Seniors discover surprising chemistry

Matt and Sherri Leimkeiler on their graduation day in 1994.

Someone had lost the keys to Sherri Gladwell's car. The Jimmy Buffett concert at Buckeye Lake had just ended, and Sherri and her friends - donning the beachwear standard at Buffett shows - had managed to avoid the summer night chill by wrestling open the lock and camping out in the car.

The next morning, they made a few calls and found a ride home to Athens. Since Sherri's car was stranded, one of the concert-goers in her group, Matt Leimkeiler - a friend of a friend - offered to drive Sherri back to Buckeye Lake to rescue it.

The Ohio University seniors weren't looking for anything more than interesting road conversation. But an attraction lingered in the air.

"It was great because it was the first chance I really had to get to know Matt," Sherri says of the concert during summer session in 1993. "We hung out a lot together because the other three were arguing with each other. I think we were the only two having a good time. Then on the ride back to get my car, we had more time to talk."

The two started dating regularly, their evenings a flurry of movies, dinners at the Oak Room and chats over glasses of Robert Mondavi wine. But Sherri didn't think of the relationship as anything but a fleeting romance. After graduation, Sherri, a licensed pilot, was counting on an internship at United Airlines.

Sherri didn't get the internship, but it wasn't a huge disappointment. By then, they were in love.

"The feelings were so strong, and it was exciting for both of us - a whole new emotional high," Matt says.

After graduating in 1994 - Matt in mechanical engineering and Sherri in public relations - Matt went to graduate school at Virginia Tech University. They married in March 1996 and now live in Odenton, Md. Sherri is assistant director of development at the University of Maryland, Baltimore County, and Matt is a program manager at a defense contracting company.

Both have visited campus nearly every year since graduation to see old friends and relive good times.

"It's a connection we'll always have," Matt says.