This piece is part of a 28-day series celebrating modern black love among millennials. It was created by Chuck Marcus and Michelle Nance, exclusively distributed by Blavity.

Her: Deioni Strickland| 34 | Commercial Banker, JP Morgan Chase & Co.

Him: Michael Strickland | 37 | Project Analyst, Apple Bank

Relationship Status: Married

Eleven years ago Deioni headed to the offices of JP Morgan Chase to meet a sorority sister for lunch. To her surprise she was joined by a group of her soror’s colleagues, one in the bunch was Michael. Instantly attracted to her, Michael told everyone who attended lunch that day that Deioni would be his girlfriend.

After building a friendship and her being the one to make the first move by going in for a kiss at a party, the two did begin dating and have now been married for five years. Deioni a Brooklyn native, and Michael a Chicagoan, the couple is now raising their two sons in their Flatbush, Brooklyn home.

Q: How did you know you were ready to commit?

Michael: I knew I was ready to make her my wife after a year.

Deioni: That long? I mean, it’s me.

Laughs

Michael: Due to things happening in the finance industry, I lost my job and I couldn’t do it then. When I did get another job it was temporary and it took me a little while to get back on my feet and know that I could propose to her. When I did get to that point I made sure I did it and I did it special.

Deioni: I knew I was ready to commit to him when one day he was over at my apartment and it was winter, it was cold. I had just gotten out of the shower and he was laying in my spot in the bed. He was warming up my spot in the bed for me because it was so cold and I was like, damn! He really cares for me and looks out for me and something that small, I knew that if he would be that thoughtful at that point I knew I was ready to commit to him.

Q: Have your expectations of marriage changed from the beginning when you were going into it to now?

Michael: Of course, it’s changed from the perspective of having a wife to now having the mother of my children to now being parents together. It’s changed from the perspective of being married and being able to travel and do everything we want together to now raising boys and our entire lives are based around them. My expectation within all of that is to still date each other. To parent as if we were in our 20s. We can still be young and enjoy our time together as well as time with our children.

Deioni: When I was younger I did have the traditional ideals of what a wife and a mother is. You see a very traditional mom portrayed on TV and I thought I could deal with that until I actually stepped in the role and became a full-time working mom of two boys. That evolved into us becoming full on partners. I’m not a “homemaker” per se. We’re just making sure we both have a pivotal role in maintaining our house as well as raising our boys. It’s not just me, not just him, it's a true partnership and as we’re growing and learning we’re learning how to become effective partners and parents.

Q: How do you maintain being parents and still be social as millennials?

Deioni: We’re working on it, it’s hard because our boys are so young. Our oldest is three and a half. Thankfully we have a great support system, we have friends, their grandparents love them, we have a great baby sitter. It’s up to us to make sure we still connect with our friends and each other outside of being parents.

Michael: I think it’s much more difficult for Deioni, it’s much easier for me because I’m out every weekend.

Deioni: He also deejays.

Michael: So, with me deejaying it’s like it’s a party every weekend. It’s a job for me, but you can’t really call partying a job when she’s home with the children and I want her to come out with me. You can’t really get a babysitter overnight and the grandparents can’t take them as much on the weekends as I would like. I still want to date my wife whether it’s brunch on the weekends or a weekend vacation.

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Q: Do you think your relationship inspires others? How?

Deioni: I hope we do. We are definitely not perfect, we’ve had our issues in the past, every couple does, but we learned to work through it so that we don’t further damage each other. We have actually have the family that we’ve both been dreaming about for all of our lives and we still have fun with each other. I hope that our friends and families see that we still do genuinely love and like each other. Some of them come to us for advice and we do our best to give them a piece of our knowledge.

Michael: I think we inspire people around us, to be together for 11 years, I think that’s an inspiration to a lot of people. In those 11 years, a lot of people come to us for advice, someone just came to me the other day. I can only give my perspective from a man’s side as far as relationships go.

Q: Who do you look to for advice on your marriage?

Deioni: Beyonce, ha, just kidding!

Michael: Will Smith.

Deioni: Those Red Table Talks are good, Jada got some tough words! Our parents, maybe, honestly there’s not a lot that we go outside of our relationship for. We tend to resolve things on our own. Prayer, and going to our parents whenever we need just a little nudge.

Q: What does black love mean to the black community?

Michael: I think that black love is inspiring, I think that a lot of people aspire to this love even though it can sometimes be fleeting. Even still, the black community sees black love and they want to emulate it. To go back to something we said earlier, we’re inspired by those who emulate black love from Will and Jada to Jay and Beyonce, people look to that for their own inspiration and kind of hope and aspire to be on that level and I think that’s great for the black community.

Deioni: To me black love is all about hope. With everything going on in the world we make sure we lift each other up, we lift our boys up and make sure they know they are loved. We try to lift our friends up. I think black love is the pillar and what keeps us as a people going. Love is God, God is love.

Q: If you could describe love in one word what would it be and why?

Michael: Love, to me, is commitment. To love someone you are committed to them in every way. Whether it’s love for your spouse, or your children, even for your career you’re committed to it, you want to give your all. Once you can give your full commitment it displays a love that’s beyond anything else.

Deioni:
Consideration. Just having your partner, your family member, your friend in mind when you make decisions. When you decide to do a small thing or a big thing, just considering them amongst the craziness of your day to day just taking a moment to think about how they’re feeling or what they’re doing, that’s love. Even when I’m going to the store I think does he need more deodorant or soap or whatever or I’ll bring his favorite snack without having to be asked because he’s top of mind.

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