How I’m Going To Propose
It seems that marriage proposals these days are getting more and more elaborate. It’s not that I have anything against intricate proposals, but they just aren’t really my speed. Here is how I envision myself popping the question to that special someone.
I take her to meet me at a nice restaurant, upscale American food, probably. The place has a chic ambiance to it— dim lighting, a sharply-dressed wait staff, perhaps some live music. As is customary at this restaurant, our table receives bread and butter and my future fiancée, not afraid of a few carbs here and there, digs right in.
While cutting into the heart shaped butter, though, her knife encounters something solid. She gasps. It’s not a ring. It’s a tiny glass vial. She takes the vial out of the butter, cleans it with her napkin, and opens the top to reveal its contents.
Rolled up inside of the glass vial is a tiny map, impossible to make out with the naked eye. Luckily, the dapper waiter brings over a magnifying glass; it is the very same magnifying glass that my great grandfather used to hand sculpt the engagement ring that has been passed down in my family from generation to generation, leading up to this unforgettably special moment.
Using the map, my future fiancée (let’s just call her Olga from now on, considering the only women I’ve EVER been attracted to are all, somehow, named Olga (so it’s a safe bet to assume that my future fiancée will be an Olga, as well)) is able to ascertain that the map is leading her to the 3rd stall in the men’s restroom. After waiting for a husky man to finish up his business in there, Olga hurries in behind him only to find nothing… or so she thinks.
When she shuts the stall door to cry (half from the odor and half from the fear that I was sending her on a wild goose chase with no proposal at the end of the tunnel), she sees an Eiffel Tower graffitied on the inside of the door. We’re going to Paris, baby.
We leave the restaurant, get a cab to the airport, and take a red-eye to Charles de Gaulle Airport in Paris. Once there, a limousine driver with our names (“Andrew + Olga Greene”, the first time I’ve seen it written out like that) scribbled on a piece of cardboard grabs our bags and ushers us into the stretch limo that I have arranged to pick us up.
The man, Pierre (fitting), drives us the Champs-Élysées. As we make our way further down the historic avenue, Olga is able to see something strange set up underneath the Arc de Triomphe. It’s a table, adorned with an intricately woven tablecloth and fine, silver utensils. We get out of the limousine and walk to the table; Olga, at this point, is weeping.
A waiter in a tuxedo emerges with mimosas and two plates, covered by silver domes. When he removes the domes, the plates contents are revealed: one croissant each. When Olga takes a bite out of hers, gingerly this time for fear of a ring inside, she, again, encounters something solid. It’s another glass vial. She sighs.
The vial contains another tiny piece of paper, this one with latitude and longitude coordinates. 40.7388° N, 73.9815° W. It’s the location of our home in New York. The ring has been there all along.
We fly back to New York City and take a cab to our apartment. When we get inside, we see that our goldfish is dead. We’ve been gone for so long and did not leave it any extra food while we were traveling. It’s a small hiccup in the plan.
Olga walks into our bedroom; there are rose petals on the duvet in the shape of a heart (I had a friend come to our apartment in order to set up the rose petals but I forgot to ask him to feed the fish). I open the drawer in my bedside table, where the ring, once worn by my great grandmother, has been all along.
I am simple man as I said. Who cares that I proposed in our apartment? I don’t need any of the elaborate frills like some other couples do. The only thing that matters to me is that I’m spending the rest of my life with Olga.
I get down on my left knee, tell her how much she means to me, and ask her to be my wife. Olga, of course, says yes. We kiss.
Something like that.
RIP goldfish. Welcome Olga!
a simple man