| Updated: 12/06/2011 10:28 pm |
Published: 12/06/2011 9:37 pm
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On Tuesday evening, a local Starbucks closed its doors to coffee-seeking customers, and opened them to the friends and family of two coffee-loving regulars Eva McCarthy and Carmine Capparello.
“Different places mean different things to different people,” Carmine said.
To Eva and Carmine, the Starbucks at 51st and Harvard will never be just another coffee shop.
“It's funny, when you tell somebody you're getting married, and they say, ‘Well, where are you getting married?’ and you say, ‘Starbucks!’ They go, ‘What?’”
“We were sort of put together in such a strange way,” Eva told FOX23.
The couple met online in December of 2008, but they didn't have their first date until February of last year.
After that first face to face meeting Carmine explained, “We used to meet usually at 7, 8, 9 o'clock at night and we'd go to Starbucks.”
Eva concurs.
“We just met for coffee and talked for hours and hours. We would talk till 3:00 in the morning.”
But Eva wasn't sure a relationship with Carmine would work.
“I was married twice before, and they both were military men. I did not want to get involved with anyone military.”
Carmine is a naval reservist.
“His reply was, ‘You can't have too many friends.’”
They came to the coffee shop and sat in the same chairs every Tuesday.
“We just fell in love over coffee, pots and pots of coffee,” Eva explained.
“Of course being gone a year, I wasn't sure exactly how it was going to work,” Carmine said.
In August of 2010, Carmine was deployed to Iraq for a year, just three months after he proposed to Eva.
“Her and her mom, the whole time I was in Iraq came to this Starbucks every Tuesday night.”
Eva would read the cards Carmine had spent hours writing.
“It's what held me together,” Eva explained.
“Which is why this Starbucks is so significant to us,” Carmine said.
The Starbucks staff, nameless friends who welcomed Eva back time and time again.
“They were so friendly. Words were powerful, they made an impact on me and my mom,” Eva recalled.
The couple planned to tie the knot a few weeks after Carmine returned, but sometimes life doesn't go as we planned.
“When I got home from Iraq it was tough. I lost a pretty good friend,” Carmine said.
“When he came back it was awful, we weren't a couple. We didn't fit together right,” Eva told FOX23.
Their dream wedding was suddenly on hold.
“We were so looking forward to getting married on a beach,” Eva said about their planned wedding in North Carolina.
They believe God had a different plan, and the couple found their way back to each other by coming to Starbucks and reconnecting like old coffee friends.
They decided to tie the knot a few months later, but the beach was out.
“When that didn't work out, me and Carmine we kind of thought, ‘Well where should we get married?’ The first thing that came to mind was Starbucks,” Eva explained.
“It's not a gimmick. It’s very heartfelt,” she said.
The shop is where they first saw each other eye to eye, where they stayed connected on other sides of the world, and where they found each other's hearts once again.
“We're finally getting married the way we want to, in place we can come back to anytime we want.”
So for one night, this Starbucks closed its doors to the under caffeinated.
“It's about us, and it's just about having an intimate ceremony in a place that means something to us,” Eva said.
It’s about realizing what's important is what you chose to make important.
“Not everybody gets a chance to marry their best friend,” Carmine said holding back tears.
“Once people realize why we're here, and why we're getting married here, I think they'll understand,” Carmine said.
And after their wedding Eva thinks, “We'll still be in here every Tuesday.”
They’ll sit in their usual spot, hand in hand, the other holding a cup of coffee.
