How my Juliet proposed

Dear Mar and other interested readers,

When it came to proposing to the die-hard romantic, my darling Juliet outdid me by far. You'd think it's important for the romantic of the two to have a magnificent proposal story. But in fact, it seems she gave the romantic the most memorable, knock-your-socks-off, romantic-est proposal ever!

Juliet and I had found a lovely "private" beach, as we called it. It was a 100-ft mini beach that the bay dumped into, overlooking Downtown San Diego. It was secretly nestled between Il Fornaio and a tented playhouse. Thinking we were the only ones ever to have discovered this secret spot, we walked down to our little private beach and people watched on our blue blanket.

Being that it was the day of our anniversary, my Juliet presented me with an anniversary gift. It was rectangular in shape, wrapped in navy blue crushed velvet fabric, tied with a gold tassel, with a red rose hanging from it. When I unveiled the fabric, it was wrapped in white paper. As I tugged at the white paper, i discovered a blue, leather bound book, with my nick name embossed on the cover in silver leaf. The binding read "The Early Works." She had compiled all my poetry, short stories, and articles and had them published and leather bound.

She made me flip through the pages, until I got to the point where the pages seemed to be stuck. At about the middle of the book was a page that included a very romantic inscription, at the bottom of which was a flap that read "Will you marry me?" When i lifted the flap, it revealed the engagement ring. She had a ring box built into the second half of the leather bound collection of everything I had written to date. Not to mention, the inscription leading to the flap made me cry, it was so cute. She not only eternalized my work, but made me a proposition I could not resist! Of course, I said "Yes!" And it was magical.

Loving her,

--Sullivan

Plans A, B, C and D

Dear Super Des and other Readers,

I thought it only fair, after sharing with you the actual proposal story, to share the runner up options which fell through.

Plan A:
Having been to the city of love/lights before, I could think of nothing better than to propose to my Juliet in France. She was graduating from college in June of 2007 and we had made plans to travel together for our 5th anniversary as a sort of double celebration. I kept pushing to go to Europe, thinking I could make it a most memorable trip.

Planning in advance, i contacted a florist in Paris that was willing to make me a floral arrangement in the shape of an engagement ring, which would hold a ring box in the center of the "stone" part. My plan was to arrange for us to go to the Eiffel Tower on the day of our anniversary, in the early afternoon. Among the crowds, I would ask my Juliet to take a seat on the bench under the tower, and wait for me to buy the tickets to climb the lift of the tower. While she waited, florists would come by to deliver her little floral arrangements and greet her with "Bonne Anniversaire Mademoiselle" until the last arrangement would arrive (the ring arrangement). The ring box would have a little note inside that said "Will you marry me?" at which point i would approach, kneel, and present the ring.

Plan B:
My Juliet began suspecting that i wanted to propose to her and jested to me that i would do something corny like propose under the Eiffel Tower. So i quickly began to amend the plan.

I contacted a friend who could arrange for a quartet to play along the banks of the Seine river, where the artists paint and sell. Once again set in Paris, I intended to take my Juliet to the banks of the Seine on the afternoon of our anniversary to have our portrait painted. While we "posed" I would arrange for the quartet to play the tango from Scent of a Woman (the song we danced to together when we were falling in love). Once again, I would have the floral scene play out as described above, at which point, I would once again kneel and ask.

Plan C:
George Bush and his ensemble ensured that the value of the dollar would drop, and it increasingly became nearly impossible to afford diamond rings and a lavish trip to France. So, i had to take the practical route.

Coronado Island happens to be the place where we fell in love. We didn't know it at the time, but the minute we became a couple, we realized that Coronado Island was the magical place that did it for us. So why not pop the question there?

I made reservations for us to stay in the deluxe suite at the Crown City Inn. We would drive down the day before our anniversary, and spend a 4 day weekend in our special place. I could not think of a better idea, than to have an insta-engagement. So i devised a "super secret" email to our most intimate friends, inviting them to drive down on the day of our anniversary (Friday August 24th) to meet us for dinner at The Rhino Cafe. The Rhino was a sentimental restaurant for us, one we had visited every time we went down to the island. It was where we shared our first glass of wine. The plan was to have them all seated for dinner, waiting for us to arrive. When we would get there, they would yell "Surprise" as if they were throwing us a surprise anniversary party. Once the excitement had settled, i would make a speech or announcement and propose to my Juliet. Poof, the surprise anniversary party would instantly become and engagement party.

