Jenna and Rory. They have a wonderful love story of two families who spent summers on the same lake. And since Jenna is a writer I'm going to let her tell you in her own words because they will sound much better than if I wrote them. Jenna and Rory got married on a mild fall day at a quaint restaurant called the Black Forest Inn, that they said "felt like the cottage", so it was the perfect place for these two cottagers to get married.
OUR STORY - by Jenna
Rory and I met on Go Home Lake in our early 20ies. Both our families had been cottaging at the lake for many years and so our childhoods summers where spent side by side without realizing it. As we got older, our friend groups converged a few times at larger gatherings and that’s when we learned about each other.
I can honestly say that it definitely wasn't love at first sight! But there was always a sort of draw towards each other.
My last university summer at the lake Rory happened to be coming up and going to the same parties as me nearly every weekend. He started to make it very obvious he was interested and I avoided him like the plague! I was leaving that fall to teach abroad in England and seeing someone was the farthest thing on my mind. I eventually gave in and we saw each other a few times in smaller groups or alone. Instead of just being that guy who was Kelly's cousin and friends with Robbie and Ryan he became Rory … someone with a little more substance then he ever let on.
3 days before I boarded the plane to England for a least a year, I saw him again. When it was time to leave I said good-bye to him in the front seat of his gold, Toyota Corolla with a kiss that I hoped conveyed the message that I liked him more than I wanted to. As I pulled away to leave, he looked at me with sad, almost defeated eyes … then in a strong and excited voice said "Go and rock it in England."
I'm sorry but here is where it gets totally sappy - my heart exploded and I literally stepped out of his car feeling elated, higher than a kite on energy alone… this man did not want me to go, but he never said that once. Instead he let me go and encouraged me to rock this adventure I was about to embark on! It was the first time that I had felt so connected to someone but entirely free at the same time.
I got on that plane, and felt this insane need to keep him up to date on my travels. We stayed in touch, and slowly what started as occasional bbm's become daily bbm's and then occasional Skype dates, until it was that Rory was one of the few people on the other side of the world who knew nearly as much as me about what I was experiencing in the UK.
Middle of winter and I happened to mention during one of our Skype dates how cool it would be if he could come visit … never did I dream he would, but he did. Only his second time ever on a plane was to cross the ocean and meet me at Heathrow Airport in London England.
There is this funny thing about distance… When you mentally understand that a person is closer then farther away from you, you can feel them again. This happened when I woke up the morning of his arrival…
When I got to the arrival gates I discovered his plane had landed … energy overload … I danced around in arrivals trying and failing to plan how I would greet him, broken thoughts never properly connecting because a new one was already replacing it. Eventually I became distracted with how beautiful the arrivals gate is and became lost in the loving embraces travelers were giving to their loved ones waiting for them. The arrivals gate is probably one of the best places in the world. Then without any preparation, Rory was standing in front of me. He was looking away from me, which gave me a split second to take him in. He was wearing jeans, a tucked in plaid shirt and a baseball cap and all the anxiety I was feeling left me. Without even thinking, I called his name, he turned and we went to each other. He was taller then I remembered and I was shorter then he remembered… we laughed nervously and then we proceeded into London. May I also point out that this day happened to be my 25th birthday… memorable to say the least! When it was finally time to get on a train to Chelmsford, and my awaiting flat, we had already fallen into something we knew was beyond us. We never said it out loud; we just let this energy exist between us and embarked on one of the most amazing weeks of our lives... the beginning of our story.
The energy, the connection we had for each other and the feeling of freedom he gave me, those were all amazing and incredible things; but it was all the challenges and the choices we made within those challenges … the combination of all of these things together that have put us standing in front of each other and saying "I Do."
I can’t wait to see where our story will take us next. Here is to love and freedom, and to taking the risk and boarding the plane even when you can’t fully know the future.
