Ten years ago, the city of Oakland adopted the slogan “Love Life.” The simple idea was expanded as a declaration by Oakland musician and educator Kev Choice some years later, words that are now often read at city events. It reads in part, “When we demonstrate love we also manifest qualities of respect, kindness, grace, truth, understanding, humbleness, and forgiveness towards each other.”

The words gesture at the many ways lifelong Oakland residents — as well as the folks who have moved to Oakland and made it their home — find people to build community with, and sometimes, to fall for.

The potential for love is all around the Town, and we heard from more than two dozen couples for whom Oakland is the main character in their love story. Whether fighting for housing rights, enjoying a summer day at Lake Merritt, reconnecting at a workout class years after graduating high school, or while grabbing drinks with friends, these couples found each other doing what they love in the Town. 

When The Oaklandside explored these love matches, we found people longing to build a family, bring together blended families, or finding young love, queer love, and above all longstanding love that can withstand the test of time. Here are some of their Oakland love stories.

Nichele and Jeff, met at Festival at the Lake

Jeff and Nichele Laynes wanted to held their wedding reception at the Bellevue Club across the street from where they met. Credit: courtesy of Nichele Laynes

Jeff and Nichele Laynes met in 1995 at Festival at the Lake, a popular summer event held in Oakland during most of the ’80s and ’90s. Jeff had come with friends, and Nichele was hanging out with her sorority sisters. The two chatted for a while, and then Jeff asked Nichele for her number.

“We had pagers back in those days, and I never gave my pager number out, always gave a fake one,” she said. “Maybe because it was fate, I actually ended up giving him my real number.”

The two dated casually on and off for years, then began their careers and got into serious relationships with other people. When they reconnected again some years later, Nichele said, “it stuck.” 

Never miss a story. Sign up for The Oaklandside’s free daily newsletter.

The couple married in 2010 and held their wedding reception at the Bellevue Club, right across the street from where they’d first met 15 years earlier. Their American bulldog, Raspberry, and daughter Nyla arrived a few years later.

“You could say that Oakland and Lake Merritt really are the reason we met,” Nichele said.

Stefani and Elsa, met at a Moms 4 Housing protest

Stefani Echeverria-Fenn and Elsa Flohr met while fighting for housing rights at the Moms 4 Housing movement in 2019. Credit: courtesy of Stefani Echeverria-Fenn and Elsa Flohr

Stefani Echeverria-Fenn and Elsa Flohr met fighting for housing rights. The two of them had faced housing insecurity in the past and joined the Moms 4 Housing blockade in late 2019, when four Black moms from Oakland facing housing insecurity moved into an empty home on Magnolia Street in West Oakland. The move was short-lived, as the moms were evicted less than two months later. But they eventually brokered the sale of the building to Oakland’s Community Land Trust. Moms 4 Housing operates it as transitional housing for moms with children. 

“We fell in love while helping build tiny homes for our unhoused neighbors in West Oakland,” Stefani said. 

Early on in their relationship, the pair almost broke up, Stefani said, and it was another activist — who died in 2021 — who brought them back together. 

“The relationship was saved thanks to the skillful mediation of Skinny, one of those unhoused neighbors,” Stefani said. 

In 2020, as pandemic lockdowns began, they decided to move in together, even though they had only been dating for a few months. 

“Six years later, we are now raising a toddler together,” Stefani said. “I gave birth at Highland Hospital. This hospital and Oakland’s Children’s Hospital saved our daughter’s life.”

Stefani said that as a queer and trans couple, they feel safe and connected raising their child in Oakland.

“There are communities here that don’t really exist anywhere else,” Elsa said. “Oakland is a really special place.”

Paul and Kathleen, met at house party in North Oakland

Paul Abernathy and Kathleen Courts have been married for 45 years. Credit: wedding photo courtesy of Kathleen Courts, the other three photos by Ximena Natera for The Oaklandside

Paul Abernathy and Kathleen Courts first casually met in 1973 at a party hosted by Kathleen’s upstairs neighbor, Pam Swett, at the duplex on 59th Street where Kathleen lived. Kathleen was raising two kids as a single parent, but Paul was married at the time. Seven years later, the two met once again at another party, this one in Richmond to celebrate Pam’s graduation from nursing school. Paul, now divorced and raising his two kids, asked Kathleen to dance, and not long after that, he asked her out. 

The following weekend, Kathleen baked Paul a cheesecake for his birthday, unaware that he hates cheese. Paul asked for a tiny sliver to be polite, and recalls his astonishment that the cheesecake didn’t taste like cheese at all.

“I don’t think we separated for more than a minute after that,” Paul said. 

Paul and Kathleen married a year later, bringing together their four kids into a blended family and adding one more of their own. Their family has grown so much that they have three great-grandchildren. The retired couple lives in the Oakland Hills.

“It’s been 45 years now,” Kathleen said. “And every day, we still tell each other, ‘I love you.’”

