Yeah, that's a lie. He (and I sometimes) is just afraid that people are quick to judge couples who met on their mission. But hey, that's our story. So before you judge, hear us out...
Tyler arrived in Armenia in August 2005. He served in two areas before his third, Charentsavan. The day he got there I also arrived in Armenia, in April 2006. My first area? Charentsavan. So there the four of us were, my companion and I, Tyler's companion and him. We like to call Charentsavan "the char." Char in Armenian means evil and yeah, you feel like you're in the twilight zone up there. Tyler and I were both there for five months together while he survived being a branch president and I survived my first area, learning the language, learning to eat the food, learning to find and teach, and learning to love it.
So while I left in September to my second area, Gyumri, Tyler pushed out a few more months in the char, serving as branch president.
My third area was Ararat, a tiny little town that took about fifteen minutes to walk completely through. While there, Tyler was my zone leader. He was the easiest zl I ever had. Nightly phone calls consisted of: "Hey Sister Bridges, how was your day?" "Good." "Great! Well, talk to you tomorrow." Awesome. Who liked those nightly phone calls anyway? Most zone leaders dragged them on, wanting to know everything you did that day, how your goals were going, etc. Personally, I hated it.
Tyler left Armenia in June 2007. I remember seeing him shortly before he left and asking him how he felt about it. He was cool, calm, and collected as usual. Two months later I left as well.
So obviously you can tell there were no sinful feelings toward each other on the mission. We got to know each other well for those five months in Charentsavan, especially on our "double dates" as Tyler liked to call them (district meetings every week) and dining out at "Stromboli's," some nasty restaurant, well the only restaurant, in Charentsavan. How did I feel about him? Eh, he was another elder. I thought he was pretty cool and that maybe we could be friends back home. How did he feel about me? Eh, I was another sister. I guess that's not a great thing though. Before my mission, I had no idea how elders really thought about sisters.
For the next year after we both returned home, Tyler and my contact consisted of seeing each other a few times on BYU campus, making small talk, and one phone call in which I ditched out on giving him a ride to a mission get-together to go watch a crush I had play baseball. It wasn't until one of my friends had a huge crush on Tyler that our sparks began to fly. I told my friend I would make it happen between them but when we started hanging out as a group, I saw Tyler's biceps (see below) and realized I didn't want her to have him anymore. Such a bad friend, aren't I? (But can you really blame me?)
So just like a lot of relationships it all started with flirtatious texting, a few hang outs, then some kissing, and bam, the rest is history...
P.S. So after Tyler read this he said, "We really didn't 'meet' on the mission." Ha! Still in denial.
