First off, it's strange that I chose Valentine's Day to propose because I have always despised this made up "holiday". Why is there a holiday where a man is required to buy something expensive and do something nice for his partner? Sounds like every other day of the year to me. I don't need a random day out of the year to remind me to love my wife, I hope I show her that every other day of the year. Luckily I have a wife that I think feels the same way. We don't celebrate Valentine's Day other than sometimes getting each other cards but for those that don't know, today is the anniversary of the day I proposed to MaryEllen.
Anyway, enough on the anti-Valentine's Day rant. On February 14, 2007, I was still bed ridden from back surgery and thinking of what I could possibly do to make that day special. I couldn't walk at the time so there really weren't that many options. I had known for quite some time that I wanted to propose to MaryEllen, I just didn't know how or when, plus I had some major reservations to take on such a task when I really didn't know yet if I would ever be able to walk again. It's pretty tough to ask someone to marry you when you don't know if you will be able to provide for that person. But back to the story. I was on the internet like a usual day in that time and decided "What the hell, it's time to do this". I don't know why it was that day, maybe it was to make the day special for the rest of our lives or maybe it was just to get over my hatred for the holiday.
So, what I ended up doing was buying a promise ring so to speak online until I could physically get out and get the real thing. At the time, my Mom was living with us to take care of me so MaryEllen could remain working. So I had her run over to the mall and pick up the ring and a box of chocolate truffles. We ended up putting the ring in the box of truffles and I think I gave it to her with some flowers or something like that.
The plan was for MaryEllen to open the box of truffles and I would ask her if she would marry me, nothing too creative but it would get the job done. Well it turned out she just took the box of chocolates and kind of tossed it aside without opening. I was thinking crap, I don't just want to say open the darn box so I started asking what a truffle was acting like I didn't know. She responded by saying a certain kind of chocolate and still didn't get it. Finally after a couple more frustrating questions I asked her if I could try one so she would have to open the box. She was getting kind of annoyed to the point where I thought she was going to just throw the box at me, but alas she opened the box and saw the ring and got kind of choked up and I was finally able to propose.
Afterwards she will tell you she felt kind of bad for giving me a hard time about opening the box but all in all I am glad it happened how it did. If it would have went off how I had planned it would have been just another boring story of a proposal on Valentine's Day. But it turned out being really fitting to our relationship, kind of humorous yet very difficult at the same time. I never thought I was going to have to work so hard to get MaryEllen to open a box of chocolates.
So that's the story for those that didn't know the specifics.
That was a nice story, Garrett.
ReplyDeleteIt reminds me of my friends Chris and Julie. Seems he thought it would be romantic to launch the kayak on Green Lake and float the proposal to her in a bottle. She would say, oh look there's a note in that bottle, somebody must need help, yada dada dah. Well, they're in their kayak, the lake is smooth as a mill pond, the sun is glowing 90 shades of pink in the West, and he surreptitiously drops the bottle in the water. He swivels the kayak, but she doesn't notice the bottle. So he paddles closer. She picks up the bottle and throws it away, saying that she wishes people wouldn't throw garbage in the lake. He retrieves it and throws it back.
Of course she thought it was very romantic when she figured out what was going on, and they got married and lived happily ever after. Such is life.