Since I have started college, whenever I happen to run into someone from home, the conversation doesn’t get very far without the question “How is Noah?”. I’m not mad about this, I mostly find it funny. It was pretty impossible to know one of us without knowing the other. We were a team, and still are even though we are apart. When I get that question, I also get a little feeling of pride because I know that most of the time people aren’t asking this just to make small talk, they ask because they have likely had the opportunity to know and love Noah Borgdorff for the crazy, exciting, and eccentric person that he is.

It is weird to have zero plans for valentines day…not that our schedules really allowed for us to have plans before, and if I am completely honest, I have been dreading this day for months. I wish that we were at my house drinking slurpies from 7/11 and watching basketball, but we can’t always get what we want.

So today, I have decided to celebrate Noah (in the least awkward way possible) not just for the way that he loves me, but for the way that he loves people in general. I went through a box with over four years of letters to try to formulate this super sophisticated “hallmark-esque” post, but then I just laughed at how poorly that would characterize our situation. For us, it has NEVER been like that. We have rarely ever take ourselves seriously and have, for the most part, created a relationship that works best for us. I am proud of that. So instead, I wrote down some favorite memories as well as the parts of Noah’s personality that make me proud to know and love him. As I did this, I realized that it was very likely that writing this down on paper was doing much more for me than it will likely do for anyone else, but nonetheless…

I hope they make you smile.

Noah Borgdorff once snuck a disposable camera into the Van Gogh museum in Amsterdam (which is illegal) just to take a picture of my favorite painting for me.

In high school, he rarely ever turned away a teammate or classmate in need of a ride no matter the distance.

He bought me a pair of $100 Birkenstocks so that we would have matching tan lines

He frequently makes me dance with him inside OR outside of restaurants whenever my “attitude problem” starts to flare up (shrugs)

After an argument about why I think Ohio is the worst state ever, he then proceeded to mail me an actual buckeye he found on the ground… in an envelope….I am not lying.

He is always game for a 3-4 hour road trip to the west side of the state.

He already has his Instagram caption for when he turns 40.

He continues to raise the bar for me every birthday, and to give you some insight as to what that means, his plans for my 15th birthday included him coming to my house at 6:30 in the morning to decorate both the inside and the outside of my house.

The love that he shows for his family looks like something out of a movie. I’m not kidding, it is so cool.

This past fall he put together packages for the homeless and then drove around Cincinnati giving them out to people in need. Wow.

Lastly, the other day I was talking to him about how frustrating it was for me to try and find a way to fund my trip to Nicaragua, and the first thing he asked me was if I prayed about it. Wow.

I know what you’re thinking, “wow he’s perfect”, but let’s not let him get a big head just because I carefully left out all of the odd smells and loud annoying noises.

Even though we won’t be together for at least a few more months, I don’t wanna waste this awesome (made up) holiday being sad when I could celebrate how clumsily we fell in love and how much it has blessed my life.

And to Noah, thanks for growing up with me and for being such an amazing example of how Christ wants us to love others.

See you soon.