Building a Relationship on Laughter, and Monthly Meetings

Though he admitted he was not prepared for a critical relationship when the 2 reconnected, as they continued to see one another over the next months, Mr. Singley, a graduate of Bradley University who was born in Bettendorf, Iowa, and raised in Orion, Ill., stated he grew to become “crazy about Julie.”

By October 2019, when Ms. Fogel introduced up their relationship standing, Mr. Singley was able to commit. “Julie had become the love of my life,” he stated. That December, his love for her grew even deeper “when I was sick with pneumonia and eventually hospitalized,” Mr. Singley added. “She refused to leave my side.”

After the lease on her Chicago residence resulted in May 2020, she moved into his condominium within the metropolis’s West Loop neighborhood. Living collectively, they relished of their love for laughter and realized to just accept their completely different habits by speaking them by throughout a casual month-to-month assembly. “We communicate to avoid resentment, and always give each other space when needed,” Ms. Fogel stated.

On August 20, 2021, Mr. Singley stunned Ms. Fogel with a proposal at his household’s residence on Lake Summerset in Davis, Ill. It included a wholesome dose of the humor that had first drawn her to him. “I got down to propose then dropped a fake ring in the lake,” Mr. Singley stated. “I was amazed that she consoled me and didn’t get upset.”

When he dropped to his knee a second time with the right ring, she stated sure. “We kissed and I cried,” Ms. Fogel stated. They celebrated the second with each of their households, his on-site and hers by way of FaceTime.

The couple had been married April 23 on the Peninsula Chicago lodge earlier than 175 friends. Chris Johnston, a buddy of Mr. Singley’s and a Universal Life Church minister, officiated.