​As we sat down to write “Our Story”, we wanted to do our best to spare you of the boring boy-meets-girl saga.  We wanted to make it a bit more fresh.  

So instead of just writing out the day-to-day details of how we totally fell for each other, we wired up a mike, and we walked through our meeting live – together – for you.  Here is the (slightly edited) transcript below…enjoy!

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The Meeting​


Location: Penn Station, LIRR Terminal, New York City, NY, USA
Date: May 24, 2008
Time: 8:00 a.m. EST.

Alison:
Well, it was the hustle and bustle of a Saturday morning at Penn Station on a holiday weekend, when the fateful meeting happened.  Zach and his group of 10 friends – all in pastel “We’re Ready for Summer” polos - piled into a train that was standing room only for the long 3-hour trip out to the beaches of Long Island.  Miserable.  I couldn’t wait to get away from him.  The last thing I wanted was to be next to a group of hung-over 20-somethings.

Zach:
Apparently that’s actually the first thing that she wanted because when the train switched at Jamaica, I found her sandwiched in the very middle of us.  She was very good looking.  But she looked a little older.  I remember that.  I remember she was wearing a green shirt.  But I remember thinking that she was very attractive.

Alison:
“She looked a little bit older?”  Awesome.  Are you going to write that and show people this?  I can’t believe that’s the first thing you’re putting on our wedding website.  Yes, we got on the train; I was stuck between them.  His friend horrifyingly asked me for my water.  I always have water everywhere I go, as everyone knows, because I’m very prepared to fight dehydration – and I was really grossed out.  I just gave him the full bottle.

Zach:
Yes, she gave the entire bottle of water to him.  I remember that.  And it was annoying because the way the train was, this hot girl just gave my friend a bottle of water, and I was effectively boxed out of the conversation.  Not only could I not get water – I was thirsty too - I couldn’t talk to this hot, older girl based on how I was positioned in the aisle. 

Alison:
I remember Zach’s friend’s breath smelled really bad, and his friends and him kept talking about “how crazy last night was”.  So dorky.  There was nothing to do for 2.5 hours, so I had to stand and I had to talk to them.  And then Zach started talking to me, and I thought he was nice and cute, and he saved me.  I thought he was nice.  I heard he worked at Goldman, where one of my exes worked, and I was especially curious.  We talked about our favorite websites – we debated Thrillest v. Urban Daddy - and what neighborhoods we were from – I’ll never forget he thought I was a Nolita girl. 

Zach:
Somehow I had maneuvered my way to talk to her, and it was great.  I remember we were laughing a lot.  The Nolita thing really fired her up.  She thought she was an Upper East Sider, and she was so proud about that.  I lived downtown, and I was very hung up on the Nolita-artist scene, so maybe me saying that was more hopeful than realistic.  Nonetheless, we talked a lot about New York and what the different neighborhoods meant.​​
 

Alison:
I said I was a West Village girl.  Not Upper East Side.  And we also talked about how your sister was training for a triathlon.  Supposedly.  Or did you make that up?  And you know I wasn’t wearing a green shirt.  You were wearing a green shirt.  And I thought you were such losers for wearing matching outfits.  The epitome of what I hated about guys working in finance in New York.  That was you.​​
 

Zach:
Okay, let’s get back to the story here.  Tell everyone how you fell in love with me.



Alison:
I remember the first thing that struck me about you was your smile.  It was so welcoming.  It made me want to talk to you.  Even though I got boxed back in by your friend again.  I remember you passing through and waving good-bye to me and saying that we’d talk again.  Even though we had no way of talking again! 



Zach:
Yes, we got off the train, and I remember thinking to myself, “This is the girl I’m going to marry”.  Those moments you only hear about in sappy stories; that happened to me.  I just knew it.  But I didn’t even know her last name!  I was screwed.





And Then Fate Helps Out a Little Bit…



Location: 1 New York Plaza, 49th Floor.  New York, NY, USA.
Date: May 27, 2008
Time: 3:05 p.m. EST.

