The early days of 2023 brought more chilly winds and snowfall to the streets of Memphis. But as our teeth chattered and the thermostats dropped, we searched the city for the couples, the lovers, and the romantics who took a unique approach to their relationships, whether it was a chance encounter at Applebee’s or a simmering seven-year passion. With Valentine’s Day on the horizon, read on for three uplifting tales of love that could melt an icy Poplar and thaw even the most frozen of hearts.
Marcella Simien and Dustin Reynolds
A lot of locals know singer/songwriter Marcella Simien’s story, including her roots in Mallet, Louisiana. “There’s a church and grocery store, and that’s about it,” she told us last year. “That’s where my grandparents’ home is and where my dad grew up. The Simien family’s ancestry goes back hundreds of years there.” But Simien arrived in Memphis to study art and play the music she’s now celebrated for here. And not long after that, her current romance began — sort of.
“I met Dustin way back in 2012, when I was 20 and he was 36 at the time,” she laughs.
“Nope!” interjects Dustin Reynolds, recalling that time and his reluctance to take things further then. After leaving his native Oklahoma City for Austin, he wound up in New Orleans, which in turn led him to tour with Jack Oblivian and Harlan T. Bobo. “After that I was like, ‘That’s it. These are my dudes. I’m just going to be full-time Memphis.’ And everybody here was like, ‘So you’re from New Orleans! You’ve got to meet Marcella!’ I’d heard of Terrance [Simien] in New Orleans, just because he would play Jazz Fest a lot. I knew his name. So I met 20-year-old Marcella, and I thought she was charming and beautiful, but she needed to ripen on the vine. A little too young!”
“And a little too wild!” interjects Marcella. “So we kind of got our ya ya’s out, and then reconnected when we were a little more calm.” The singer has a gift for understatement: Getting their ya ya’s out actually took a full seven years.
“So I moved home to Oklahoma City for a while, got my shit together, saved some money,” Dustin explains. Meanwhile, the connection they’d felt stayed with both of them.
“I had kind of a crush on him when we met in 2012, but we just had a couple conversations and that was about it,” Marcella says of their first encounter. “He was only in Memphis for a short time that year. Then in 2019, I reached out to him. I really wanted to see him. During that seven-year span, he was kind of in the back of my mind. Like he’d pop up in my mind and I’d think about him sometimes and wonder how he was doing and what he was up to. Those thoughts became so strong that the day after New Year’s 2020, I drove up to Oklahoma City to visit him. And stayed for the weekend, and when it was time for me to leave, we didn’t want to be apart, so he drove his car back to Memphis with me! And he said he was just going to stay a few days —”
Dustin lets out a big laugh, then Marcella continues, “And we didn’t want to be apart, so he just stayed!”
Looking back now, they feel they had two things going for them: their shared love of music and the weeks of lockdown due to Covid. The latter turned out to be a plus, romantically speaking. “It was actually kind of the perfect way to dive in,” reflects Marcella. “It’s sink or swim, and you’re either going to go so well together that you can tolerate and handle each other and know when to give each other space, or not. It’s the fast track to developing a relationship, and I think it strengthened our first year together. We wouldn’t be where we are without that constant time.”
They also made plenty of music during that time, including a single they just dropped, a cover of Johnny Thunders’ “I’m a Boy, I’m a Girl.” And making beautiful music together clearly makes their bond ever stronger, as becomes clear when, at the close of our interview, Marcella lets out: “We just got engaged in August!” — Alex Greene
Regis and Ashley Eleby
Twenty-four years ago, 19-year-old Regis Eleby’s grandma spotted a hiring sign at the Applebee’s on Union while they were out for lunch after church. She urged him to apply, so he did. Soon, he was hired as an expeditor in the kitchen. “And that’s how it happened,” Regis recalls. That’s how he met Ashley.
Prior to meeting Regis, Ashley had been working at the Applebee’s for a year or so as a hostess. “I was quiet,” she says. “I saw him, but I just thought he was the new guy. He was very loud. Seriously. His job was to call the waiters to come get their food when it was ready in the kitchen and literally I could hear him when I was at the front door at the hostess station.”
Yet, as Ashley and Regis say, opposites attract. Plus, it didn’t hurt that Regis found her cute. But their differences, they soon realized, complemented one another. “I think we’ve kind of rubbed off some on each other,” Ashley says.
“I balance her out, with her coming out a little bit more,” Regis says. “And she actually showed me ways and times when I need to pull back just a little bit. … She has taught me just generally in life, there’s a give and take.”
“Once we really got to know each other,” Ashley adds, “it was like we were different, but we were somehow the same. We realized that [we shared] a lot of experiences from growing up. … We both had our grandparents kinda heavily in our life. I lived with my grandparents and my mom, and he stayed with his grandparents, too. And so I think a lot of the traditional things that we saw growing up just kind of attracted us to each other ’cause it was so familiar.
“Like even I tell [Regis] — him and my grandfather share the same birthday — but I think sometimes the longer we had been together, I realized that they were so much alike. So it was kind of familiar in that way. It was just like some things felt too easy to not be real.”
