Richie's Story:
It was one hot day in May. I got a call from my cousin Ben, “Hey, Owusuwa is having a get-together in about an hour. I can pick you up in 30 minutes man” Owusuwa, aka, Eunice Adegoke, being the amazing cook that she is, I couldn’t not go. So, Ben picked me up right away, and when we got there, true to form, Eunice had cooked up a storm and invited a few close friends over. Sola had the music going and he was ready to unleash on the dance floor. I saw Odi in the kitchen and immediately thought, “This must be the girl that Sola and Eunice have been dropping hints about for the past couple of years.” As I sat there thinking of how I’m going to approach this beautiful girl and ask her out, Sola headed to the garage to pick up something, I followed him, and I’m like, “Is this the girl you and Eunice have been talking about?” Before I could even finish my sentence, Sola goes, “You Ghana boys work too slow! A Naija boy would be there, spitting game right now!” For the next 15- 20 minutes I contemplated how I was going to make my move. Then the time came for us to dance- this girl can clearly dance and dance very well. Not that I can’t dance, but I have a condition known as two left feet syndrome, so this wasn’t the time to make a fool of myself. All this added to my anxiety about asking her out. It took some convincing but I finally danced and at the end of the night invited Odi to come to check out my monthly happy hour group. I knew I had a chance when we kept texting all night and then picking right back up the next morning. Then hours of phone conversion each night. I finally asked her out and for some reason, she said yes. And again, she said yes when I proposed on the month of the anniversary of our meeting 3 years later.
Odi's Story:
We met on Memorial Day, 2018. I remember it was hot as hell. I didn't want to go anywhere really but my really good friends, Sola and Eunice were hosting a BBQ. I planned to go late as a typical Nigerian and show up when the food was ready, stalling for as long as possible. I’m preparing to relax in bed with a good horror movie, and the next thing I know, Sola sends a text to the effect of, “You better show early cos Richard is coming.” I blanked for a second, like, which one consign me, consign Richard??? Then I remembered, oh, the Ghanaian guy they’ve been saying they would introduce me to for like, 2 years now (eye roll). I had given up on that promise honestly but omo, once I read that text your babe sat up so fast, lol. I grabbed my fav green summer dress, white sneaks, and braided wig… Oga will see my real hair one year into the relationship if he’s lucky! That's how your girl mustered her ‘freshest babe’ vibes and headed over to chop free food and check out man.
So I get there, eating only light chops, (cos my breath gotta stay fresh) wondering when their boy will show. Richie comes in with his cousin, Ben. I sha gave him like 30 mins, like ok, he’s going to walk up and say a proper hi. Nothing. I started thinking “ What’s doing this one?” Sola opens the dance floor. Me, I enter to give them my best moves. Richie is just standing in the corner staring. I’m like, doesn’t he dance? Sola goes “Richie come and dance, give us your moves”. Nothing. By this time I’m wondering, what African doesn't dance at a party? Finally, Richie agrees to dance with us the masses. We take a water break and he strikes up a conversation with me, we chat a little and the next thing I know he’s asking if I want to check out this group he organizes. I'm like, sure no problem. But then he started to head out without my number …as in two more steps in the opposite direction and he would have been friend-zoned. But then he turned around and asked for my contact info.
When I got home that night, he texted me, so obviously I used that opportunity to tease him about his shakara earlier. He responded with a dry but witty comeback, and we texted back and forth for like, 3 hrs that night. It was wonderful. It felt so natural, like talking to someone I had known for a long time. He then asked me out under the guise of “Let’s meet up so I can tell you more about the group I facilitate”. Sure. We met up at Red Rabbit for happy hour and he was already there and that’s when I really saw him well well. THE MUSCLES. I won’t lie, it's his arm muscles that reeled me in. And he was wearing a fitted, custom, button-down shirt. I was like, ok, let’s see how this goes! :) We ended up walking over to Freehouse (now our spot) for grilled chicken wings and hung out till 10p, we even shared an uber ride back and he asked me out again. Four years later, here we are planning our wedding!
Our first year anniversary
Odi: Richie tricked me. Period. But I’ll let him tell the story.Richie: I invited Odi out to happy hour to “chat about this professional monthly hour I host”. Lol. Of course, I had a hidden agenda. I wanted to use this opportunity to figure out her interest in going out with me.
During our “first date”, we realized that we had actually, sorta, kinda, met before at our friend’s birthday a few years ago and we have some friends in common.
Odi: Richie and I hit it off very naturally in person, just like with our texts, and we chatted for a long time about everything under the sun except the “Black professional monthly hour” thing. So much so that we went from the first spot to another. Richie said Freehouse had one of the best grilled chicken wings, which, no, it’s ok but yea, no. Anyways, we walked over there, ordered chicken wings, and gisted long into the night.
