Ashley and Vince Ortiz’s Wedding

I love to write about our couples and their relationships but Ashley wrote a beautiful account of her love story with Vince and I couldn’t bring myself to change a word….

So let’s start from the very beginning:

The Beginning

The summer of 2005 was a busy one.  I had recently ended a five year relationship, my grandmother had taken a turn for the worst, and I was finishing up my AA degree to get ready to transfer to UF from Santa Fe College.  One day that summer, running late to Calculus III class, as was often the case, I sat in the only remaining empty desk.  It just happened to be in the last row of the classroom… next to a guy that I hadn’t noticed in the couple weeks since the class started, Vince.  I quickly took the seat.  As the professor was calling out pages from our textbook, I peered over at Vince’s desk to the open pages, because I didn’t have my textbook with me.  He immediately looked me in the eye, smiled, and put the book on my desk.  That was it.  That’s all it took.  I was smitten.  Now, of course, I wasn’t even paying attention to anything in the textbook.  I couldn’t stop thinking about this guy next to me and his beautiful green eyes and friendly smile.  I wondered why I hadn’t noticed him before.  (It was probably because I was always late and tried to sneak into the first available desk I could spot.)  When class was over, I thanked him and returned his book.  Shortly after, as I was walking down the hallway to the parking lot, Vince ran out of his next classroom to introduce himself.  He stopped me in the hall, and we chatted about our majors.  I told him that I didn’t know anyone named Vince, other than my Uncle Vince, and that I’d be able to remember his name because of it.  Later that same night, I called my mom to tell her about this guy that I met earlier that day that had the most beautiful bright green eyes and that his name happened to be Vince.

The next time that I saw Vince, I made sure to sit at a bench outside of the classroom, so that he would have to walk past and see me sitting there.  Exactly as I planned, he came to the bench to strike up a conversation with me.  This was when we exchanged phone numbers.  Later that night, we chatted on the phone and got to know each other.  He was so easy to talk to.  It was like we were old friends.  In the next week, we chatted on the phone a few more times and exchanged homework notes in the library.

On Memorial Day weekend, I went to New Smyrna Beach to visit my grandmother who was in failing health and visit with my friends and family.  While at the beach, I received a call from Vince’s phone.  It was his friend, James, calling to tell me that Vince was in the hospital.  He had been in a bad motorcycle accident.  His ankle was completely messed up.  I didn’t really know what to do.  We weren’t dating, but I was sure that we liked each other.  So, I asked James if I should visit Vince in the hospital, and he said yes.  A couple of days later, when I returned to Gainesville, I visited Vince at Shands Hospital.  His mom, stepdad, and grandparents were all in his hospital room.  They introduced themselves and then exited so that I could visit with Vince.  He was in the hospital for three weeks, and I visited him almost every day.  It was convenient that I worked as a valet parking attendant at the hospital.  So, I had a good excuse to go inside and visit him.  On his very last night at the hospital, I stayed in his room to keep him company.  We watched a couple of movies… and had our first kiss.

In the following weeks, his mom would bring him to my apartment, every few days, and he would stay with me.  He was bedridden for about a month, and on crutches for many more.  He rode with me to New Smyrna, crutches and all, for my grandmother’s funeral.  The same summer that I lost someone very special to me, another special person had entered my life.  He told me that no matter what I asked him, he would always tell me truth.  And one of my favorite qualities about him was that he always called when he said he would.  He didn’t play games or keep me guessing about anything.  Vince and I had become inseparable.

In-Between

For the next six years after we met, Vince and I experienced a lot of life together.  A year after his accident, he learned that his ankle would never heal.  He had to have it surgically fused.  He struggled with where his life would take him.  He put school on hold and went back to work.  His father passed away in 2007, before I had the chance to meet him.  I couldn’t even attend the funeral with Vince, in Puerto Rico, because I had final exams.  I was working on getting my bachelor’s degree and worried about finding a job after graduation.

We definitely had a lot of good times together.  Vince took me skeet shooting for the first time and to the springs where he used to hang out in high school.  We went up in his uncle’s hot air balloon, watched fireworks together every July 4^th, snowmobiled through Granite Hot Springs in Wyoming, and visited family in North Carolina, California and New Mexico.  On a trip to a friend’s wedding in Panama, we toured the rainforest, went deep sea fishing, both got sea sick, and still managed to reel in some Tuna and Mahi Mahi.  I graduated from UF, landed a job in Jacksonville, and began classes for my master’s degree.  Vince returned to school at UF to finish his bachelor’s degree, and we adopted two little Beagles, Huey and Duey.

