Engagement story, the long version

Ben and I celebrate the day we went on our first date every month, on the 12th. Usually we dress up and go out to dinner somewhere special, but sometimes we stay home and make dinner there. It's not too important what we do, we just do something together and don't let any distractions in. This month he asked if I'd like to go to Galveston and have a bonfire on the beach, which we haven't done since Hurricane Ike.

This sounded like an awesome idea to me! We packed up his mini grill, my set of lawnchairs my sister gave to me for my birthday last year, some food, some drinks and some sunscreen and drove down.

After searching several beaches, we found one that was clear and deserted and had convenient bushes nearby to make up for the lack of restrooms. We unpacked the lawnchairs and started the grill and poured the drinks.


The grill went out, blown out by the wind. We started it again, and it went out again. And again. And again. But after repositioning the car to block the wind and using nearly an entire bottle of lighter fluid, we had hot coals! The night before, I'd wrapped chopped chicken, red and green peppers, onions, mushrooms and lots of italian salad dressing up in foil packets. Somewhat nervous that the coals wouldn't stay hot and we'd have to eat at Taco Bell, we threw them on the grill and ate deviled eggs while we waited. And waited.

Roughly a million years later and after dark had fallen, we opened a packet and I cut into the chicken. It was cooked! It worked! Ben laughed at how wide my eyes got when I realized it had worked, I had really thought we'd have to end our day at a fast-food joint.

As we ate chicken and then delicious s'mores, the stars came out, much brighter than you can see in Houston. It was getting late and we still had a long drive home, so we packed up the car and got ready. Unwilling to leave, though, we held each other close and admired the beautiful view.

All of a sudden he went down on one knee and said,

You're everything I want.
You're everything I need.
(My full name),
Will you marry me?

By the time he got the last words out we were both shaking and crying and laughing at the same time, and I was hugging him so tightly I could barely say yes!


But I got the words out! Eventually we calmed down enough that he could actually put the ring on my finger. We stood there a while longer, admiring the ring and telling each other how much we loved each other, and looking at the stars.

The stars which are thousands of light years away, so the light we saw had been traveling through empty space for thousands of years just to fall down to Earth on that night, the night we were engaged to be married. I thought that was very awesome.