Emily + Paco | Hall of State | by gary donihoo

Paco and Emily first met at Shriners Hospital for Children in Los Angeles in 1998. Emily was a volunteer; and Paco, who was born without legs, had been receiving prosthetics at the hospital since he was 2 years old. Paco didn’t socialize much with the other kids, which made Emily especially curious about him. One night, as she was on her way out of the hospital, she saw him sitting all alone in the TV lounge, watching “Ally McBeal.” She struck up a conversation with him – rather, she tried to. He didn’t once take his eyes off of the screen to look at her! He had just begun dating another young woman, so he attributes his lack of eye-contact to the belief that, “If you’re dating one girl, you can’t look at other girls.” Paco took it quite literally.

Paco and Emily went their separate ways, Paco marrying and moving to Tucson and Emily relocating to Dallas, but they kept in touch through sporadic e-mails and phone calls. When Facebook came along, Paco spontaneously reached out to Emily. His marriage, which had produced two beautiful little girls, was over and he was going through a difficult time. The longtime friends quickly developed a close bond, talking on the phone every night into the wee hours of the morning. They soon embarked on a three-year long-distance relationship that culminated in Emily relocating to Tucson, where the couple now lives.

Emily and Paco sealed their engagement in a whirlwind trip to Paris in January, and were married on November 8, 2014 at The Hall of State at Fair Park in Dallas Texas. See all the images here.