BY JE’DON HOLLOWAY-TALLEY | Special to the Birmingham Times
Tamara & Jason Forbes
Live: McCalla
Married: Aug. 20, 2022
Met: Fall 2012, on Twitter, now X. Although Jason and Tamara were both students at the University of Alabama in Tuscaloosa [UA], they did not initially meet on campus. Jason took to Twitter to make her acquaintance.
“I knew of her because I saw her twitter activity through our hashtag #UA16. That was a way for incoming freshmen to connect, and I saw her posts. She was and is attractive, so I followed her [and when you follow someone] you see the person’s interest, likes, and tweets and that planted a seed,” said Jason.
“After that, we texted a few times and then we fell off. We didn’t end on bad terms or anything, we just never made time for each other,” recalled Tamara. “We’d see one another in passing and at parties but we had never gone on a date. Until, a few years later [fall 2015], he slid in my DM’s again, and that led to our first date.”
First date: Fall 2015. They went on a movie date in Tuscaloosa to see ‘Woodlawn’.
“I picked her up from her apartment and I guess I viewed it as a nice intro date where you get to talk to somebody,” Jason said. “But it went well. Getting to see each other outside of campus, parties, and seeing each other outside of our online personas and super social environments was a big step.”
“It was nice. He picked me up, he opened the car door, and he talked to me about his mom and his family. He was such a gentleman, it kinda made me feel bad about not pursuing it and making the effort the first time around,” Tamara said.
The turn: Spring 2016. “We started spending a lot of time together,” Jason said. “We went on more dates [but] we weren’t really making the turn, so I reached out to Tam, and I asked her to plan a date so that I could see some investment, like the time and investment I was putting in. I asked her if she would plan something interesting for us to do outside of the normal young 20s dating [activities such as movies, bowling, etc.], and a couple weeks went by and I wasn’t really hearing from her, and when I called her, she said the date had slipped her mind.”
Jason had had enough. There was seemingly no reciprocity, so he told her, “Never mind, don’t worry about it. I think we want different things. And we stopped talking for about a month, and that next time we saw each other, that’s when things changed,” he said.
That day was UA’s ‘A Day’ [the University of Alabama’s annual spring football scrimmage game. “I saw him at a tailgate and we hung out that night, and then the dates started becoming more frequent. I was beginning to hang out at his apartment, and he would come to my apartment, and we got pretty serious after that,” Tamara said.
The proposal: September 2020, at a Selfie Museum in Leeds. “I did it the weekend after her 26th birthday. At that point we had been dating for a while, had graduated and both came back to Birmingham… I knew it was time to get engaged, but I wanted to make it special. I tried to throw her off by making her birthday really big, and that following weekend, I suggested that we go do something lowkey like check out the new Selfie Museum in Leeds. And so, I set it up so that we ‘accidentally’ ran into a friend and his [wife] who just so ‘happened’ to have her camera with her. We went onto [one of the themed sets] and took some pictures, and then I dropped down on one knee and proposed. And as I was proposing, all of our friends and family started gathering around us,” Jason said.
“I was surprised, I started seeing all my friends and family appear right before he got down on one knee and I was in such shock that I didn’t hear anything Jason said,” Tamara laughed. “He had to ask me, ‘are you gonna say anything?’, and it took me about 30 seconds to respond because I was trying to take it all in. I think he was a little worried I wasn’t gonna say ‘yes’ because of my long pause, but I answered him, and I said ‘yes’.”
“I wasn’t worried,” Jason said. “I wouldn’t have been down there if I was worried about what she was gonna say.”
The wedding: Downtown Birmingham, at BridgeStreet Gallery and Loft, officiated by Jason’s childhood pastor, Pastor Deborah Debardleben. Their colors were mauve and burgundy.
Most memorable for the bride was the first look. “We had got a bunch of opinions from people about whether or not we should do a first look, and I’m glad we did. He was waiting for me at the bottom of the stairs with his back turned, and when the photographer said turn around, he looked at me and started crying,” Tamara said. “And then I started crying, and it was just a beautiful intimate moment. It was the only moment where it was just me and him that entire day.”
Most memorable for the groom was seeing his bride walk down the aisle and honoring his late mother’s absence. “I, of course, came down the aisle first, and we had an empty seat in the front to honor my mom’s life [who had passed away in 2017 from heart failure], and seeing that empty seat made me emotional,” Jason said. “When you have missing parents and you hit major life milestones it kinda brings it full circle that you don’t get to share it with them. And when I saw Tam coming down the aisle, I lit up, it lifted my spirit in a moment that I felt sad.”
They honeymooned in Punta Cana, Mexico. “We did a lot of exploring, we ate a lot of good food, we partied, and we ended up missing our flight and got two extra days of honeymoon time,” Tamara said.
Words of wisdom: “Do what works best for you and your marriage. I’m not saying it’s horrible to take advice from other couples, but it may not work for you. So do whatever works for you and your household,” Tamara said.
“I think it’s important to keep you and your partner’s goals (long and short term) top of mind and do whatever it takes to make the goals happen and make your union work,” said Jason. “Even if that means throwing out societal roles as it pertains to gender norms, do whatever it takes to pour into your partner the way they need to be poured into.”
Happily ever after: The Forbes are expecting their first child, a baby girl, due on August 17.
Tamara, 30, is a North Birmingham native, and Gardendale High School grad. She attended the University of Alabama, where she earned a bachelor’s degree in communicative disorders and works for a municipal court system as a magistrate.
Jason, 31, is a West End native, and Ramsay High School grad. He attended the University of Alabama, where he earned a bachelor’s degree in political science. Jason works as a footwear buyer for Hibbett Sports.
“You Had Me at Hello’’ highlights married couples and the love that binds them. If you would like to be considered for a future “Hello’’ column, or know someone, please send nominations to Barnett Wright bwright@birminghamtimes.com. Include the couple’s name, contact number(s) and what makes their love story unique.
