Things started out pretty normal in our apartment on December 15th, 2007. I made coffee and read the latest front page Yahoo news. Jonathan slept in for about an hour after I got up and walked out in his usual ensemble of sweats, a fleece, faded black work socks, old man fully-lined slippers and furrowed eyebrows. He poured his coffee, took his vitamins and left two of the kitchen cabinets open.
We were very excited to be going to the Nutcracker ballet that night and were still deciding on where to have a nice dinner before the big show. Oh, how clueless I actually was.
Big show was right.
We ended up eating dinner at a local bistro-type restaurant called West Town Tavern outside the city. We both absolutely loved it! It was a small place, had great wine and such an elegant atmosphere. Jonathan ate peppered steak with vegetables and I had pot roast with mashed potatoes. I know, me and mashed potatoes, who would have guessed?
We sifted through the falling snow to catch a cab downtown and showed up with just enough time to check out the theatre, take off our coats and sink softly into our beautiful plush box seats. ‘Box seats,’ I thought, ‘He went all out this time.”
After a fantastic performance we hustled out to try to catch a cab before the rest of the mob, only to find ourselves smack in the middle of the worst snow storm I’d seen in years. Someone must have shaken the snow globe a little too hard. Jonathan and I walked through the snow and wind and horrible cold for about a half an hour before finally catching a cab home.
We both looked like drown rats and Jonathan was acting abnormally impatient.
As we rode the elevator up to our apartment I looked at Jonathan. He gave me a weird smile; a smile that I could only interpret as a great mixture of happiness, nervousness and pure excitement. I thought I knew all of his looks by now. But, this one, I’d never seen.
That’s about the time when the slow motion started for me.
I could faintly hear music coming from the other side of the elevator door and my eyes started to tear. I knew at that moment that the time was now. The door opened and I took one step in to only cover my mouth, blink a little faster than normal and wipe the tears from my frozen cheeks. There, all I could do was stare around the room at what seemed like a hundred tiny candles glowing in the dark. Sitting on the table was a bottle of champagne in a bucket of ice and two flute glasses. The speaker in the corner was playing a string of my favorite snow tunes and the floor was swimming in rose petals, leading all the way over to the only teeny tiny little box under the Christmas tree. Jonathan picked up the small box wrapped tightly in a beautiful red bow, unwrapped it, opened the box and knelt down on one knee.
I remember it not as a memory but more like a movie I watched. I can’t remember what I said or even the exact sequence of moments. What I do remember is a feeling of pure joy.
That was the first surprise.
After the crying died down and the champagne was opened I told Jonathan that I was really surprised that he didn’t wait until we went home to Anchorage for Christmas the next week for a chance to ask my dad. He looked at me and said, “Oh, I’ve already been to Anchorage.”
A very very long story short- Jonathan works out of Seattle Mon-Thurs each week and two weeks before this night he had a long “work session” week until Friday. Yeah- right. Apparently, he flew from Seattle to Anchorage for all of about 9 hours. My sister Megan picked him up at the airport and took him downtown to meet my dad at a restaurant for lunch. Jonathan had schemed with my dad’s secretary to make him think he was meeting a corporate sponsor for lunch. My dad walked into the building, saw Jonathan and was completely confused. After he understood why Jonathan was there- they had a nice meal, an important conversation and a fun day surprising the rest of the family.
To this day, I tell Jonathan that the only thing that worries me about marrying him is knowing how good of a liar he is. For the record- he said he only lies about good things. That’s reassuring.
It’s weird being engaged. It’s strange wearing a ring on my left hand. It’s all very new and exciting. But, I’ll take it.
I think Caitlin tells it the best. This was one of the storytelling hits told while in Council Grove for the weekend:
