Kneeling in the dark beside a waterfall, a man held a ring box. His girlfriend turned to walk to the car and tripped over him. Despite the inability to see, the word that escaped her mouth was, “Yes.”
Driving down the interstate, a man spends his weekends filling up his gas tank, traveling to meet his wife who lives across the country.
We see these people in the classroom and in their offices, grading work and offering guidance. These people are Ball State professors, and although students rarely get to see that side of them, they are real people with real love stories.
The Waites
Spending two out of their three years apart, the Waites believe long distance relationships can work even though they’re hard.
Meeting at the University of Tennessee in Knoxville, Brandon Waite, an associate professor of political science, and Evelyn Waite, an instructor of the educational psychology, began dating in 2007 after Brandon stole her from a friend.
In means of swooping Evelyn off her feet, Brandon wrote, “I think you’re cute,” on the bottom of her foot in permanent marker. Forgetting that her temporary tattoo was there, Evelyn noticed it two days later in the shower.
However, the couple did not start dating until six months after Brandon’s permanent pick-up line.
“Everyone left for the summer from school,” Evelyn said. “That’s when things started to pick up and our friendship turned into dating.”
After three years of dating, the couple became engaged at a waterfall in Kentucky.
At the time of the proposal, Brandon was working at Ball State and Evelyn was attending graduate school in Greensboro, N.C. After driving all day to meet in Kentucky, Brandon insisted they go to a waterfall.
Tired from driving, Evelyn didn’t feel like traveling all the way to a waterfall in the middle of the night. After Brandon persisted long enough, she finally caved.
“We were tracking the stars,” Evelyn said. “I was ready to head back to the car and when I turned around, I almost fell over him.”
Brandon was kneeling on one knee in complete darkness. Evelyn said, “Yes,” even though she had no idea what the ring looked like.
Once they hopped in the car, Evelyn immediately turned on the car light to look at the newly placed rock on her left finger.
“Hey, at least I didn’t say, ‘Yes,’ because of the ring,” she joked.
The couple married in 2010.
For their honeymoon, the pair spent 30 days camping in Yellowstone National Park and went on a cross-country trip. Stuck with a tent surrounded by two feet of snow and a blow-up mattress that didn’t fit inside, the Waites still managed to explore.
They ventured to Mount Rushmore, a rodeo, the Colorado and Arkansas rivers and went white water rafting.
Describing each other as polar opposites, the Waites do have a few similarities aside from camping and hiking. The couple enjoys antiquing and consider themselves laid-back. They also shared similar relationship advice when dealing with a long distance relationship.
“If you have trust issues, you are not in a relationship,” Evelyn said. “If you have some concerns about the person, you have to face them head-on because they are not going to be there on a daily basis.”
For those who think distance makes the heart grow fonder, Brandon does not necessarily agree.
“It’s not easy, but it can be done,” he said.
Luckily for Brandon, his birthday is the day before Valentine’s Day. The couple normally celebrates both.
“Since it’s my birthday, I usually feel guilt free for not getting her anything for Valentine’s Day,” Brandon said jokingly.
The Mortimores
During his first year at Ball State, Curtis Mortimore measured his free time in gas mileage, interstate exits, radio stations and love.
When he wasn’t spending his weekends working tech in the theatre department, Curtis was driving through four states to help his wife, Melanie Mortimore, renovate the house she owned in North Carolina.
Melanie was working for the theatre department at the University of North Carolina Wilmington, 731 miles away from Ball State.
When he could, Curtis left Muncie after teaching morning classes on Fridays, drove for 13 hours and slept a few hours when he arrived. On Saturday he woke up early to work on the house until he couldn’t any longer.
He slept few hours Saturday night before waking up and working a few hours Sunday morning. He left North Carolina on Sunday afternoon, arrived in Muncie late Sunday night, slept a few hours and woke up to teach class on Monday.
“I spent so many hours in my van that year,” Curtis said. “The work was terrible, because of the heat and humidity, but seeing her [Melanie] was worth it. If you can renovate a house together and not kill each other you are in good shape.”
Curtis and Melanie met at the University of Tennessee in Knoxville during graduate school. Curtis worked in the theatre tech department, while Melanie worked in the costume shop.
Curtis would come to the costume department and eat during his lunch break. The pair worked together, and ran around with the same friend circle.
They went on their first date in the summer of ’98 while they worked at the Utah Shakespeare Festival over the summer.
“I suppose that would be our official first date even though we hung out a lot,” Melanie said. “We went to nice steak house in Cedar City, Utah.”
That fall the duo returned to Knoxville to help with a few theater productions before Curtis travelled to Berlin for the semester, while Melanie continued to study in Knoxville.
Even with 4,586 miles and an ocean between them, the couple stayed in contact on a regular basis.
That spring, the couple added 148 miles to the distance between them. Curtis returned to Knoxville, but Melanie spent her Spring Semester in ’99 in Salzburg, Austria 4,734 miles away.
“For most of the first year we dated we were in separate countries,” Curtis said. “We emailed each other pretty much on a daily basis, and she came to visit me in Berlin once.”
Two years after they started dating, Melanie changed her last name to Mortimore. In 2000, the couple married at the Grand Avenue Bed & Breakfast in Carthage, Mo.
After they graduated the couple moved to Cincinnati for three years, then moved to Little Rock, Ark. for two years.
While they livedin Arkansas, the couple started looking for other jobs, and found them; in different states. Curtis moved to Lamoni, Iowa while Melanie moved to Wilmongton, N.C., 1,282 miles apart.
“When we were in Little Rock, we were disappointed,” Melanie said. “We doubled our income overnight, and we decided to move to different states and hope a job would open up so we could be closer.”
After his first year at Graceland College in Iowa, Curtis accepted a job at Ball State, but Melanie remained in North Carolina for one more year.
“By the end of our second year apart, it was an easy decision to move here to Muncie with him,” Melanie said. “We had been apart enough.”
Melanie moved to Muncie, and the couple bought a house together.
During her fIrst year in Muncie, Melanie did freelance work until she received an adjunct position at Ball State.
The couple has a two-year-old daughter. Curtis is a technical director for the Department of Theatre and Dance, and Melanie is the director of the costume shop.
“We are not hopeless romantics,” Curtis said, “we are just normal human beings and best friends.”