Plan D:
The jerks at the Rhino cafe refused to accommodate a party of 12. So instead i thought of the next most sentimental spot for us: The Lambs Players Theatre. Every time we visited the island, our ritual was to see a play at the Lambs Players Theatre and have dinner at The Rhino. I had asked a friend to make arrangements with the theatre to do the following:

I would take my Juliet for what she thought was a Friday matinee. We would be seated in the front row of the dark theatre, after which i would excuse myself to go to the restroom. Prior to our arrival, our guest list of friends would have been allowed to fill the seats of the theatre. So unbeknownst to my Juliet, our friends would have been sitting behind and all around her. In the meantime, the stage manager would have directed me to the back of the stage, so that i may make an appearance on the set. A light tech would have shined a spotlight on me, and a sound tech would have played a song i had prepared. I had made a medley of all of our songs, ending with Peter Gabriel's "Book of Love" which ends with the line "I want to give you wedding rings." I would come on stage, do a little pirouette to the medley, get down on one knee and propose. After she said "Yes," the house lights would go on, and the audience would applaud. Much to her surprise, my Juliet would find us surrounded by our friends. Dinner reservations were made such that we could all have an instant-engagement party immediately after at the Hotel Del Coronado.

The history behind Plan E:
About a month before the "big day" I sent out an email to all our friends, telling them the super secret surprise engagement details. One friend replied to the email and added that we should get together for dinner soon. As stupid as i am, i replied and copied in my Juliet to ask if she was in agreement over the dinner date schedule. Much to my stupidity, the previous chain of emails were included, and the surprise was spoiled. she had seen the details of the insta-engagement plans included in Plan C. So to throw her off, i told her i was so upset at the misfortune of her having found out about it, that i was cancelling the whole thing. In reality i proceeded to plan out Plan D. Well, feeling bad that i had gone through all the trouble and then cancelled, she sent out an email of her own, inviting all the same people to try to surprise me on her own! Before we knew it, we had each invited all the same people, to the same place, for different reasons. Well, we found each otter out, and simply planned a joint engagement dinner for the evening of our anniversary and had planned to each propose to each other when we felt it was right - we just had to make sure we did it before the engagement dinner part! haha!

So about half an hour before Plan D was supposed to take place, i found out that our guests were nowhere near the island yet. So i was willing to abandon the "audience" factor of my grand scheme and rushed to the theatre at 5:30 to make my grand performance for my Juliet. At 5:25 my friend called to tell me that the lady at the Theatre called her to tell her that they didn't have a light or sound tech available. Fine! I would abandon all that too. Finally, she called to say they simply wouldn't be able to accommodate us anymore. So, spontaneously out of options, I thought that the beach front at the Hotel Del Coronado was the other most sentimental spot for us. I immediately texted all our friends, urging them to rush over there. I parked the car in a loading zone, grabbed the blanket out of the back seat (which was luckily there) and dragged my Juliet by the hand to the beach where... you can read all about it in the previous post on Plan E!

Still laughing about the fiasco,

--Sullivan

How I proposed...

Dear readers,

I am ashamed to admit that when the time came to do the most romantic thing in the world, all my world-class perfect proposal ideas fell to flame and all I was able to do is the following:

In a rushed Plan E, I texted everyone to meet us on the white-ish sands of the Hotel Del Coronado on August 24, 2007. We were wearing the same outfits we wore exactly 5 years ago, when in a completely unexpected moment, we kissed on August 24, 2002.

We found 4 rows of white wedding chairs lined on the sand in preparation for a wedding rehearsal, and sat and waited for our audience to arrive. I laid down a blue fleece blanket on the sand, and the wind began to blow. My best friend, at the time, laid down her purse to keep the edges of the blanket from curling up. We each took off our shoes and lined the other corners and edges of the blanket. I took my Juliet by the hand and led her to the blanket. I gently got down on one knee and said:

"In this unforgiving world,
We seek to find
A smile, a glimmer, a breath returned
To call home.

And I - I’m lucky, because
Every time you smile back at me,
When I see that glimmer in your eyes,
When I feel you breathe…
I know I’m home.

I want nothing more than to come home to you
Every day for the rest of my life.
So if you’d like to come home to me too...
Will you marry me?"