The Proposal

During the summer of 2011, I had to work at Naval Air Station North Island, in San Diego, CA, for eleven weeks.  One of my best friends, Heather, who also works for the Navy, was supposed to come out and visit me for a little vacation.  I was excited when she called and told me that she actually had to travel for work, to Camp Pendleton, near San Diego, for a project that she was working on for the Marines.  She travels frequently for work, so this didn’t sound unusual.  Plus, I had hosted quite a few visitors since I had been there.  My dad came to visit and spend a few days with me.  My mom and a friend of hers came to visit and hang out in San Diego.  I was ready for Heather to be my next visitor.  I thought about making us pedicure appointments, but I didn’t because she hadn’t given me too many details about her trip.  I wasn’t sure what time she’d be finished each night or how many / which nights she’d be able to stay with me.  To be honest, I was a little annoyed that I didn’t have more details about her trip.  When I was finally able to talk to her for more than a couple of minutes on the phone, I asked her more about her itinerary.  She said she’d be there on July 7.  She gave me an airline, flight number, and told me what time to pick her up from the airport.  I even looked online for her flight, to see if it was going to be on-time.  I found her flight number, but the times didn’t quite match up.  I thought that she had just made a mistake with the flight number.

On the afternoon of July 7, I was still at work when I got the text from Heather that her plane had landed.  I texted a reply saying I’d be there shortly.  Once I got to the passenger pick-up area, I called Heather to tell her what my rental car looked like.  She told me that her bags didn’t show up.  This wasn’t unusual, either, because the last time that I picked her up from the airport, her bags got lost.  She told me what she was wearing so that I could spot her after I parked and came inside to wait with her.  She said the baggage counter lady was calling her name to have her fill out paperwork and quickly hung up.  Annoyed that I had to park (because there was so much construction and the regular parking lot was closed), I finally found the temporary lot, parked, and walked for what seemed like two miles just to get to the airport entrance to meet her.

When I walked into the airport, no baggage carousels were moving, and it didn’t even look like any baggage counters were open.  I didn’t see Heather anywhere.  I kept walking to make sure that I looked around all of the baggage carousels, and I thought I saw a guy that looked like Vince sitting at a table.  I quickly shook that idea out of my head when my view of him was blocked.  As I got a little bit closer, I realized that IT WAS VINCE!  I was completely shocked.  He had a bouquet of roses, his golf clubs, and some luggage.  With a huge silly grin on my face, we hugged, and I asked him what he was doing there.  He told me that he had come to visit me.  I’m so gullible that I was still looking around for Heather.  I thought that maybe they had both come to visit me.  That’s when it happened…  To my complete shock, he got down on one knee, right there at baggage carousel #3, and told me that I was the best thing that had ever happened to him and that he wanted to spend the rest of his life with me.  He opened a ring box that held my grandmother’s engagement ring inside and asked me if I would marry him.  I felt like my heart was going to pound out of my chest.  I was completely speechless.  Once I could finally speak, I said “YES” and he slid the ring onto my shaking hand.  A stranger walked up to us and handed Vince back his phone.  He’d asked the stranger to record the entire proposal.

I couldn’t believe that I’d just had two of the biggest surprises of my life.  Vince was staying with me for four weeks during his break from school, and he’d just asked me to marry him.  I could hardly drive us back to my apartment.  I kept making wrong turns and going north when I needed to go south.  I was still in shock, but I wanted to know all of the details.  He told me that he’d been planning it for about a month.  My mother even knew about it when she came to visit me.  It’s nice to know that our families sure can keep a secret.  I didn’t have the slightest idea about any of it.  He said that she had the ring with her when she came to visit me and was going to hide it in my apartment, but decided against it.  So, he met with her to pick it up before he flew to San Diego.  When I asked my mom how he asked her if he could marry me, she said that he called her and said, “I’d like to marry Ashley.  Don’t worry.  I’ll take good care of her.”  She said that it was so sweet, she started to cry.

Today

We’re married!!

Every time I look down at my ring finger, though, I stop and think of my grandparents, married over 50 years, and imagine my grandmother wearing the ring.  Then, I think about what it means for Vince and me: a lifetime of memories to be made.  We can’t wait to start a family of our own!

http://ggevents.net/

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