Richie: We hung out till closing time then shared an Uber ride back home. On the way home I was already planning my next move to hang out with Odi again.
Our first year anniversary
Odi: I happened to have one of my major academic conferences around our first year anniversary, so Richie and I used that opportunity to plan a trip to the DMV area to celebrate this milestone. It was a wonderful time. We hung out with my school friends, and one of my best friends, Ruth, and her family. During this time we also affirmed that besides really liking each other, we were very aligned in what we appreciate- art, music, museums, and our values. This experience really deepened our relationship and I knew it was time to start introducing him to my family.
Getting the ring
Richie: I had known for a long time, about 6 months after we met, that I wanted to pop the question, but the when and how weren’t clear. In May of 2020, I called two people, Moji and Eunice, two of Odi’s best friends who knew the most about our relationship at this point. This was the initial call to let them know that I was “thinking of thinking of the proposal” and to get a sense of if Odi felt the same about potentially getting married to me. A couple of months later, I made three sets of calls. One, to Odi’s Mum to ask for her hand in marriage. The next call was to a couple of family members to announce my intentions and the last to a couple of Odi’s close friends who looped in a couple of other very close friends. I told everyone to keep it on the low.
Shortly after, the search for the right ring began. I had an idea of the type of ring she would like. I called Eunice and Moji separately and they both confirmed that I was right. After a three-month search, at the beginning of December, I finally nailed it down. I got the ring and kept it hidden in my brother, Francis' house, waiting for the right time to propose.The proposal
Richie: Initially, I had wanted to do it in December, but I remembered Moji had given me the heads up that birthdays and holidays were off limits. So I came up with the idea to take a couple of weeks off to Florida and work remotely from there in January…which Odi shitted on schedule-wise. We moved it to March but that still didn't work out because Odi started preparing for her PhD candidacy exam. She eventually agreed to go to Florida in May. May! Who does that? Especially when Minnesota finally had good weather! But that's what worked best for her schedule, so we headed out to Fort Lauderdale at the end of April for about a week.I had planned to propose the night before our scheduled road trip from Fort Lauderdale to Key West, but guess who worked all night and in fact, pulled an all-nighter? Yea. The next morning felt like that perfect now or never moment, and so I decided to propose right then before we headed out the door. As we were packing and trying to rush out the door, I told her to stop everything. I took her by her hand and told her how important she is to me and how I want to spend the rest of my life with her. Then I got down on one knee, pulled out the ring, and asked her to marry me.
Odi: At first when Richie suggested we go to Florida for a few days to change scenery during the panorama, I thought it was great because we had talked about it the year before. But then he started pushing to go in February or early March specifically, and I started getting suspicious cos, why then?? Also, I had started prepping for my school exam so I was like yea, no, I needed to focus on that first. So we decided on the end of April/early May and I put the trip aside to focus on exam prep. I passed (yay) and we got on a plane to Fort Lauderdale. We had promised to free up some time during our trip to explore, bond and just enjoy the trip, but then I had to present at two conferences and finish a grant proposal to fund my dissertation work. I know… booooooo! Anyways, I tried to wrap up work as quickly as I could, but I pretty much had to pull an all-nighter on one of the evenings we were there. The exact night I promised him we could go out and chill. I felt BAD. Ugh. But he was so sweet about the whole thing.I literally finished work at around 6:30a the next day, May 1st, and even though my right eye was twitching and I was running on fumes and adrenaline, I convinced Richie we didn't have to postpone the road trip to Key West for the day. I showered and packed a day bag in record time. Lol. As we were heading out for the day, Richie stopped me and held my hand. I thought he was going to try to convince me to just stop and rest. Before I could object, he started saying something about our relationship and jwhuhrfwa rhurhwrhf ugrfrwrfhj, or at least that's what it sounded like to me because, at this point, I was in a daze. All I could think was, Oh shit, this is really happening! Before I knew it, my guy got on one knee and pulled out the most beautiful ring box ever. Seriously, I kept admiring the box and had to bring myself to focus on the actual ring that was inside. The ring was so beautiful and PERFECT. He asked me to marry him and I said yes! Then I went back to admiring my ring. I was on cloud 10 the rest of the day and kept taking pictures, singing, and recording us with the ring the whole trip to Key West, a corny AF moment. He must have been sick of me (he wasn’t) but your girl was too happy.
Richie: Odi, will always be my first priority.
Odi: I am truly grateful for this special gift of Richie in my life. He is an integral part of my peace. Even though I am bound to make mistakes, I promise to handle this gift with the utmost care, to water it, to tend to it so that it continually bears the most beautiful harvest.