"How to Propose in an Infinite Number of Exhausting Steps"   

     Before you’re in a committed relationship, I’m sure that the idea of a proposal is “Buy ring, ask, live happily ever after.” 

     You’ve never been more wrong about anything in your entire life.  For a man, the idea of asking the woman you love (or man – it’s not about gender, it’s about caring, love and commitment) to spend the rest of their life with you can be the most cut-wrenching experience you’ll ever go through.  Luckily, you’ll have my experience to learn from - Exactly what and how I pulled everything off without Stephanie finding out about anything.  I hope it’s informative.

     The first decision I had to make was when I wanted to ask.  For the longest time I had a general idea of when – it was going to be either February 14th (Valentine’s Day) or March 14th (our second anniversary).  For the most part I was heading towards our anniversary as it would make it a very special day in general, and because proposing on Valentine’s Day seemed a little… clichéd.  However, the date in which our Spring Break fell and our plans caused me to rethink that.  As luck would have it, Dream Theater’s “World Tourbulence 2002” closest stop was the weekend of our break, so we decided to combine the break, anniversary, and DT shows into our first “real” vacation.  We were traveling up to Chicago from Thursday to Sunday to see the shows, celebrate our anniversary, and generally relax for a change.  Unfortunately, this meant that our anniversary proper would be spent packing, driving for 6 and ½ hours, dealing with Chicago traffic, and checking into the hotel.  Not exactly the most romantic of schedules, so I made the change to Valentine’s Day for the proposal, and hoped that I could make it into something special.

     The first step was to be absolutely traditional and ask her parents for permission to marry their daughter.  Now, I moved down from New York to Kentucky to be with her, have lived with her for almost two years at this point, and spent a good deal of time with her family.  I’m very lucky to be considered a member of the family… so much so that when I asked her mother and father, they responded “No,” and started to laugh.  In their eyes my proposing was a given, and my asking their permission was simply silly.  For me, it was just the proper thing to do.  But then we all got serious - they told me that I made her happier then they’d ever seen her, and that of course I had their approval.  On my part, I told them that her happiness was the most important thing to me, and that I would take care of her and treat her with the respect she deserved.  Now that I was “allowed” to marry her, there were plans to be made.

     Stephanie and I had plans to spend a weekend with our friends Jen and Frank (at whose wedding we had met in realtime for the first time back in March of 2000), the weekend before Valentine’s Day.  Through some light deception between Jen and myself, I was able to bow out of the trip so that it was just Stephanie and her friend Jennifer going – leaving me the entire weekend alone to make plans without fear of discovery. 

     I was able to think of a plan of action fairly quickly.  We’ve had a favorite restaurant, “Bella Notte,” that’s been “ours” for special occasions since I came down here to Lexington.  It’s a smallish local (read non-chain) Italian place that’s quiet, dimly lit, and very romantic.  I figured that we could go under the guise of the traditional Valentine’s Day dinner, and I’d propose there.  The only problem was getting the restaurant in on the plan with me…

     We’d been there on Valentine’s Day last year (with a 4 hours long wait), so I knew I’d have to work something out with the staff ahead of time.  I called that day and spoke to the manager.  When I asked if I could make reservations, she said that wasn’t their policy for Valentine’s Day… but after I explained that it was our anniversary, and that I wanted to propose to Stephanie in out favorite place, she immediately warmed up to the idea.  As long as we could have dinner somewhat “early” (before the 8 pm rush), she’d hold us a table.  After speaking for a few minutes, the plan was in place – we’d have dinner, I’d excuse myself “to the bathroom” when I’d meet the manager who would transfer the ring to our server.  The server would then bring out the ring box on the dessert tray with whatever we ordered. 

     Needless to say I was nervous as all hell the few days before – I wasn’t sleeping or eating well, but from what Stephanie told me, it wasn’t noticeable to her at all.  On Valentine’s Day I went through my classes in a daze, and paces from the early afternoon until about 5:00, when I started to get ready.  I can’t say how many times I checked for the ring, but it was a good amount. :)  I got dressed (dressy black shirt, khakis and my one pair of good shoes) and met Stephanie in her room, where she was dressed beautifully (I suppose that’s one positive about having it on Valentine’s Day – there was no need for an excuse to go out).  We left for “Bella Notte,” which already had over a 2 hour by the time I got there.  You can imagine how nice it was to simple give the greeter my name and be whisked away to a romantic corner table before people who had been waiting there for a good deal of time.  I explained this to Stephanie by saying that I’d called a few days earlier and been able to make a reservation “if it wasn’t too late.”  Technically, I wasn’t lying.

     Dinner was up to their usual (wonderful) standards.  I had the Chicken and Linguine with Alfredo sauce, while Stephanie had an oven-fired Four-cheese pizza.  I was able to keep my nervousness from showing by alternating chatting and listening to her busy day.  After what seemed to be hours, our server came to take our dessert order – the sign.  A moment after that I excused myself and found the manager, who took the ring and told me that once they saw that “It was good,” there would be complementary Champagne brought over (I had wondered when she asked if we were over 21 on the phone).  I returned to the table, but took a different seat that was easier to get on the knee from.

     Our server come back after what seemed to be an eternity with our order – a “berry cream” martini, a cup of their homemade strawberry gelato in a waffle cup, and a black box.  I picked it up, bent onto one knee and opened it.  Of course, that’s when Stephanie started crying, seeing what was happening.  I went through a 30 second speech that for the life of me I’ll never be able to recall.  One thing I do remember is the murmur of people whispering about us.  Stephanie said yes as she was crying, I came up to kiss her, and people broke out into applause… and seeing as it was a “yes,” the champagne.  The rest of the time there was spent looking at Stephanie staring at her ring, and people coming up to congratulate us.

     After we left (thanks all the staff involved), the remained of the night was consumed with us stopping by close friends to let them in on the new, informing Stephanie’s hall (which were more excited than anyone, including us.  In particular her friend Alyson, who spend the night calling people to tell them “My friend got engaged tonight!”), and calling the respective families and grandparents.  Sometime around midnight I collapsed out of sheer exhaustion and the release of all the stress that had built up over the last few weeks… and thus ends the story. 

…And they lived happily ever after. :)