Pictured above are two of my best friends: Nick and Maddie. They met when Maddie was a freshman in high school, and Nick a junior. Maddie was 14 and Nick 16. They were so young at the time and still had so much to learn in life, and let's be honest, Nick was still on his way to puberty, naturally as 16-year-old boys do. But yet, the factor that was age wouldn't deter the love they would later feel for each other.

I'm almost sure when Nick and Maddie started dating people just imagined it as the typical high school relationship. The kind where your boyfriend walks you to and from class and you attend the homecoming dance together, but eventually you two grow apart, and pursue different things in high school. Whoever assumed that was far from wrong as Nick and Maddie are nothing of typical, and I do say that in the best way possible.

I sensed this after I grew to learn Madison more and learned about her and Nick's relationship. I can literally recall the day I met Madison, I myself at age 16 and her at 17. She told me she had a boyfriend in the US Marine Corps, and I proceeded to say, "Oh my gosh, that's so cute!" as I admired their long-distance relationship. However I soon came to see that their relationship was so much more than that.

Three years then passed, Madison, Nick, and myself now best friends, and I remember another day. The day Madison called me and told me Nicholas had proposed to her at the airport. I think I literally shrieked into the phone and then proceeded to drop it as I jumped up and down spuratically. Let's just say it was a happy day for us both. There was a particular reason I was so ecstatic for these two however, and that is this:

They had the most beautiful relationship I had ever seen. It was one that consisted of a eurphoria that never went away, a continuous state of laughter (whether it meant laughing side by side or miles apart), an abundancy of smiles, and a relationship solely built on trust. It is honestly a relationship that is still hard for me to describe in words, as it is one that impacted my life personally.

You see, before I met Madison and Nick, I often chose to agree with societal standards. I believed that one could be too young for love, or for marriage at that matter. But I think that's because I didn't fully recognize that love can affect a person at any point in there lifetime. I now see love differently. I feel that love can come out of the blue and into one's life like a whirlwind. I believe that God plans for everyone to find love at a different time, and there is no right or wrong time frame for this. Maddie and Nick have proven this to me. They have shown me that true love has no age limit, and they have demonstrated to me the value of love itself.

Upon meeting Maddie and Nick, they further instilled this idea in me of being a hopeless romantic (and honestly I'm not mad about it). They were able to teach me what I want in life from a significant other. And they were able to show me the true meaning of compassion. They taught me to never give up on love, to believe in fairytales, no matter how many times my heart would get broken. They taught me to have faith.

And I do truly feel that their relationship was meant to form when it did. These two had love from the beginning, they found love walking the tiled halls of their high school, and when they found that love they never let it go. They grew up together and matured together, and for that it made them better people. They supported one another and made sacrifices for one another. They understood each other and respected the time in which they did need apart, the time they needed for friends and family. However, they also combined their friends and family, conjoining them into one group, making us all comfortable around one another, as to get to know them as not just Nick and Maddie separately, but Nick and Maddie together.

They learned about themselves individually but also as one. They managed to form a beautiful and healthy relationship at a very young age. A relationship that I would say is much more genuine than many in which I've seen adults of older generations have today. Essentially, I think their innocence made them that much more pure and kind-hearted to one another, as well as the world around them.

Because of Nick and Maddie, I will never doubt young love. I will never question a person's emotions or their capacity to feel for someone. I feel that when love finds you, it finds you. And if one is wise, they'll never let it go.

I aspire to one day have what you two do, I love you both forever Madison and Nicholas Larsen.