The Proposal Story Part I

by Junius

It all began the week of the wedding for our friends Dave and Emily (in mid-October). At that point I had decided that I would propose by New Year’s at the latest, and had decided that it would be best to go ahead and call her parents to talk to them about it well in advance. I knew that she would be out at the bachelorette party Thursday night, so I thought that would be a safe time to call her dad without any chance of her showing up at my place or calling him while we were on the phone. The plan of course backfired, as her dad insisted we wait to get her mom on the phone, which would be the next day. He promised that they would call sometime Friday afternoon.

As (bad) luck would have it, Rebekah was trying to take advantage of an uncharacteristic lull in her day (and the last lull before a busy wedding weekend) on Friday to spend time with me. I was writing a lecture, but more importantly, I was aware that her parents could call at any minute and that there would be no way that I could explain away why they were calling. I shooed her out the door as quickly as I could, but she could tell I was wanting her to leave, and got pretty upset by it. That was when I realized how hard this surprise proposal was going to be, because I really hate keeping things from her.

I had a great conversation with her parents that totally put me at ease. Over the next couple of days, I was frustrated by the inability to share my mounting excitement with the one person I most wanted to share it with, and realized that December, or even Thanksgiving, was too late to propose. I was hoping to be going home with her for Thanksgiving, and at that point we could either be getting engaged, or be going having already been engaged for a few weeks, with everyone having had some time to get used to it. The latter was much more attractive to me, and at any rate, her parents’ support was burning a hole in my pocket and I couldn’t wait.

It’s not easy to plan a surprise proposal in under 10 days, but it’s not terribly hard, either. I had pondered for months how I could create a special memory for her, and the weight of my own expectations on myself was crushing. That was finally relieved when I came up with the idea of following the proposal with a gathering of our friends at the church, so that she could immediately show off the ring and tell the story. I knew that that would speak volumes to her about my commitment to our marriage being embraced within the community, and that in many ways that would be the more important part of the evening. Having that piece in place, planning the rest was a lot easier.

I had already arranged a ring shopping expedition with my friend Josh, who was also plotting an engagement (he has since proposed and been accepted as well). We were both terribly nervous going in, but the wonderful lady at Peter Indorf (Sarah) put as ease and made us feel confident that we oculd find what we wanted in our price range. Within a few days, she had found exactly what I was looking for, and at a surprisingly good price.

The biggest problem was going to be how to get her over without giving away that something big was going down, since it wasn’t going to be an anniversary or anything. I casually suggested it in conversation, and had us add a day to the calendar, and somehow she bought it without suspicion.

The story of the rest of the preparations is dull, except for the amazing support I received from the folks at the flower store and the wine store. They made it very easy to create an atmosphere that I was certain would be special and memorable. The key was in my decision to do at my apartment—in addition to the comforts of homefield advantage, it also meant that I could have everything already set up upstairs without having to worry that she would notice.

At this point, there was nothing to do but wait—the hardest part.