The Groom's backstory

It seemed like it was about time for an entry post for "The Groom"... best place to start is probably the part of the story the future Mrs. didn't know.

I won't try to write down the reasons I decided to propose because those are a bit too personal for a public blog, but I will say when - New Year's. A lot of people become engaged around New Year's, probably because there's a lot of excitement around with the end of one year and the beginning of the next - the metaphor to one's life story at engagement is pretty clear. For me, its always been a point in the year where I like to size up where I've been, where I want to be, etc. I looked back at 2009 and watched our relationship play back and forth in my head and thought about what I wanted over the next year. I realized then that whenever I thought about my future she was in it.

Nevertheless, I've always told myself that I would never make such a big decision without being at least a year into a relationship and I told myself that I would keep to that. Not yet knowing when, I began passing subtle hints and testing the waters (I also believe that one should never pop the question without knowing what the answer would be, so I had to figure that out too.) We went "window-shopping" at Tiffany's in NYC over New Year's to get a sense of her style. (For Christmas I had bought her a small "I love you" ring from Tiffany's - while my decision was not made at that time, the thoughts were there and I figured that it was never too early to start gaining intelligence about ring sizes, etc. Buying that ring not only gave her a great present but also taught me all about her finger sizes - information I filed away for future reference.)

I knew this would get her all excited (and suspicious), so I let her talk - the whole ride home from NYC she read the Tiffany's book and educated herself and me about all things diamond. I intentionally let any excitement/suspicion fade into the woodwork for a while. Life continued - I closed on the condo, she helped me pick out furniture, paint, etc. Her birthday came and passed. So did Valentine's Day, as well as numerous "date nights" that could have been interpreted as opportunities.

Sometime in February, we decided to book our Caribbean cruise. As soon as we did, I began thinking about that as the intended timeframe. I did whatever I could to not tip her off on that, however, so I let everything sit for a few more weeks. In March, I decided that I would have to get cracking if it were going to actually happen in late April. As March/April is the beak of busy season at work for the future Mrs., I figured that I'd be able to find some time over the weekends to do some ring research without tipping her off; what I didn't plan on was being just as busy myself ever since January, so I lost my weekend time as well.

Finally in March she had to go into the office when I didn't, so I decided to grab the opporunity. I took a drive out to Tiffany's in Chestnut Hill (not realizing at the time that EVERYTHING would be as overly expensive as what we saw in NYC). About 5 minutes from the mall, I get a call from the furture Mrs. saying "I got out early - where are you?" I had to think fast - I had talked about needing ramps in order to work on my car, so I said I was almost to the auto parts store so I couldnt turn around but would go see her after that. It seemed like she bought it, but I knew I would have to keep my trip limited so she didn't get suspicious, especially when I didnt buy anything (I later learned that she DID get suspicious, so it was lucky I did this far enough in advance).

Having decided the little blue box was out of the question, I threw out the whole "what kinds of rings do you like" question and got her buzzing about it again. She didn't seem to recognize my questions as being more directed towards an actual purchase this time, but just in case I wanted to do it far enough in advance so that "buzz" would fade well in advance of April 23 (our vacation start date). I think it worked - we didn't say anything more about it after that point, and I think the "buzz" once again retreated.

For a couple weeks, I used my "spare" time looking at the styles she said she liked and hunting for the perfect ring. Eventually I found it, put it on order, and moved onto the next step....

Asking her dad. She had made it very clear that there would be no engagement until 1) I got a ring and 2) I asked her dad. With step 1 done, step 2 presented difficulty because not only do her parents live an hour away, but her dad was working up by Dartmouth ever week except the weekends - clearly an evening drive was out of the question and with my busy schedule leaving early enough from work to get up there was not feasible. This left the weekends (which were becoming precious few by this time), but those had their own issue because we were both working so much. Then it hit me - Easter weekend. Rather than her going up herself on Saturday, I figured why not drive up together for dinner on Saturday, then drive back to my parents in Sudbury after that? So that became the plan. Problem was that the future Mrs. got stuck at the office until late, so dinner got pretty squeezed - my hope was to get up there early enough such that she and her mom would, at some point, take off upstairs or somewhere such that I would have a few minutes to accomplish my task without her knowing. Well, the clock kept ticking and it was about 11pm and everyone was getting tired. Fearing my window was closing, I got lucky - the dogs needed a walk! Her dad went downstairs to walk them - saying something about how I wanted to see the dogs (I'm not sure what I said, really - I was kinda nervous), I followed. Once her dad brought the dogs back inside, I said what I came to say (again, not exactly sure what I said, but I did get the message across). We went back upstairs and I made up some silly story about watching the dogs chase the flashlight in the back yard to try to evade suspicion as to why I went downstairs. Hoping she wasn't suspicious, I left the future Mrs. and her parents and took off to Sudbury.

All sat quiet for the next few weeks. The ring arrived, insurance was purchased (no Type A lawyer is going to bring an engagement ring through airports and on a cruise without insurance), and we psyched ourselves up for the cruise. While the ring was delivered to my office, I didn't want to leave it there - so it stayed in its nondescript brown shipping box next to all my camera equipment in the office for about 2-3 weeks. Luckily, she never asked me where the brown box came from or what it was...

Now, where to pack an engagement ring when you 1) are traveling with the future recipient, 2) have to go through airport security, and 3) don't carry a man-purse. Solution? SLR camera bag. Not only would it be with me at all times, but the future Mrs. never touches that stuff unless I ask her to. Obviously it was a risk (telling her to leave it alone would have raised suspicion), but it was the best I could do. I packed it under a bunch of other equipment in my bag and off we went.

We made it to the ship with my secret still intact. However, I had heard stories of people getting stuff swiped from cruise ship cabins during fire drills, etc. so I needed to figure out how to hide it. Fortunately, there was a safe. Since I couldnt ditch a ring box in the safe, I put it in a plastic case for one of my filters - fortunately she didn't ask why I cared enough about a piece of plastic to put it in the safe!

The last step was figuring out when, where and how to ask the all-important question. I had googled for some cruise ship proposal ideas before leaving and had decided 1) a "formal" night would be a good opportunity because we'd be dressed up all nice and the ship would have professional photographers all over to take pictures (when else do you get professional photos on engagement day?) and 2) earlier in the cruise was better than later so that she could enjoy being the almost Mrs. Andersen (and so I wouldnt have to worry about her finding the ring). I contemplated a public proposal, but decided that wasn't us, especially since we didn't know anyone on the ship. I tried to get out steward to sneak in a bottle of champagne, but that raised logistical problems with arranging room service. After running through it in my head about 20 times, the plan solidified itself. The green dress, the curly hair, "I've Got a Feeling", sunset, balcony, wine, etc. - it just seemed so us.

And the rest is history.