Zach:
On Tuesday, when we all got back from the holiday – I’ll never forget it.  At the end of the day, I turned to my buddy on the desk Julian, and I was telling him about this girl I met.  This girl Alison.  And after I was finished talking about her, and lamenting that I didn’t have her last name, somewhere from a few desks down a guy yells out, “Alison Koplar?  The girl you met, are you talking about Alison Koplar? Cornell girl, used to run track?”  I didn’t even know this guy had been listening to our conversation.  Turns out that he was Alison’s ex-boyfriend.



I brushed off the comment, and I, of course, immediately hit Facebook.  Yes, we’re a product of Facebook love.  Believe it.  And I couldn’t find her at first – she spells Alison with only one “l” and Koplar is tough too.  I first tried “Coppler” and then “Copplar” and…you get the idea.  It was annoying, but I finally found her.  And then I typed up a message and pushed send.  Facebook keeps an archive with all the old messages, which is pretty neat.  I’ll include the message on the website.

Alison:
You’re going to show people the message?  That’s bold. 

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Alison:
We obviously didn’t know each other that well at that point.  Brooklyn?  Really?  Are we going to include my response? 

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Alison:
Haha, that’s funny.  That was a funny response.  At least I was consistent.  I still won’t go to Brooklyn for a drink.





From The Outside Looking In…



Location: New York City, NY, USA.
Date: Summer 2008



Zach:
All throughout summer, we bantered back and forth on Facebook, but we never were able to meet up.  In fact, no phone numbers were even exchanged.  Reading the archived Facebook messages is a bit strange – in one of them, I had to go to my brother’s high school graduation in Texas - he’s now graduated college and working at an investment bank.  Pretty amazing.  Time flies.

Alison:
To give you the idea of how fast time flies, those were the ages of my Motorola RAZR phone.  I kept losing my phone that summer.   The funny thing is, I think I still have that phone saved in a drawer somewhere in case I had to go ‘back to the future’ – what I thought that phone was.



Zach:
Yes, she kept losing her phone, or so she said.  It was the kind of thing where I would write her something on Facebook to me, and she wouldn’t respond for two weeks, and then she’d pop out of nowhere, say something funny, and I’d be intrigued all over again.  After a few months, we exchanged numbers, and we talked for an hour or so on the phone.  I remember – I was on Andy’s rooftop deck during a party and just stepped away.  I heard she was a runner, and I challenged her to a foot race.  She freaked out.



Alison:
I didn’t freak out.  I just had never heard the term “Foot race” before and thought it was odd that you used it.  I remember thinking you would be great to setup with one of my friends who had just gotten out of a relationship.  I asked you if you were single, and I think I might have given you some false hope at the time.

Zach:
So you weren’t interested?



Alison:
I didn’t think I was.  It just wasn’t a question.  I was dating someone at the time, so it wasn’t something I was focused on.

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Zach:
Of course, I had no idea at the time that she was dating someone.  No idea at all.



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And…The Axe Came Down

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Location: Murray Hill, New York, NY
Date: August 14, 2008
Time: 10:00 p.m. EST

Zach:
After a few conversations, I couldn’t wait to meet her, yet she was always so evasive.  It was strange, but I didn’t really think anything of it.  And then one night, when I was at my buddy’s house, I got a text, “Can you meet me on 34th street?”  I bolted without saying a word, and here’s the email I wrote (with minor editing) to them the next morning.
--

To:  Ari <******@gmail.com>, Jeffrey <*******@gmail.com>,  "<Andy********@gmail.com> 

Date: Fri, Aug 15, 2008 at 1:24 PM

Subject: The black swan​
 

--​
 

From Wikipedia:

Black Swan.  In English, when the phrase was coined, the “Black Swan” was presumed not to exist.  This phrase was a common expression in 16th century London as a statement of impossibility.  After Dutch explorer Willem de Vlamingh discovered black swans in Western Australia in 1697, the term metamorphosed to connote that a perceived impossibility might later be disproven. 

The importance of the simile lies in its analogy to the fragility of any system of thought.   A set of conclusions is potentially undone once any of its fundamental postulates is disproved. 

