Sweethearts growing together
By Meghan Youker
Skiff Staff

Next time women, don’t waste so much time getting ready.

Your plans may not be worth such extensive preparation.

Because after all, senior Jason Groom said you should not expect to find your true love at a mixer or fraternity party.

Feel sad now, but know that not all of us are as lucky as he was when he came to college.
Groom and his high school sweetheart, senior Tiffany Boyd, are engaged after four years together. He never even needed to look.

The couple, both of Roanoke, got engaged Jan. 16 when Groom resorted to an old game of hangman.

“I asked Tiffany out in high school by spelling out ‘Will you go out with me Saturday night?’” Groom said. “This time, I gave her a ring and game of hangman asking her to marry me.”

Groom, an e-business major, said he was glad that he and Boyd were friends first, because finding someone at TCU would have been a lot more difficult.

“A lot of (women) at TCU come to get their ‘Mrs.’ degree, just to get married,” Groom said.

Boyd, a marketing major, said she and Groom were always good friends, so dating and coming to college didn’t change their relationship a whole lot.

“My parents thought I was following him to college,” Boyd said. “And maybe I was, but it wasn’t really intentional.”

Boyd’s father, Bill, said there was a significant chance that the couple’s relationship wouldn’t last through college, but he is happy that it did.

“I have known Jason since he was in third or fourth grade,” Bill Boyd said. “I’m glad that TCU has allowed their relationship to grow and evolve.”

Groom said they took a lot of UCR and lower-division business classes together and have always had plenty of mutual friends.

The couple said they will be married May 22, 2004, in Robert Carr Chapel, a year after they have graduated.

“I’m a little bitter because I thought our wedding date had been booked out from under us,” Boyd said. “When I asked a woman from the chapel about it, she called me ‘madam’ and threatened to charge me $400.”

Carolyn Rowell of University Ministries said wedding services at Robert Carr Chapel cost $400 for alumni and $100 for current students and that the price of a wedding depends on when it is, not when you reserve the chapel.

“You have to draw the price line somewhere, and graduation seems to be the easiest place to do it,” Rowell said. “If you graduate on Saturday, and get married the next Saturday, you pay alumni prices.”

The earliest time a couple could get married in Robert Carr Chapel is in June of 2004, Rowell said, so love-struck fools should reserve their date early.

Meghan Youker