The Proposal
I chose to propose to Blaire under the Eiffel Tower for two main reasons:
2. To live the cliché that many dream of and propose under an international symbol of romance: a 317 meter tall, 7 thousand ton wrought-iron tower.
I took a risk. Asking a woman to marry me on the second of a nine-day trip? What if she said “no?” To spend seven more days in an unfamiliar city, sharing a cramped, cell-like room and having only the girl-who-said-no as a companion was inviting an experience that would be the “vacation from hell.”
Thankfully, as attested by the nearby tourists and street vendors, startled as they were by our faces—Blaire’s full of tears and mine, pale and covered with a film of nervous sweat—and the inexplicable croaking noise coming from my sweet beloved (the ability to articulate words momentarily deserted her), she said yes.
For the remainder of our night, we took in the sights of New Year’s Eve Paris. We watched in awe as the electric blue light bathing the Eiffel Tower was out shone by the starry twinkling of the hourly light show. We looked at the ring. We moseyed toward the Seine River, weaving our way between the food stalls lining the streets, creating gauntlets of confectionary delights, snack foods and crappy light-up Eiffel Tower commemorative figurines. We looked at the ring some more. And even though the night was young, we retired, bowing to the pressure of a nine-hour time change, french police gearing up for what seemed to be a small war and the thousand-strong crowd growing larger and drunker by the minute.
Thus we spent out New Year’s Eve in Paris: engaged (happily), eating cheese and crackers (voraciously), drinking wine (carefully, our room had no corkscrew; we hacked the cork out with a knife and clothes hanger), and watching a french-dubbed version of High School Musical on the tiny television in our tinier room.
Best New Year’s ever.