Craig and Bianca, met teaching at Madison Park Academy

Craig Dittman and Bianca Lorenz started as co-workers and their love blossomed from there. Credit: courtesy of Craig Dittman

Craig Dittmann and Bianca Lorenz met at Madison Park Academy, a public school in deep East Oakland. Bianca was teaching middle schoolers there when Craig toured the school in 2016 to explore the possibility of teaching at the academy’s high school.

“I just see her standing on this desk as we’re coming around the corner, yelling at a bunch of middle schoolers,” Craig said. “And instantly, I was like, ‘Oh, dang, she’s pretty cute.’”

Craig said their connection grew organically. They first became co-workers, then friends, and finally began dating in 2018. 

Their first date was at the Berkeley Thai Temple’s Sunday brunch. 

“We shared values, similar family backgrounds, and a worldview that made conversations feel effortless,” Craig said.

“One of the defining moments for me was adopting our cats, Bart and Momo, from Cat Town,” the Oakland animal rescue, in 2019, Craig said. “Seeing Bianca care for them, nurturing and patient, I realized the depth of her heart. Those cats became our anchor through the uncertainty of the pandemic, and in a small but profound way, they showed me what life with her could be.”

When Craig’s grandfather died in 2024, family members gathered at the funeral started to ask about their wedding. 

The two hadn’t really talked about getting married. But they realized their remaining grandparents were getting older and they’d want them there. The pair ended up getting married six months later in Bianca’s grandmother’s backyard in Southern California.

“We have our lives ahead of us to plan,” Bianca said. “It’s been fun to think about what it will look like living in Oakland and growing older together.”

Devan and Matias, met at Bishop O’Dowd

Devan and Matias Meneses first met as high schoolers at Bishop O’Dowd. Their love story however, didn’t start until 16 years later. Credit: courtesy of Devan Meneses

Devan and Matias Meneses first met as students at Bishop O’Dowd, the Catholic high school in East Oakland. But they barely knew each other, and only talked during their senior year, in 2006, when Devan briefly dated Matias’s best friend. 

Sixteen years later, in 2022, fate threw them back together. First they ran into each other at The RIC bar on College Avenue while Matias was on a date. Then they ran into each other again at Sweat, a gym in Rockridge where they ended up as workout partners for the class. Devan recalls Matias trying to show off, not realizing that Devan was a fitness instructor there. 

“Little did I know that I had shown up on the apps for him, as he did for me. But neither of us swiped on the other,” Devan said. “We wanted it to be a meant-to-be real life moment, and here it was.”

For their first date, they walked around Rockridge, the neighborhood they both called home, and got caught up on their lives after high school. They were inseparable after that. They moved in together in early 2023. That summer, they moved into Matias’s childhood home in Rockridge, and by November, Devan was pregnant with their first child. The couple got married in April 2024, and Devan is expecting a second child in July. 

“Matias loves being a dad. He is so patient with our 18-month-old,” Devan said. “He makes parenting feel like a partnership. And that is the most incredible thing that I could ask for.”

Priscilla and J.T., met at Drexl

Priscilla Lam and Jonathan Tom have only been together for less than two years, but they are already planning their life together. Credit: courtesy of Priscilla Lam

Priscilla Lam was having drinks with her sister at the patio at Drexl, a bar on 19th Street,in July 2024 when they came across their mutual friend, Penny Lane. Penny introduced the sisters to the friends she was with, including a guy named Jonathan Tom, who goes by J.T.

They were both drawn to each other, but their quick introduction among friends nearly turned into a missed opportunity. Priscilla asked J.T. if he wanted to go inside and get a drink, but he wanted to stay outside to smoke a cigarette. Priscilla ended up taking an Uber home not long after. 

J.T. wasn’t going to let her slip away. So, he asked Penny for Priscilla’s number.

“A week later, I get a text from a random number,” Priscilla said. “It was J.T.,”

The two began dating, and their relationship moved pretty fast after that. Within weeks, J.T. gave her a key to his apartment. Priscilla works nights as an MRI tech, and J.T. works a typical 9 to 5, so Priscilla said staying at J.T.’s place allowed them to spend a little more time together.

“I guess I never left,” she said. 

The pair haven’t let their opposite schedules get in the way of their blossoming love story.

“It’s tough,” Priscilla said. “We definitely make whatever time we have worth it.”

Priscilla said that one night, J.T. casually asked her if she wanted to get married. A few months later, J.T. began sending her photos of engagement rings asking her what kind of diamond she wanted, what cut and setting. Two weeks later, she said, the ring showed up at their door, and J.T. has been holding on to it since, waiting for the right moment. 

“I would never imagine myself in this position knowing my dating history,” Priscilla said. “I’m nervous because getting engaged is such a big step. But, I’m excited. I love this man so much.”

… We rely on your support

Hey, we know that most readers only scan a headline and a couple of paragraphs. Thank you for reading to the end of our story. Since you clearly appreciate the in-depth approach we take in reporting the stories that matter to Oaklanders, please consider chipping in to supercharge our newsroom.

“*” indicates required fields