She said "Yes!" :)

Still in love with my Juliet,

--Sullivan

The Lord's Prayer in Armenian

Dear Readers,

On the off chance that any of you might want to learn how to recite the Lord's Prayer in Armenian, here it is transliterated in English for you below.

A Phonetic key:

'i'-s have the long "eeeeeeee" sound below. 'tz'-s make the same sound you get in tsetse fly. 'gh' makes the same sound as the French 'r'. 'u'-s make the same uhhhhhhhh sound as in uncle. 'oo'-s make the same oooooooo sound as in "ooooooooo, ahhhhhhhhhh". And all 'r'-s must be rolled. "yoo" is pronounced like "you" with an 'n' or 't' tacked on depending on the word. 'o'-s alone make the long 'ooooooooo' sound as in oval. 'Ayl' is pronounced like aisle.


The Lords Prayer: Transliterate (English) - Hayr Mer (Our Father)
Hayr mer vor hergins yes;
Soorp yeghitzi anoon ko.
Yegeghtze arkayootyoon ko;
Yeghitzin gamk ko;
Vorbes hergins yev hergri.
Uz-hatz mer hanabazort door mez aysor.
Yev togh mez uzbardis mer,
Vorbes yev menk toghoomk merotz bardabanantz.
Yev mi danir uzmez ee portzootyoon;
Ayl purgya uzmez ee chare.
Ziko e arkayootyoon yev zorootyoon yev park havidyans, havidenitz, Amen.

Yours,

--Sullivan

They just can't be happy for us!

Dear Reader,

My dearest and I did a lovely thing this memorial day. We spun a huge web of lies just to surprise my family in Orlando, FL while on their week-long DisneyWorld vacation. My father had been very upset that I wasn't joining them on this trip. They seem to have removed all thoughts from their minds that I have a significant other and that we are progressing towards settling down together. Needless to say, when I told them I was saving my vacation days for something else, they got mad at me. They don't know that "something else" is our honeymoon. But, to smooth things over, Juliet and I did what we had to do, spent too much money, and surprised them for the long weekend. They were ecstatic to see us. They were so happy to have us with them for a few days that nothing else mattered. We were away from home, away from all the burdens, and enjoying that imagination and sublimation of the happiest place on earth: DisneyWorld!

It was great and we came back without them. We had the house to ourselves for a week so Juliet told her parents she was away on a conference for a week and stayed with me instead. It was wonderful playing "house" and living together as we will be soon. And nothing was more awful than when we had to finally part.

The last few days since my parents' return have been quite strange. I've been moody and she's been needy and in between us is our family. My folks have wanted to consume every minute of my time and so have Juliet's. They've driven her crazy at this point. And all the while, we struggle to get together for meals and share a couple of hours together. Unfortunately, spending that time at my house seems to be the worst thing, now that every one's back home. It was lovely while we were here alone, but now that we're back, my mother has started again with her heavy sighs and ugly faces. Juliet doesn't deserve that - and yet my mother can't stop hating her for being the one person to come in and ruin her complacent bull shit life! It makes me mad. We dine with our other friends at my house, and my parents praise their relationships and are overjoyed for them. And when they see my Juliet and I exchange a smile or a glance, they develop a look of disgust and follow it with those ugly sighs. Why can't they be happy for our affection too?

What's worse is that I'm now officially poised in the position where I'm about to crush everything in every one's lives by taking this huge plunge. And as D day gets closer, i get more and more nervous. I don't know how i can do it - to ruin so many people. My parents will be shamed by the lady Capulet. My grandparents, who are friends with the Capulets, will have their social circle destroyed. Their monthly gatherings will officially crumble because of us. The community will be in an uproar. And as much as I'd like to care less about them, the Capulets will be ruined. All they have is their one daughter and i am ruining all their hopes and dreams because I'm a woman. My Montagues will never get along with them and I have no idea what we got ourselves into.

I almost want to call it quits, run away, forget it all... but I can't! I adore her. I'm just not sure how I'm going to work out living with myself for the rest of my life, knowing i caused the heartache of so many people, albeit that they are narrow minded and un-accepting. This is the cross I bare, daily. And yet, I can't take it anymore; I can't stand not living together anymore. I'm ready to start my life. But what's the solution? How do I get around the mess? What do I do?

Readers, please comment with some suggestions. I'm losing my mind in this conflict between martyrdom and doing something for myself for a change!

Nervous and Confused,

--Sullivan