In May of 2016, during the start of Gregory Swistel’s brief stint as a bartender in New Orleans, Molly Franichevich walked into his establishment. She requested a “lemon drop,” which essentially consists of vodka and lemon juice. The drink was his first attempt at a mixed drink.
She revisited the same bar a week later, only to find that he was now staffing the door. They had a nice talk and eventually swapped phone numbers. That was the beginning of a months-long pursuit on his part to persuade her to go out with him.
She Explained, “He Asked Me Out a Few Times, but I Declined Each Time.”
As he put it, “I just thought we had a tremendous spark.” Moreover, it wasn’t as if she was actively trying to avoid me. I knew she was just trying to keep me hanging on.
She was wary of him due to his younger age (she is now 29, and he is 27) and because he was still a student at Tulane University.
“He was still in his collegiate phase, whereas I was ready not to be around all that stuff,” she explained. “I wasn’t sure how serious it was.”
She didn’t completely dismiss him since she found him attractive, and after about two months, they went on their first date.
“He was just so insistent,” she remarked. “He insisted, and I figured he must be seriously curious. Wow, it was a fantastic performance.
He was supposed to pick her up for their date, but he took a detour to assist a buddy with automobile trouble. The halt soiled his clothes, but may have given him a halo effect.
I was Basically Putting Things off,” Mr. Swistel Explained.
The Chais Delachaise nightclub in New Orleans was the site of an all-night date that spawned the couple’s now-famous tradition of keeping a running tally of the restaurants they’ve visited together.
According to Mr. Swistel, there will be “no Uber Eats or anything like that.” The night ended with a first kiss between the two of them.
New Orleans native and University of New Orleans alumna Ms. Franechivich claims to have known within a few weeks of their first date that Mr. Swistel was special. We were at the Half Moon, and I’ll never forget the exact moment when I realised how much I liked this guy.
She Had Been Pleased by His Inquisitiveness, Wwork Ethic, And Tenacity.
She gushed, “He has a very good heart and is quite loyal to the people he loves, and he loves studying and figuring out how stuff works.”
New York native Mr. Swistel and his wife relocated to Nashville in 2019 so that he could pursue an MBA degree at Vanderbilt. He recently accepted a position as manager of corporate development at Freedom Mortgage, a Florida-based financial institution.
Ms. Franichevich, who plans to adopt her new husband’s surname, is a licenced real estate agent in the state of New Jersey and a vintage apparel reseller on the internet. In order to start their new lives together, the couple has relocated to Spring Lake, New Jersey.
On May 29 at New Orleans’s St. Mary’s Catholic Church, presided over by the Rev. Anthony Rigoli, a Roman Catholic priest, the couple exchanged vows in front of roughly one hundred witnesses. A tribute to the Catholic tradition in which the bride was educated, the reception was held outside at the Old Ursuline Convent Museum, and 220 guests attended.
Mr. Swistel Responded That he Understood Everything And Appreciated His Persistence.
He described her as “very remarkable,” adding, “She was super pleasant, she’s lovely, and she has a lot of energy.” Just like that, I felt an overwhelming pull. You’ll enjoy chatting with her. It may appear to be a lot of work from the outside, but once we got talking, it all came out easily.
