A Botched Proposal

This story was meant to be performed out loud for an audience and was originally written as a piece for The Moth stage. Enjoy!

My mother sometimes says that my husband, Thomas, fluctuates at a lower frequency than most other human beings. While everyone else is somewhere up here (raise your hand up and down), Thomas maintains a consistent humming right about here (lower hand and shake steadily). Thomas has always been a slow-moving man. He puts his shoes on slowly; he walks slowly; and if you ask him a question, you better be willing to wait for an answer. And while this quality may drive his family and friends nuts at times, I think it says more about his character and his extreme thoughtfulness more than anything else. Thomas is, if anything, a thoughtful, methodical man who, when he does something, he does it right the first time. It might take longer than your average Joe, but it’s going to be the best result possible. This is probably why it took him six years to propose.

We met when we were both studying abroad at Harlaxton College in England. He had a girlfriend at the time but I was in love the minute I saw his greased up Mohawk and his swimming, blue eyes. We became close friends and I waited a whole miserable year for him. Within the first year or two of dating, we started talking about marriage, and it was something we both wanted, but we were willing to wait. There was no rush. After college we decide to move to China and travel around a bit – we weren’t done with our adventures abroad. After moving back to the states, years passed by, and yet there was no proposal from Thomas. I waited, and waited, and waited until finally I thought to myself: “I am a badass feminist. What exactly am I waiting for?” I decided then and there, before our sixth anniversary, that I was going to propose.

I bought a ring and planned a huge birthday weekend surprise where I was going to snatch Thomas up for a secret getaway near Louisville, Kentucky for whiskey distillery tours, a romantic steak dinner, and a quaint bed and breakfast. I had a shiny piece of metal, a bottle of aged whiskey, and Victoria Secret on my side. I was so excited! However, there was a snowstorm the Friday before we left. It cleared up that next Saturday morning, despite the piles of snows lining the highway and the butt ends of various cars and trucks sticking out of the wall of snow we followed down south. Little did we know that despite the 45-degree weather and the fact that you could see more ground than snow, Louisville, Kentucky basically shuts down whenever there is any snow whatsoever. We drove from distillery to distillery – all of them were closed. I was utterly devastated. While Thomas was out of the car checking to see if a local distillery was open, I called my sister crying: “Everything is closed because of the snow and everything is ruined...” As I was blubbering to my sister, Thomas got back in the car and my sister asked, “Are you still going to propose?” Low and behold the volume on my phone was so high, Thomas heard every word my sister said. He stops, turns and looks at me, and said, “You can’t do that. I’m going to do that.” I completely collapsed from failure inside and cried to my sister, “He just heard you I have to go.” My poor sister thought she had ruined my proposal when it was doomed from the start I swear. Thomas asked me what was going on and I said take me to the nearest bar that’s open! If we are going to talk about this I need a drink!

At this point, I just lost it. I began to take shots of whiskey and I felt as though this heavy cloud was starting to appear over our heads the more we talked as tears were streaming down my face. We started to assess our relationship, our time together, our goals in life, what we both wanted, etc. Thomas began to cry and I was so confused. I asked, “Why are you crying?” And he responded, “I can’t believe I waited this long to marry you.” We went to dinner but I started to feel ill. I thought I was because we were in uncharted waters and I was sinking fast but the cold sweats and fever suggested otherwise. The next morning I woke up with the worst flu symptoms imaginable. We were the only two people staying at this bed and breakfast and the owners prepared this HUGE spread for breakfast! I am talking sizzling eggs, maple bacon, fresh fruit, and berries on a yogurt parfait. It was colorful, succulent, and all for us - and I couldn’t eat a single bit. I slept for the next week straight, feverish and a shell of a human being. I was so sick that Thomas and I weren’t even able to talk about what happened in Kentucky.

After I recovered from the flu, Thomas and I went through what we can only call a mourning period. We felt as though something had died and we weren’t quite sure how to recover. We started by agreeing not to discuss marriage for a while. A long while. We then started with little sentiments to help rebuild what we had lost or left behind in Kentucky. There was a white board in our living room that we used as a way to communicate what we loved or appreciated about each other on a daily basis - little white board love notes. We planned date nights were we would do something different together and spend quality time just having fun. After a while, we were able to talk about the botched proposal and work through our feelings.

Ultimately what we both experienced was a paradigm shift of some sort. Thomas felt obligated as the man of our relationship to propose. It was his duty, despite the fact that it doesn’t quite fit his personality. I had always been the first one to make the move in our relationship. I am often times the first person to make the move in any situation: that’s who I am! He felt that a woman proposing to him made him seem less of a man. So we began to explore why he felt this way and where these messages were coming from. And let me tell you this idea is reinforced EVERYWHERE! Slowly, he began to redefine what it means to be manly when it came to marriage, proposals, and all the American traditions surrounding these patriarchally driven institutions.

For me, I needed to remember that I didn’t need to be married in order to be truly loved. I needed to remember that after year one of dating, Thomas and I sat in our favorite bar called the Joynt, had a pitcher of Premium Grain belt and decided that this was it for us, that this was all we’d ever want and nothing else mattered because we’d be in the thick of this crazy world together. Those were our true wedding vows, that night at the Joynt, surrounded by cigarette smoke and beer, snuggled up to the bar and each other.

Thomas proposed four months later, on our 6th anniversary. It’s been almost two years since my botched proposal and I’ve never felt that that experience tarnished our relationship in any way. If anything, it made it stronger and it’s a great story to tell at a party. My husband may be a slow moving man but love has no timeline and is in no rush. And when Thomas does something, he does it right the first time, even if it takes a bit longer than usual. As Shakespeare once wrote: “Go wisely and slowly. Those who rush stumble and fall.”