Gentlemen,

After pulling such a stunt as I did last night, I felt I owed you all an explanation and an apology. I mean, sure, the night was shaping up to be a rained-out-Olympic-viewing session, but giugee was in town, Ari was chomping at the bit after cleansing himself and Andy was ready to get his Andy on. We were a dangerous foursome in a land that lacks foursomes comprised of members from Florida, Texas, and New Mexico. So in light of that, I apologize for bailing. But, as you'll see, I had to.​
 

This girl, her name is Ally, has been my black swan this summer - the unattainable girl that
shows enough interest to keep you hooked yet never allows you to fully pull the trigger. Ari, I think, has felt that pain too. It's a real driving pain - akin to an emotional blue-ball that has driven me to speed dial my exes. But I digress.



Ally is the consummate showgirl - supermodel face, beautiful lips, personality that always keeps you guessing...She had my heart from day 1 and over the past 3 months, we've been back and forth. On Andy's rooftop one night, she and I had an hour long discussion that had left me in love and ready for a first date. (vouch for this Andy??) And last night, after recognizing my hook had been baited, she called when we were in the middle of women's gymnastics - was she drunk? I think. Ready to meet up? Check. At that point, I made the decision to take off. I hope you all understand.​
 

After playing a game of "guess where I am on 34th street!!", we ended up at the romantic Joshua Tree. About an hour passes of genuinely enjoyable conversation. We laughed, we shared stories, we "connected". We got up to leave the bar, we paid the check, and when I was feeling particularly good about myself, I turned to her and asked it - "want to do a dinner?" I said. She started laughing...and then, a recoil. "I can't. I need to tell you something."



Oh no. This can't be happening. Oh no. I felt like the Japanese boy looking to the sky, watching the Atom bomb fall. The heart sinks, the game's about to end – and rather unfairly too, the little boy thinks. The fresh air outside of J-Tree was suddenly not as comfortable as the confines within, and I wanted to be back at the bar, drinking midori sours, sipping water on ice, and acting like a fool in love. But Pandora's Box had been cracked. There was no turning back.

"I have a boyfriend," she said. Ouch.  Ego gone?  Check. Heart ripped out? Check. 3 months of hoping, down the drain? Check.  Still hopeful though? Truthfully, yes I was.​
 

"We've been dating for 6 years."  Hope now gone? Check. All of a sudden, my mind was racing, thinking thoughts like, "why didn't I ask her this when I met her? Why am I such a fool? Did I really just spend 42 dollars and tip generously so that this girl with a boyfriend would be impressed?" But alas, my soul crumbled. I felt like a lost man.​
 

And so the story goes, gentlemen. 

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I might never see Ally again; we might end up getting married. The unpredictability of two sets of emotions coming together at an exact point in time create nothing more than a cacophony of what essentially is the makeup of our life.



Thank you for being my moral support in such a time of greater understanding - you are all my friends and in my eyes, true gentlemen.”
--



Hurry Up and Wait



Location: New York City, NY, USA
Date: Winter 2008, Spring and Summer 2009



Over the next 6-9 months we did see each other often, getting to know one another more and more.  Given Ali was in a relationship, we always worked to keep arm’s distance and be respectful of that. And that’s sort of what it was about – we just really, really loved spending time together and getting to know one another.

In reality though, both of us were living very different, separate lives.  While Ali stayed in her relationship, Zach dated other girls.   

Zach:
Although I was dating other girls, the times that I would be hanging with Ali always left me wanting to see her more.  My friends kept asking me, “Why do you even spend time with her at all given she’s dating someone?”, and for me, the response was always, “how do you not want to talk to the girl that you’re going to marry?”  At that point, I didn’t care who she was dating, I just knew that she’d be the girl that I would marry.  I had complete conviction. 

And you know where this is going next!  Ali ultimately split with her boyfriend in late spring 2009, and we spent the summer hanging out occasionally.  After a date that ended very late in the night at the tail end of summer, we had our first kiss outside of Ali’s apartment, only blocks away from 34th street!  And the rest, as they say, is history!