Love is a high call
I get to marry my best friend and lover, Peter Lundblad!!!
Words can’t quite capture the poetry of this love.
We drove up a winding road from Napa Valley passing vineyards and chasing the light on Saturday, looking for a place to watch the sunset. The day was spent celebrating my 27 years of life (I ate cake for breakfast), sipping cappuccinos at States Coffee in Benicia and Wine Tasting at Calmère Estates in Napa (fun to visit my UCSB teammate Katie Records at work!). I suggested we go chase the sunset while we explored Napa, not an unusual request from a poet who has FOMOS (Fear Of Missing out on Sunset). We turned at the top of the mountain at a sign that read “rough road” at the top. There was a property for sale off the road that happened to have a bench overlooking the Sonoma Valley as the sun danced down on the horizon in a golden hue of joy. With perfectly unmanicured nails and joy in finding a perfect sunset spot I sat down next to Peter on the bench (thanks God for the miraculous proposal spot that was completely spontaneous). Next thing I knew, he was down on one knee with a stunning ring (*female-owned and conflict free design*) asking to chase light together for life. A few giddy squeals later I declared the easiest "YES" of my life. I was so excited, I wanted to give Peter a ring too and made one out of some wildflowers. Creator, Artist, God decided to turn up the vibrance in the sunset as we watched Venus ( the brightest planet named after the Roman goddess of love and beauty) appear on the horizon and day turned to dusk. This is just the beginning of a lifelong journey of discovering new depths of love.
----
I met Peter in the 4-minute pass-the-peace at Reality SF Church two years ago the day they began their “dating and relationships” series. I'm sure God laughed as I jokingly told my sister en route to church “Maybe I’ll meet my husband today!”. I was living in Paris and coming out of a dark night of the soul and back home visiting family and friends for a week. Peter remembers me asking "What are you passionate about?" in that short moment of eternity (you can listen to the sermon “Marriage as commitment” here that was given that day). My therapist had encouraged me earlier that year to practice presence, giving the tangible example of focusing on one person in the pass-the-peace moment rather than meeting all twenty people around me. In the process of healing and finding freedom, I met Peter in the midst of the mess of life. I slipped a sheet of Mrs. Grossman's stickers onto his journal after service with my instagram handle (I didn't have a US number or business card). He slid into my DMs and showed up to my door with freshly baked sourdough bread and ended up meeting my entire family that evening. When he left, everyone asked "who is the bread boy?!". My brother even asked me "what's your plan for dating this year?" in which my response had to do with the beauty of being single mixed with a bitterness from a lot of pain in this area of my life. I secretly asked Peter if he'd like to grab a coffee the day before I flew back to Paris. We met at the Ferry Building and felt like time stopped. He had to leave for the airport for a work trip, which I found out 6 months later he changed his flight to be able to meet up (oh la la!). We wrote letters and slowly got to know one another across the ocean.
I came back to California for New Years 2020 and he once again showed up to my doorstep with fresh sourdough- the way to a girl's heart who lived in France. We held hands on our first date and began dating despite 5,000 miles of distance. He booked a ticket to Paris and arrived March 11, the eve of borders closing due to the pandemic. We went from long distance to quarantine as his flights home were cancelled. It was a grand adventure amidst total chaos. Peter means rock in Greek. Truly, this has been a rock in some very uncertain times. Our first grocery shopping experience was apocalyptic yet somehow we found joy in the trials 2020 brought. He eventually found a flight home amidst the unknown. Little did we know borders would remain closed and eventually I made the difficult decision to move back mid-pandemic with an expired visa, a few overweight bags and not sure what the future held. Fall was full of culture shock and transition and figuring out this season of in-between. Winter brought a tempest of my own soul searching and process. Peter has been ever patient with me in waiting, providing space and a listening ear when I needed to get back in touch with God's calling for my life. Spring came with new hopes and plans for the future. Then, as if the world stopped all over again for our family, my mom was diagnosed with stage four cancer. I felt for the first time all year, home in Martinez was exactly where I was supposed to be.
The past few months I have been learning to take one day at a time, be present and pray without ceasing. Peter and I have had to navigate some wild "rough roads" these past two years, but I am confident, like this proposal, that God has placed a space of refuge and rest amidst it all. Like that bench in the middle of a future foundation for a home overlooking the sunset, love is full of surprises and unexpected paths. We are thrilled to step out in faith this season and plan a wedding (aka an Agape Love Feast), but most importantly, prepare for a marriage. We invite you to join us in this journey in prayer and any wisdom you have in love. Love indeed is a high call, a good story, and a never ending poem…
…A few fun photos from the past 2 years of “getting to know” one another from across the ocean
cutest sister hannah on our bike ride from church that day, peter also snapped a photo of his secret note .
A month in California, we reunited after 5 months of exchanging letters on New Years of 2020… We made it “official” after a few weeks of quality time together… Peter booked his tickets to Paris for March 11 (you know what’s next…). We had 2 days in Paris to explore before borders were closed and a lockdown was announced. Peter’s flights canceled, we made the most of it in my studio at La Fondation des Etats Unis: I wrote my Masters thesis, and Peter cooked, baked and created all day! Marissa Wu took our portraits on film the day before lockdown in the streets of Paris, they got developed 3 months later and hold such a beautiful memories!
Back to America…. After 6 months of distance and facetime calls, my visa was expired and I decided to come back to California. Peter met me at the airport and handled all my “heavy baggage” (literally and figuratively) as I transitioned back to life in America during a pandemic, election and wildfires. These past 10 months have been full of adventure, thick and thin, figuring things out and cappuccino dates. One thing has remained: WE ARE IN LOVE… the best is yet to come!
