00:00Having to cancel, you do it for the safety.
00:03I think if we were so persistent about trying to force
00:06the wedding, it just makes it so much about the wedding.
00:09That part is fun, but at the end of the day,
00:11it's about something much bigger.
00:14Hi, I'm Josh.
00:15Hi, I'm Jill, and we had a virtual wedding.
00:18We met at the Nike store in the Lennox Mall.
00:21Josh was managing the store at the time,
00:23and I went in looking for a pair of shoes for my dad
00:26as a Christmas gift.
00:28And Josh helped me that day.
00:30A couple months later, I was looking for a part-time job,
00:33and so I asked if they were hiring.
00:35And of course, I got the job.
00:39He is Jill's biggest cheerleader.
00:43Whenever we bring a significant other around
00:45and they can hold their own, it's like, OK, well, welcome.
00:49We'll keep you.
00:50She was not only excited about him,
00:53but he challenged her in a different way
00:56than other people did.
00:58She was her true self, and he was his true self.
01:02Without any pretense.
01:03How did we get engaged?
01:06I woke Jill up on Christmas morning.
01:0941 years prior to that day, her father proposed to me,
01:16and they did not have a clue.
01:18I was trying to get her attention.
01:20She kept fighting me.
01:21I was not trying to wake up.
01:23You do not wake Jill up out of her sleep.
01:25Then I said, yo, I got your gift for you, whatnot.
01:28And she looks, she sees, because the ring box had a light on the inside.
01:32And she goes, oh, Josh.
01:34She didn't want a group of people or a party or anything like that.
01:39So it was very fitting.
01:40The wedding was set to take place March 28, 2020, in Savannah, Georgia.
01:47We had a photo booth, a DJ.
01:50Instead of doing the big traditional wedding cake,
01:52we had little customized mason jars.
01:55The day before, we had a pub crawl schedule.
01:58I was looking forward to, like, everybody still being dressed for the wedding and,
02:02you know, going from bar to bar and just enjoying each other's company.
02:06The ceremony was going to be held at First African Baptist Church.
02:10The church is the oldest continuing Black church in North America.
02:16It has a tremendous, tremendous history.
02:20My grandparents, I guess, would have been the first members of the church.
02:24So I'm, like, third, fourth generation.
02:28I was blessed there as a baby.
02:29I was baptized there.
02:31It is definitely a church that's near and dear.
02:36For our honeymoon, which was planned to be in Italy,
02:39we were going to start off in Paris and then go to Rome.
02:43And we were doing the Amalfi Coast.
02:46Once cases started to hit Italy, that's when Josh was just like,
02:51Jill, I don't think this is going to happen.
02:53And I was just like, oh, Josh, you don't even know what you're talking about.
02:57The weekend of my bridal shower, that's when the schools here announced,
03:02the county that I work for announced that we were going to be closed until further notice.
03:06But then comes the day, stay-at-home order, complete shutdown.
03:11And so that's when I knew, okay, there's no wedding happening in Savannah,
03:16and we're going to have to come home sometime.
03:19I turned into, like, fix-it mode.
03:22One of my friends who had been working from home, she's using Zoom to work from home.
03:27And she said, you guys should just use Zoom.
03:29I've used other platforms in the past.
03:31And quite frankly, this one feels the most seamless.
03:35So I was on board. Josh still wasn't, he's just like, okay, here goes Jill and one of her ideas
03:42again.
03:43But why? Because I had never used Zoom until we did the rehearsal the night before.
03:48We were probably on for about an hour, hour and a half.
03:52We had the pastors on to make sure they understood how to get on and how to use it.
03:57One was in Savannah, one was in Macon, and one was in Augusta.
04:03They were great sports. Thank you, guys.
04:05After that call ended, Josh looked at me and he said, okay, I'm on board now.
04:11This Zoom isn't so bad. Like, yeah, thanks for telling me you're on board the night before.
04:15But, and so Josh pulled out one of his suits and I had a white jumpsuit on.
04:21You definitely still feel everything you would. It was a lot for me.
04:27At one point, I deleted a good portion of my vows. So I'm freaking out.
