Warehouse Engagement

It was a perfect plan: the three year and nine month anniversary of our first date. "Let's celebrate by going somewhere nice," I said. She was a little surprised but, hey, who's to argue about a nice dinner out?

We were students at schools about an hour away from one another, so we met at our usual place, the parking lot of the church we attended together. Our destination? The Warehouse Restaurant in Marina Del Rey.

She wore a mid-length orange-brown suede skirt and a colorful silky top. Very seventies. We sat at a quiet table overlooking the marina. I asked how her day was. She began to eagerly describe an education class she had taken that day. Something about how to develop a lesson plan: "Hook, Book, Look, Took," as I recall.

I had trouble concentrating because, like Frodo, I had a secret mission and carried a secret ring. The mission? Get the ring out of my pocket and onto her finger. Find Mount "Groom," I guess you could say.

Anyway, she rattled on, oblivious to my plan. I feigned interest in the ring on her finger, an opal I'd given to her long before. "May I see it?" I innocently asked. I slipped it off and pretended to look at it, and then at her as she continued her story. "Hook, Look, what?" I asked.

My hand slid down into my jacket pocket. Surely it was there somewhere. I'd secretly purchased it a week earlier from my roommate's father, a jeweler in a nearby town. He'd made me a sweet deal, allowing me to buy a larger stone for the price of a smaller one. Still, it was likely too small, though the setting was quite beautiful I thought: a floral pattern completed only once the wedding band was attached. As a poor college student, I'd pretty well depleted my meager savings. But who cares when you're in love?

Soon the ring found my finger. I quickly exchanged the opal for the diamond and snuck a peak to make sure it looked just right.

Trying to appear nonchalant despite the beating of my telltale heart I casually put the diamond on her ring finger -- as if it were still the opal. At first she didn't notice. She gave a second, incredulous look. She looked at the ring, she looked at me....

"Will you marry me?" I asked, looking her straight in the eye. An interminable moment. She took another breath, her eyes glistening a little. "Yes!" she said, leaning across the table, sealing her acceptance with a kiss.

That was twenty-five years ago today: December 5, 1979. There's a lot of water under the bridge since then: we're both a little wiser -- and a little wider. Together we've made three of the greatest kids any parent could want. Is it perfect? Of course not. But if I had it to do all over again, I'd do it all over again -- in a heartbeat.