by Linda L. Esterson photo by Kathy Plunket Versluys
Sasha and Chris Harter
First Date: November 2012
Where: The Walters Art Museum
Wedding: June 26, 2015
Venue: Lodges at Gettysburg
Current Residence: New Windsor
Favorite Activity: Soccer
Nine months in advance of Sasha Gonchoroff’s 30th birthday, her boyfriend, Chris Harter, hatched a plan.
He would give her 30 small gifts, each with a letter that would spell out a phrase she would need to decipher on her birthday in February 2014. He purposefully didn’t tell her how many words comprised the phrase, nor did he share the number of letters she would receive.
The first gift was a Baltimore Orioles hat, which he gave her in July 2013, in advance of her very first trip to a baseball game at Camden Yards. The gifts and letters continued; her friends teased that they had to be part of a master plan to propose.
“No way. You have that all wrong,” Sasha assured them. Surely they were wrong.
They were right. But Chris got a few things wrong.
On Sasha’s 30th birthday, she gathered all the letters. They didn’t spell out a message. She was irritated.
A tad flustered, Chris shared what the message was supposed to be: “Will you spend your life with me?”
She missed the moment: “I don’t have those letters,” she replied.
“I said, ‘Will you spend your life with me,’ Babe,” he answered.
The full message is now framed in their New Windsor home.
Sasha and Chris met through an online dating “store” called OK Cupid in November 2012. Chris messaged Sasha first, including a list of specific questions.
“I had done a lot of online dating,” said Chris, 32, an American government teacher and social studies department chair at Pikesville High School, in his ninth year with Baltimore County Public Schools. “I knew exactly what I was looking for.”
That list required someone who was active and a teacher who would relate to the pain and late nights associated with the workload.
They met right after Thanksgiving. Chris drove to Sasha’s and they went to the Walter’s Art Museum, a “neutral, low key” location. Chris had a soccer game that evening, so after about three hours the date ended with very little fanfare.
On their second date they met at Chris’ Carroll County home and went for a run. They enjoyed sushi afterward and talked about music all evening. He also encouraged her to try soccer, something she hadn’t done previously. Her willingness wasn’t lost on him.
“She was willing to try new things and play soccer even though she never had before,” he said. “She was not scared of life.”
Shortly after, one of the women on his coed team sustained a season-ending injury.
“Guess you’re playing next week,” he told Sasha.
She was game, and found herself on the field at Carroll Indoor Sports in Westminster that Friday and every Friday thereafter. In the meantime, they saw each other Monday nights after Chris’ doctorate classes at Notre Dame (he anticipates a 2017 completion), during games and on weekends.
By their second date, they realized they were developing feelings. Chris openly discussed his desire to have children by age 32, which was a relief to Sasha, who was surprised to find someone his age who knew what he wanted and was willing to discuss it with her. By the third date, they established that they were boyfriend and girlfriend.
“We both didn’t like to date around and test the waters,” said Sasha, 31, an art teacher at Lansdowne High School in Baltimore County. “We both felt we knew what we wanted.”
They married at the Lodges at Gettysburg on June 26, 2015. About 130 family members and friends bore witness as Sean Manear officiated. They incorporated some Jewish customs into the ceremony for Sasha’s family. Chris broke a glass to commemorate the destruction of the Jewish temple and Sasha’s father, Toni Gonchoroff, recited the blessing over the wine.
The teachers delivered rhyming Dr. Seuss wedding vows and handed out apple and pencil favors. The tables were decorated as different school subjects.
“What I love most about Chris is I see him as a really great father in the future,” Sasha said. “He’s always there when I need him.”
He says he couldn’t ask for anyone better in a wife.
“She’s the most breathtakingly beautiful, awesome woman I ever met,” he said.
Chris summarizes their relationship as playful. Beyond soccer, they host game nights, attend parties, enjoy going out, and love spending time with their 18-month old yellow Labrador, Lilly.
“Chris said it best,” Sasha said. “‘Couples that play together stay together.’”