And things have remained easy for the two, even through difficult times. “With us being together forever,” Regis says, “we’ve gone and grown through normal things in life with each other — setbacks and celebrations. We’ve done that with each other over all of this time.
“And, like, when we got married [in 2018], it was not a formal thing, but kind of more like a celebration ’cause everybody was constantly asking us for the longest time, ‘When y’all getting married?’ Imagine hearing that for 20-something-plus years from everybody’s family and everybody you know.”
“We’ve pretty much grown up together,” Ashley adds. “You change as a person, personalities and sometimes expectations change. If you don’t recognize that, that’s where the ripples come from. At times we’ve gone through that and had our ups and downs. And in those times we have realized that maybe this is just us from being together so long, changing and growing, so we gotta switch it up and figure out how to settle things.”
Still, the two have found fun in growing together, raising their dog Ro, traveling, embracing being homebodies, and, after their days at Applebee’s, embarking on different careers: Regis as a lead department manager at Floor & Decor, and Ashley a case manager at Regional One Health Medical Center. Through it all, laughter remains at the core of everything they do, whether that’s speaking in obscure movie quotes or gifting each other with gag gifts.
“I think anybody else would probably get sick of us,” Ashley says. “But at times where things just get rough and you wanna cry, we find something funny out of it, so I think it definitely eases a lot of the conflict. We gotta laugh.”
As the couple reflects on their 24 years together, from rocking baggy jeans to rocking gray hair and back problems, they look forward to the future and growing older together. “We just talk about [the past] and look at what we’ve been through and realize how that is helping us to focus on the future of what’s coming and just to be ready,” Regis says. “Ready to tackle and handle whatever comes.” — Abigail Morici
Alex da Ponte and Karen Mulford
Alex da Ponte and Karen Mulford’s meet-cute wasn’t ushered in by a car ride from Chicago to New York or a summer romance set at the beach. Believe it or not, their relationship started with a slap.
Alex — a local musician — and Karen met at Ardent Studios, where a music video was being filmed.
“Karen was the star of it,” Alex explains. “She was having to slap people across the face to the beat of a song.”
Alex explains that as someone was running around Ardent Studios looking for other volunteers to be slapped, she was doing vocals for another project, and eventually became lucky enough to be slapped by Karen.
“Literally the first time I met her, she slapped me across the face,” Alex says.
After a few conversations, Karen says she thought Alex was cute and remembers reaching out to Alex to see if she was playing anywhere.
“I ended up going to one of her shows at the ‘old-old’ Hi Tone,” explains Karen. “That’s kind of how we got to talking and kind of started to get to know each other a little bit better.”
“In true lesbian fashion, we moved in fairly quickly,” says Alex. “I think we knew when we had gotten through the whole summer and we were still wanting to be around each other all the time.”
April will mark 10 years since they’ve been together, and it also marks their seventh wedding anniversary. And a lot has changed since the couple first crossed paths in 2012, including welcoming a child through IVF. While parenting has changed their lives, there has been a defining characteristic of their relationship that they say has stayed true: silliness. Alex explains that it’s something they both share, and something that keeps things fun.
Becoming parents has also provided an opportunity for the two to learn more about each other, and how to balance each other out with their strengths.
“It’s been funny to see both of us coming on this journey from completely different sides of the coin,” Alex says.
Alex grew up as the middle child of five, while Karen grew up as the “baby of the family.”
“I’ve learned a lot about parenthood through her,” Karen says. “The first diaper I’ve ever changed was my son’s diaper, and I was like 35. So seeing how she is with other kids, with our son, she’s just really good at just setting boundaries and sticking to them, and it being consistent.
“We have different strengths in that arena for sure,” she continues. “Swooping in when we see the other one needs to switch out. It’s been a good experience.”
Karen points to tasks outside of parenting, such as housework, that they’re able to level each other out with. Alex also shares that while she has been able to teach Karen about parenting, she’s been able to learn more about authenticity.
“I think she helped me get more comfortable with being sincere and genuine,” says Alex. “I’m much more guarded in general, and I think I was more so, before Karen, very guarded, less open. I feel like I’ve become more open.”
They’ve been able to help strengthen each other in areas that they may lack, but they also emphasize how the little things make a big difference.
“If I get anxiety over calling the doctor, she’ll just do it for me. Always. It’s just something that she takes care of. And vice versa. It’s lots of little things like that where it’s like, ‘I got you,’ or ‘I’m here for you,’” Karen says.
Those little things are actually key in a successful relationship, Karen says.
“You never feel like you’re going to have to face something alone, for one. You’ve always got your teammate, your partner, but also if it’s something that you can’t handle then you know the other one is there,” Alex adds.
“It’s a tag-team effort.”
This is also a result of time, which the couple agrees has made their relationship stronger. Karen says that in the beginning they weren’t used to each other’s quirks and rhythms. But as they continue to get to know each other, it becomes so much easier. — Kailynn Johnson