04:34Trying to get Jill to kind of like get me grounded.
04:37But she's like, I have to do makeup. Call your sister, dude. Like, I'm not doing this.
04:40He was very, very upset about that. Very distraught about that.
04:44And so I sent a text to him like, the day is going to be perfect because you and Jillian
04:50are getting married.
04:52We are gathered together in the face of this company, the sight of God,
04:57to join together in the holy matrimony, this man, Joshua, this woman, Jill.
05:06I promise to be patient, to be honest, to be everything that love demands of me as a husband.
05:12I promise to spend each day working to become the truest version of myself,
05:16for you, for us, and our family to come.
05:18Josh, thank you for this experience of love that I never imagined I would have,
05:23let alone deserve. The way you look at me gives me a confidence I never had.
05:28I will be that sweet, but I will try to always be that sweet Southern girl you always told everyone
05:35you would marry. This is love, and it feels better than me.
05:40I need to argue.
05:41I lost my body in the heart.
05:42We had a little over 100 people.
05:45People were so excited. I just had to sit there the entire time with the participant list open and
05:51just pressing mute, mute, mute, mute.
05:53I loved their vows. You could tell it was definitely from the heart.
05:58Behind where we were standing, my brother passed when I was younger, so I had a floral arrangement
06:03that Josh had bought for me.
06:05That also warmed my heart.
06:07He bought it when I was sad about the wedding getting canceled, so I had that floral arrangement,
06:12and I had a picture of my brother in the background.
06:14Mr. and Mrs. Jillian and Joshua Ayodele O'Gundele.
06:30And even Yoda got to be there.
06:33Oh, Yoda.
06:35We were able to have our first dance.
06:42There was a fall. He did slip.
06:46Somehow in the process of Josh trying to open, the bottle of champagne kind of
06:51ended up everywhere except the glasses and made for a very slippery floor.
06:59Oh my goodness, can we please rewind it?
07:06I immediately wanted to stop the recording so I could go rewatch it.
07:10Like his feet just in the air.
07:12You could not have had a better ending to it.
07:17Josh is an amazing sport, and he just took it.
07:21We had our dance, our toast, and our fall.
07:25Josh fell for Jill.
07:28Watching the two of them just truly glow in that moment.
07:31This is my best wedding ever.
07:34I think it was kind of emotional the entire time, and half the time my camera was off,
07:39so thank goodness no one could actually see me like tear up.
07:42Everybody was still dressed up. Some people stayed on. We did toast. So it still felt the way that she
07:51wanted it to be. Whether anyone was there or not, it was going to be great, and it was going
07:55to be
07:55fitting for them, and it definitely was.
07:57To walk away from the wedding but know that it could still happen virtually, and that I would still get
08:03to
08:04marry this guy, I think that's what made it okay.
08:08Not being able to see my mother, my sisters, my nephew, that was the part that really like,
08:13that got me. But, you know, she still able to see it via virtual, you know, on the Zoom and
08:18everything.
08:19But then, silver lining for me was the other people that got on. Like, I had cousins that I
08:23haven't seen in like 15 years. They were on.
08:26If you are the couple that's really into the big wedding and you need it, then I would, you know,
08:32just post on and wait on that date. If you're the couple that's, you know,
08:37you're ready to start that next chapter, I say a virtual wedding was a great way to go.
08:42I'm fortunate that I got to have the experience of actually planning the wedding. You know, I got to
08:47pick out the dress, pick out flower arrangements, and things like that. So, I had that experience,
08:54and now I was just, I'm excited about starting the next chapter.
08:59We did not miss out. What is truly important is faith, love, and family. She thanked being my
09:07husband for being the parents that we are to her, and she would hope that we all never forget what's
09:15truly important. So, perfect.
09:18What has married life been in during quarantine?
09:21For marriage boot camp.
09:22But it's been great. We had never been around until this long. I'm like, yes,
09:27we've been in some relationship for four years, but I'm like, I enjoy every moment. Every day I wake up,
09:33I'm still happy to see much, you know. So, I love it.
