In the fall of 2017, our story began at Stony Brook University through the Society of Physics Students (SPS). We both joined the club’s executive board with aspirations of making SPS a more welcoming, supportive community for our diverse student body. As we chased down professors to give seminars, baked dollar-store brownie mixes for fundraising, and brought the club and department together with a cardboard boat, we came to admire and respect each other’s go-getter attitudes and dedication to helping others. Two years later, on the last Saturday of August, we went on our first date at a bistro in Port Jefferson. The food was okay, but the conversation and company were great. Walking along the docks listening to live music under starry skies, we might not have realized it yet, but we had found our best friend for life.
Since graduating college, we’ve been on many adventures together, including moving to Colorado in 2021, driving across the country from New York to California, watching two incredible Buffalo Bills victories, and getting engaged in November of 2024. It is a blessing to mature into an adult with the person you love, but it certainly helps when that person supports you in becoming the best version of yourself.
On the last Saturday of August in 2027, we hope you will join us in celebrating our decade of friendship and love in the village where it all began. Unfortunately, Stony Brook University doesn’t do weddings. Instead, we invite you to the Three Village Inn: a pre-revolutionary homestead at the heart of Stony Brook. Incidentally, the inn was once owned by Ward Melville: the Brooklyn-born philanthropist who donated 400 acres of land and money to establish Stony Brook University in 1957. In the spirit of Ward Melville and our own love story, we hope our wedding is a testament to the joy and fulfillment that comes from loving community and uplifting all.