner/hangout with us after we were done with activities during the day. Rach also had a group of her own going so eventually my group was going to invite hers to dinner and hang. Now much to her chagrin, she was one of the last groups we invited out. I had avoided inviting her group out to do anything yet because she was obviously the most beautiful girl in the class and didn’t want to immediately be hitting on her like I imagined every other guy in the class was doing.

So eventually I worked up the courage (read as: was out of other groups to delay with) to invite her and her group out to hang. I think I ended up at the other side of the table during dinner but after dinner when we were walking to a bar in the freezing cold January night in Berlin I noticed that she was walking in front of the group alone. I took the chance and went up to talk to her with no one else around.

It was going well and we got to what I imagine was a pretty typical Berlin, cigarette smoke filled, sports bar and keep chatting it up and then playing drinking games with the group. I thought it was going well, might even say great, until Rach gets asked her first impressions of the person to her left (Me). Which, to my absolute horror, she reveals that we had met a year earlier during a COVID year in-person Greek Mythology class AND THAT I SAT RIGHT NEXT TO HER. I was mortified. In my defense, we all had masks on, I was coming from ROTC PT before the class, I wasn’t wearing my contacts regularly yet but didn’t wear my glasses around either, and I wasn’t paying much attention in class anyway (maybe the last one isn’t a good defense since I was supposed to be paying attention in a college class).

Look, long story short from there, after getting over my major embarrassment at the bar and getting through the rest of the night I kept chatting with Rach until the trip ended then texting her once we got back to states. Eventually we hung out and then went on some dates and enjoyed the rest of my senior year together. Soon I wasn’t at Elon anymore so we did long distance until she finished school. After that she moved down to Pensacola, Florida with me and we continued to grow our relationship to what it is now.

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Rach's Second Attempt: After seeing Ted's long story I figured I should add some more details. Let me preface by saying, typically I am the one that writes long notes, but this time I kept it short and sweet. Ted usually writes shorter notes, but he surprised me for sure.

So Ted and I did meet in a greek mythology class at Elon, but what I didn't tell you is that after that class I tried following him on instagram and he didn't follow me back. I was so shocked! I let it go but as I mentioned, as fate would have it we met for a second time.

Before taking our study abroad trip we did a fall semester prep seminar course to get acclimated with the topics we would be discussing on the trip. Me being the girl I am looked at who was going to be in the class just in case I knew someone who was going. And...immediately I noticed Ted's name right at the top of the participant list, so naturally when it came time for the first class I was on the lookout for him and for my second chance with this cute guy I wanted to get to know more. In typical fashion I didn't talk to him during the prep seminar class, but thankfully on our trip Ted approached me on our way to a very classic sports bar in Berlin (as he mentioned).

When we got there we ended up playing a game where you had to tell the person to your left (Ted) where you met them. The shock on his face when he found out where we actually met was priceless. From then on he wanted to make it up to me by never forgetting me again. I would say that based on where we are now, he did a good job of that. All of that and our stories probably show so much about our dynamic together and our individual personalities. I can't wait to share our day with all our guests and marry my best friend!

Registry