Okay, I have to admit it, I enjoy great love stories. I like movies where the guy gets the girl in the end, or vice-versa. In fact, I really enjoy it when the geeky guy gets the really hot looking chick. Why? Because it's the story of my life. But what I really don't like are movies that end in tragedy, or a movie when a couple breaks up and they just decide to walk in separate directions forever. It's just sad. We've been all though those break ups, and it's just a horrible feeling that I don't wish it upon anyone. It's even worse when you go pay ten dollars to see a movie that depresses you. But, it happens...all the time.

Once in a long while, I get a couple who unfortunately doesn't follow through with their wedding plans for one reason or another. Cancellations have happened anywhere from minutes before their wedding, to weeks, months, even years. It's never a happy occasion when I learn about one of my bride's breaking up. But, the way I see it, it's better that they break up now, than later.

Enter Nicole. An awesome woman. Funny, smart, talented, great conversationalist, a great catch for any man. She had booked my services, and like every bride, she was looking forward to her wedding. Several months from her wedding I received a phone call from her. It wasn't a good one. She informed me that her wedding plans were off. Bad news....or was it?

As it turns out, it was probably the best thing that had ever happened to her.

Few years went by and an email from Nicole popped into my inbox. She had found someone! And this man, Keola, was an extraordinary guy. I'll Nicole take the floor from here:

"It was our friends' wedding, Aug 4th, 2007 in Sonoma, CA, where I lived at the time. My friend and I pulled up to the rehearsal site and were sitting in the car as the groom pulled up. Suddenly the back doors of my car open and 2 guys get in and Keola introduced himself. My friend and I thought "what the hell? Is this guy crazy?" I guess they had dared him to do it or something.

I was working at San Quentin at the time, so over the rehearsal dinner I grilled him with my prison psych evaluation (we jokingly were giving him a hard time). I thought he was a player, he was just too smooth. After the wedding we hung out and I started to realize he wasn't the player I had thought he was. Keola went back home to San Diego and he kept calling me. I ended up going down to San Diego a few weeks later and we started to really like each other. We dated long distance for 8 months until I moved to San Diego.

Now we're married! Thanks again for the amazing pictures and video! I created a website for the wedding, with lots of your pictures, complete with my hula for him (which, by the way, I was supposed to dance on the beach, but I forgot my music). Yes, I took hula lessons in secret to surprise him. So I ended up dancing at our second party in Papakolea. He actually cried. We had a reception at the Hale Koa on the wedding day too. You know those Hawaiians like to party.

-Nicole

So I wanted to make a comment on Keola. I'd like to call him Captain Awesome. He reminds me of every tough guy that I knew in my life. They look tough, act tough, because they are tough. But at the same time, they are also extremely sensitive, and they are not afraid to reveal their true emotions. It takes a real tough guy to cry in public.. Lets just make that clear.