Mike and Linda first met in our English class as eighth graders at Pryor Junior High.  That school year moved from the 1960s to the 1970s.  Viet Nam was still raging.  The Beatles broke up that year.  But in our little town, all was still innocent. We spent Friday nights at football games. We listened to songs by Chicago, Led Zepellin, and Three Dog Night at each other's houses.  We all had Hang Ten shirts. Destin was still considered "out of town," and when you reached the Green Knight you had gone a long way.

Each day we longed to be at the high school across the street- Choctaw! Another high school opened that year that changed some relationships forever as we were divided on different sides of town.

In May, 1974, graduation day finally came, and it was off into the real world to find our destinies and adventures.

Through the years we continued to keep in touch, mainly at class reunions. Each time we saw or spoke to each other we caught up on the old days and heard about each other's current successes.

It is hard to say where the road of life will take us. Mike's career in information technology took him away from the Ft. Walton Beach area, and Linda, too, left the area as she started her teaching career in Jacksonville.  We still stayed friends through our classmates and reunions.

In the summer of 2010, a casual meeting at TGIFriday's led to a deepening of our friendship.  It was not unlike any other time we got together- two friends sharing life's good parts and losses.  We left the meeting just like we always did, but fate had another idea.   Little did we know that this time would be different.

That meeting led to a year of long airplane rides, long telephone calls and countless text messages.  At the end of the year, however, we found ourselves together in our hometown once again.  This time in love.

On July 9, 2011, we got engaged and started planning our New Year's Eve wedding.

Our wedding ceremony will take place at Shalimar United Methodist Church at 6 pm on Dec. 31, 2011.  We want this to be an intimate ceremony so we are inviting just our family and closest friends.

The reception is at the Emerald Coast Convention Center on Okaloosa Island in Ft. Walton Beach.  We plan to have not only a wedding reception, but the best New Year's Eve party ever!  There will be lots of surprises for everyone who attends. We will have a live band and will bring in 2012 with champagne.

Although we are starting the new year as Mr. and Mrs. we are delaying our honeymoon until March where we plan to spend a week in Honolulu, Hawaii. Truly a dream honeymoon!