Couple's path to marriage winds through Southwest Asia deployment

Published Aug. 9, 2010
By Staff Sgt. Jeremy Larlee
380th Air Expeditionary Wing Public Affairs

SOUTHWEST ASIA -- Most young girls often dream about what their perfect wedding will be like. They dream of the perfect dress, cake, ring and who their dashing groom will be.

Senior Airman Sherry Nolen, formerly Sheri Soneff, spent her childhood in Denver more interested in playing in the dirt and running around.

"I never really thought about a wedding when I was a kid." she said. "I was too busy blowing things up and playing with Barbie dolls."

As she got older, she thought a wedding on a cruise would be ideal. But, Airman Nolen was skeptical that she would ever find the right person to spend her life with.

Then Senior Airman Donald Nolen, who grew up in Colorado Springs, Colo., entered the picture.

Airman Donald Nolen is a communications navigation maintainer in the KC-10 Extender and Airmen Sherry Nolen is a crew chief on the same airframe.

Although both assigned to the 380th Expeditionary Aircraft Maintenance Squadron at this undisclosed location at the time of their marriage, the path to their meeting and marital bliss was an interesting one.

The two met at Joint Base McGuire-Dix-Lakehurst, N.J., in April 2008 and became fast friends. In October of the same year, they started to see each other romantically.

Airman Sheri Nolen said she knew early on that she had met the person she could spend her life with.

"His smile and his eyes are amazing," she said. "He is always willing to help anybody in need. He will literally give you the shirt right off his back."

Airman Donald Nolen was equally smitten with his future bride.

"She is the kindest and most amazing person I have ever met," he said. "She has the most amazing energy and I look forward to spending the rest of my life with her."

In 2010, Airman Donald Nolen started to plan out his proposal to his future bride. He thought of doing it adventurously while the two were skydiving.

Then the needs of the Air Force intervened.

In April of this year, Airman Sheri Nolen got only five days of notice that she would be deploying to Southwest Asia. Fortunately for the couple, her future groom had a planned deployment to the same location in June.

The two Airmen quickly went to Plan B and discussed options of how to get married.

After some research, the couple found out that they could do a double proxy marriage through the state of Montana. A double proxy marriage is one where two proxies stand in for the absent parties. Neither the bride nor the groom needs to be present for the ceremony. Montana is the only state in the United States that allows this type of marriage.

The marriage became official July 12.

Airman Sheri Nolen said it was a unique experience for her.

"We pretty much just emailed a couple of certificates," she said. "It really felt more like we were applying for credit cards than getting married."

So the new couple would have some type of ceremony, their co-workers planned a wedding ceremony here Aug. 4.

The ceremony had a few touches that reminded the attendees of the fact that it was in a deployed location. The bride had a train made out of Airman Battle Uniform material and the groom had a boutonniere made of pink tissue paper pinned to his uniform.

The couple was not going to get a honeymoon though, as the bride had to return to Joint Base MDL due to the end of her deployment here.

Airman Sheri Nolen said that even though it has been a strange and twisting road to marriage, she wouldn't change a thing.

"If I had the chance to do this differently I would choose to do it the same way all over again," she said.

Both Airmen are deployed from the 605th Aircraft Maintenance Squadron, 305th Air Mobility Wing, Joint Base MDL, N.J.