High Line Car House

Wedding Day

Wedding

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Our Wedding

From Rachel's first visit to SF, 2013. 

 

According to Rachel, we met at our freshman orientation at Otterbein&nbsp;University in&nbsp;Westerville, Ohio.&nbsp; However, this fact is up for dispute for two reasons:



1) I met my co-best man Matt Neitz this day and was quite distracted with my new college friend, but would have noticed a young Rachel









2) Rachel says she had a crush on Matt, which is impossible, because I&nbsp;am profoundly more handsome than him, and was even more so in 2008.









In all seriousness, Rachel seemed to always just miss me.&nbsp;&nbsp;She started her college journey as, like me, an English major.&nbsp;&nbsp;Like me, she was involved at WOBN, the college radio station; in fact, she and I&nbsp;were on the same staff in support of WOBN.&nbsp; Turns out, neither of us honored our responsibilities there very well because technically while I was her boss we never saw each other in this capacity.&nbsp;&nbsp;









Luckily, at the end of our senior years, we were willing to honor a responsibility to each other.&nbsp;&nbsp;While I&nbsp;was in California getting my M.F.A. in creative writing, Rachel found herself in Oxford, Mississippi, getting her Master's degree in Higher Education &&nbsp;Student Personnel.&nbsp; This began what we assumed we be a life-long quest of trying to get at colleges and universities ever so slightly closer&nbsp;to each other.









From 2013 to 2017, Rachel and I&nbsp;were in separate schools, separate states, and separate timezones.&nbsp;&nbsp;If you want to know what time it is at Ole Miss while you are standing at the beach missing your girlfriend in San Francisco, I can tell you.&nbsp;&nbsp;If you want to know how long it takes to get from the 32nd row of a Delta 727 that flew from SFO to ATL to MEM to the baggage claim, I&nbsp;can tell you.&nbsp; What I can't tell you is what makes a woman drive from her apartment in Oxford to Memphis (other than that being the closest Chipotle to Rachel) in order to fly to Los Angeles and then once more up the Pacific coast, just to see me in my too-small apartment with my friends and our cat, only to be greeted by a futon underneath a pile of books and dirty clothes.&nbsp; I&nbsp;can tell you she took a red eye home that trip AND went to work that same morning, after a six hour flight, a one hour drive, and the fastest parking lot make up job Rachel has probably ever done.&nbsp;&nbsp;









This is to say Rachel's devotion to our relationship is infinite and immeasurable.&nbsp; I'd like to think my Greyhound ride from Youngstown to Mississippi to watch with her family (who, to be fair, offered to give me a ride) be the first Ripley to earn a Master's degree counts for some hot shit.&nbsp; It would be a fool's errand to try to compete all the same.









En route from Oxford to Ohio, finally, Rachel and I&nbsp;in the same state (albeit us both at our parents' houses, me without a car) we had to take a break in Nashville so she could ace a phone interview with the Ohio State University at&nbsp;Newark.&nbsp;&nbsp;It is of note that I&nbsp;was a barista at the time.&nbsp; It is of further note that she got to pick from a slew of job offers right after graduation and boy am I&nbsp;glad she picked the Columbus area.









That was a weird year, to say the least.&nbsp; Right around my birthday I was offered a job teaching at a trade school in Columbiana, just South of Youngstown.&nbsp; That same day I&nbsp;was offered three sections of the first-year writing class I'll have to cancel a few meetings for so we can have our wedding next year.&nbsp; Pretty soon, we were, again, in different states albeit under much more agreeable terms.









My aunt and uncle graciously invited me into their home, and were always welcoming to Rachel.&nbsp; It should be noted the 2006 Chevy Colorado I&nbsp;take such pride in driving was often loaned to me for the purpose of seeing Rachel on her home turf, before Uncle Bill finally just gave the thing to me.&nbsp; But, from 2015-2017, we had eliminated airplanes from the equation and sort of both had cars.









In the spring of 2017 I&nbsp;was accepted into the Ph.D program at Wayne State University in Detroit.&nbsp; That was it.&nbsp; For the first time since the supposed first year we met I&nbsp;had a firm five year plan.&nbsp;&nbsp;Now we could talk about moving, Rachel could think about jobs, and I&nbsp;had to talk to my future in-laws about it being cool if I ask to marry their daughter.









Since it isn't all my story to tell, I'll say this:&nbsp;nobody in the history of the world has ever been as nervous as I&nbsp;was in the Marysville Wendy's, and that I&nbsp;had the blessing.&nbsp; This meant that I needed to cook up a surprise.









On&nbsp;April 8th, 2017 I&nbsp;was in Ohio, although not the part of Ohio Rachel thought I&nbsp;was in.&nbsp;&nbsp;Under the subterfuge of an Italian dinner in Youngstown, I&nbsp;drove down 71 south listening to a playlist you'll enjoy during the cocktail hour of our wedding, hoping, praying, wishing she'd say yes.









Y'all know this part of the story.&nbsp;&nbsp;Surrounded by friends, she did.&nbsp; Now here we are.









Epilogue:









I&nbsp;got this Buckeye Nation devotee to move to Michigan, which, I&nbsp;guess was easy considering the three job offers she had to choose from at Oakland University in Auburn Hills last summer.&nbsp; Same state, schools only&nbsp;one county apart.









This fall, Rachel started a job at University of Michigan Dearborn.&nbsp; Tomorrow, at the beginning of a new semester, the last first-day of a new academic year where I&nbsp;am not a husband, we'll carpool together.&nbsp; I'll teach, she'll advise, we'll make the lives of the students we encounter better.&nbsp; That's the hope, anyway.









The thing for sure is that Rachel has been making my life better since 2012, and since 2008, to hear her tell it.&nbsp; At the end of our first date, I&nbsp;more or less asked her how it went.&nbsp; She smirked, that smartass, and told me to try harder.&nbsp; Otis Redding tells us we have to "try a little tenderness" and in moments when Rachel is lost in an old soul song, or I'm lost in a moment of warm bursts of light coming through the blinds of our crummy first apartment wondering if that isn't the glue that holds together the best relationships.









I'm not sure what's more powerful: the urge that I&nbsp;believe will be inside me to always try harder, be it for me, for her, and for us&nbsp;- or - if it worked, and after that blunder found a kind of tenderness good enough for Rachel to stick around.









 







with love and gratitude,









Tony, September 4th, 2018.

Try Harder.

<a href="https://tidal.com/playlist/05257653-b50f-4f31-ae1d-2c46b8e35ec4" target="_blank">"She Said Yes" Playlist</a>Click here to hear some songs that are special to us!

"She Said Yes" Playlist

Our Story

Details

Adam Ripley

Stephen DeGenaro

Elizabeth Dela Rosa

Matt "Kitten" Neitz

Kristie Xian 

Jonathan Fanta 

Matt Porter 

Abberly Dela Rosa 

Jim Somerville 

Brent Ford 

Wedding Party

Photos

Registry

Q + A

Where do I park?

The parking garage across&nbsp;High Street on Blenkner Street is the best option.&nbsp;

Rachel & Tony

Rachel & Tony

R&T

Wedding Day

Wedding

Reception