The Engagement: David’s Story

9 Days and Counting

            So I have the ring already and I am sitting in my office.  I mean I’ve had it for about two weeks now, stowed in a drawer in my room.  Periodically I would take it out, inspect it in the light to make sure it was a real diamond.  I would wonder about just walking into Kristen’s office and sitting it on her desk in the morning and saying something really cool in a deep voice like, “Hey baby, a diamond is forever, and so is my love for you.”

As I sat I pondering, in walks the fabulous Lauren Shaffer.  “Have you picked a day yet?” she inquired.  Lauren was on the inside.  “It’s complicated, there are coming events this weekend that I have no control over” I responded.  “Why don’t you just do it on Thursday?” she stated simply.  “That’s freakin’ brilliant,” I said.  Not a moment later Lauren had emailed Kristen’s roommate, her good friend and my best friend and organized an attack procedure.

            Here was the plan as detailed as I was willing to make it: normal day at work, distracting activity afterwards, then surprise proposal and dinner back at her place that had been set up by friends while we were out.  I knew that if I tried to plan much more than that I would start to get stressed out which could potentially tip her off.

4 Days until Thursday

            I’m hanging out with Kristen and her roommate and The Day is drawing nigh.  I am racking my brain trying to figure out what activity to do this coming Thursday to distract Kristen until the house is ready for our surprise dinner.  In a moment of inspiration I pipe up, “Let’s go bowling.”  We had just played Nintendo’s Wii bowling the previous weekend.  “I’m just going to pick a random day: this Thursday, we are going bowling this Thursday.”  “You have prayer room team on Thursdays, your not going to skip it are you?” she looked puzzled.  Then followed an awkward conversation about how I was in fact going to skip prayer room team to go bowling with my girlfriend.

The Day to Bowl

            Priority one: act normal.  There’s nothing special going on today, just a normal bowl with a diamond ring in my jacket pocket.  The day was difficult.  I was concerned she would head home for some unknown reason only to find four random people in her house cooking and moving around furniture.  I wanted to check on her but I knew that would make her suspicious.  During lunch she mentioned how long and tiring her day had been at work so far and how she wanted to take a nap at home.  “You shouldn’t throw off your schedule,” I bursted out nervously.  That was a close call.

            We bowled after work; just one game.  I won 96 to 75; I don’t know that I have ever broken one hundred in the five or so games I’ve played in my lifetime.  I’ll just have to add that to my bucket list.  I need to get back to Kristen’s house at seven otherwise the food will get cold but not sooner than seven.  It’s not yet six in the bowling alley so I demand that we play pool.  She hasn’t played before; I have, but I’m not very good.  Our game drags on as neither of us can hit the ball into the pocket.  She is getting board but I make her play three more games.  Eventually she just sits down and lets me take her turns as well.

            We get back to the house at twenty after seven.  I had Lauren unplug her garage door opener so that she would have to enter the house through the front door.  “Perhaps it’s out of batteries,” I suggest.  I am now shaking and swallowing hard.  Kristen opens the door and stops.  The dimly lit hall leading to the living room is flickering in the light of many candles.  She spins around and looks at me, her eyes wide, “Did you do this?”  I am still standing outside, “Let’s go all the way in.”  She slowly makes her way to the living room, pausing every step or two to catch her breath.  All the furniture in the living room had been removed and replaced solely by the dinning room table.  The fire in the fireplace and the candles generously dispersed throughout the room romantically provide the only light.  The dinning room table supported a fantastic meal cooked by the one and only culinary genius Richard Liantonio; I would do the meal a terrible injustice to try and describe.

            I didn’t know how the room would look so I am just as surprised as she is when we enter.  After we both came to, we turn to face each other.  We look deep into each other’s eyes, then trembling I get on one knee.  Her hand is over her mouth, “Kristen, will you marry me?” I squeak out barely audible.  I don’t know if she even heard me but she started squealing, “yes” over and over so she must have gotten the idea.  We ate together and I made sure to go slow to give my heart time to slow it’s beating otherwise it would pound right out of my chest.  It all felt so fantastic that it I had to remind myself it was not a dream.  But in fact Kristen Anderson and I are very happily engaged.  I love that girl!  And I look forward with great expectation to the upcoming months.

 

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