Marissa and Will both worked at Facebook when they met. Marissa was a Data Science recruiter and Will was a Data Scientist. This was the first photo ever taken of them on their recruiting trip to Boston!
Marissa was supposed to head to MIT to recruit but last minute another recruiter asked if she could switch campuses and head to Harvard instead - which was where Will was assisting with the recruiting efforts.
Marissa and Will's recruiting trip was only 3 days long, but those initial conversations between them felt as if they had been friends for years. They discovered they shared a lot of common interests and experiences.
Marissa swears that it was fate since she had actually put in her two weeks while they were in Boston. So if she hadn't gotten asked to switch recruiting events, they may never have had the opportunity to get to know each other better. Will even tried to convince Marissa to stay at Facebook and even called the head of recruiting to tell him they couldn't afford to lose her as she was the best recruiter.
Marissa then asked Will on their first "date" a couple weeks later to a San Jose Shark's game.
Will invited Marissa to his housewarming party hosted by him and his roommates in San Francisco. Marissa grabbed her SF friends, Zimka and Val, to join as her wing-women. Will was excited that Marissa had made it to his party. Marissa was trying to play it cool and hang with her friends but secretly loved that Will kept checking-in and coming to hang out with her.
This was the party where the infamous "shotguns" began. Marissa used her recruiting skills to gather the troops to play several rounds of flip cup and of course, shotguns. These Canadians needed some practice; needless to say Marissa beat everyone by a LANDSLIDE.
After several invites to Sharks games and even an invite to her holiday party, Will finally invited Marissa to his Facebook holiday party at Levi's Stadium.
Marissa also finally got invited on a ski trip (after she got uninvited from the first trip Will had invited her on, because Will's his brother, Matt, had come to town).
Will and Marissa went quadding in San Luis Obispo, traveled to San Diego with friends, and went cherry picking. They even attended their fair share of weddings with Marissa's highschool friends Davi and Adina, Marissa's brother and sister-in-law - CJ & Allison, and Marissa's work wife for life - India & Adam.
Will's parents, Ming and Julie and Uncle Morgan and Aunt Frances even paid us a visit for a wine filled weekend in Napa with Marissa's parents, Chris and Lisa.
The rest is history, we have had the blessed opportunity to travel to some of the most spectacular places together! Kicking off our travels was our first solo trip to Nashville! We loved everything country and even snuck in a Nashville Pred game.
Our busy lives have taken us all over the world. We've been to Banff, Alberta to ski/snowboard with Will's sister, Carolyn. Flew to Hawaii to vacation with the Enfantino's, Canada for a wedding of Will's college friends (Zach and Meg), wound up back in Banff to vacation with the Chong siblings, and two of Will's cousins, Ross and Ryan, and to visit the iconic Lake Louise. We ended our travel for the year in Italy for Marissa's cousin's wedding, Rick and Kathie.
Amongst all the travel, Will managed to find time to proposed to Marissa in their favorite location, Tahoe. Their good friend Aren was there to help capture the moment.
A couple months after the engagement, we took a month to travel to Japan to ski some amazing powder, and hiked the famous Patagonia W trek which was a long time bucketlist for Will. Later that year, we attended two more weddings in Canada one for our good friends, Ganesh and Brit and also Will's long time childhood friend, Pat and Jen!