What to know
- Nikki and Chris reconnected later in life after both losing previous partners, with a borrowed camping tent unexpectedly helping spark a relationship that has lasted 23 years.
- Joe and Jen first crossed paths at university but didn’t fall in love until reconnecting years later while working at a summer camp. They’ve now been together for more than 28 years.
- Ollie and Melanie met while working at the same bar, where an encounter involving spilled wine eventually led to a first date and a relationship built around trust and humour.
- Bob and Eva started as grad-school friends before getting closer on a field trip. Fourteen years later, they’re married and have a child.
- Despite their very different beginnings, the couples repeatedly pointed to trust, respect, forgiveness and giving each other room to grow as keys to lasting relationships.
A borrowed tent. A summer camp. Spilled wine. A grad-school field trip. None sounds like the obvious beginning of a love story – but for four couples, that’s exactly what they became.
Their relationships range from two-and-a-half years to nearly three decades, but despite finding each other in very different ways, the couples had remarkably similar ideas about what keeps love going: trust, respect, forgiveness and choosing to grow together.
For this edition of This Is Dating Now, we asked four couples how they met — and why they keep choosing each other.
Read More
- ‘He never left’: Three couples share the unexpected places they found love
- ‘It’s either her or no one else’: How Canadian reality TV star John Ferguson found the love of his life
- ‘I found her, It’s this girl’: These 4 couples met in very different ways, but their advice sounds surprisingly similar
- School, work, volleyball: Shining a spotlight how these 4 Toronto couples met
- ‘Agree with everything your husband says,’ Queer couples in Toronto share how they met their partner
‘Romance blossom’: A borrowed tent brought Nikki and Chris back together
Couple Nikki R. and Chris R. travelled from the U.K. to Toronto to see Nikki’s son get married. Their own love story took years to flourish and has now blossomed into a loving 23-year relationship.
“We worked together for a while, and then as life changed, we met a little bit later in our lives after both separately having children,” Nikki told Now Toronto.
Chris shared that they had both lost their partners in their 40s and had found comfort in each other by then. But how they reconnected wasn’t intentional, and it turned into an unexpected love.
“I wanted to borrow [her] tent. I was taking my children camping, and someone said Nikki has a tent, so I borrowed it. I went back and said, ‘In exchange for borrowing the tent, we’ll go out for a meal,’” Chris explained.
“We got together after that and had our romance blossom,” Nikki said.
After 23 years together, the couple says that to make a relationship last, you need to trust each other.
“It’s about trusting somebody and knowing that if you get things wrong, it’s fine. They’ll forgive you,” Nikki said.
‘We found each other again’: Joe and Jen’s second meeting changed everything
Couple Joe R. and Jen R. originally met in Thunder Bay when studying at Lakehead University, but didn’t find love quite yet.
“We both studied the same course in outdoor recreation, parks and tourism. We were in class together,” Joe said.
But during those three years together, Joe didn’t even know his now-wife’s name.
“I just called her Red,” he laughed, and Jen added that he still calls her Red to this day.
“He can yell ‘Red’ somewhere, anywhere in a store, and I turn around because that’s pretty much his name for me,” Jen said.
But three years later, the now-couple met again while working at a summer camp.
“We found each other again,” Joe said.
From there, the pair hung out at a bookstore chatting for hours, and that’s when Joe knew he was in love, because they were each other’s best friends.
Jen adds that he’s the one for her, given the respect they have for each other and their constant support.
“We give each other space to grow, and because you don’t stay as stagnant as you evolve through the chapters of your life, it’s about understanding that the person needs that space, and you just keep coming back together,” she said.
The couple has now been together for 28.5 years and married for 26.
Their workplace romance started with wine poured down his nose
Toronto couple Ollie D. and Melanie B. have been together for two and a half years, ever since meeting at work.
“We worked at the same bar, and you poured wine down my nose,” Ollie joked.
“It was a blur,” Melanie laughed it off.
After that funny interaction, the pair had their first date, during which Ollie brought fresh homemade buns to her place, and they cooked a Spanish omelette together.
But the pair keeps choosing each other for their trust and understanding.
“Don’t jump to conclusions, and don’t worry about it,” Ollie said.
“We give each other the benefit of the doubt,” Melanie added.
‘We were school buddies’: A field trip turned friendship into something more
Bob T. and Eva F. met in school and decided to lock in the relationship after a field trip.
“We were in grad school together. She was in the geology department; I was in geophysics. We were school buddies for a while,” Bob told Now Toronto.
Eva explained they later went on a field trip, where they were assigned to the same group for activities and started talking more.
So, Bob took Eva on their first date at Pizza Hut.
“She’s American, so I was like, ‘You gotta try this. This is kind of pizza, but not really pizza,’” he explained.
From that moment on, the couple stayed together for 14 years, worked through challenges, got married for 9 years, and had a baby together.
