He Asked, She said Yes

It happened on a beautiful Kauai beach early in the morning.  It was our first morning on the island, and we were both excited to be there, and tired from traveling the day before.

The first question people ask me (Ally) is, “Was it a surprise??”  Well, after almost 9 years, a proposal in general wasn’t exactly a surprise, but where/when it happened absolutely was.

We’d discussed marriage, but Mike kept telling me that it would happen when it happened.  He didn’t want to talk about it a lot, because he wanted it to be a surprise.  So I stopped asking (mostly) if it was ever going to happen, and Mike acted like nothing was going on.  I knew that there was (probably) a ring out there, and I knew that he wanted to marry me, but I didn’t know when or where he would actually pop the question.  And after several months of thinking maybe tonight, or maybe this weekend, I gave up trying to guess.  I would not let myself even entertain the idea of a proposal on Hawaii.  I refused to spend the entire week guessing if every single moment was IT, so I just decided it wasn’t going to happen.

Which brings us back to that beach on Kauai.  The night before, Mike and I decided that we wanted to take a walk on the beach. It was entirely Mike’s idea because he knew he wanted to propose to me me then, but somehow he used his super mind tricks on me and I SWEAR I thought it was my idea.

So, we woke up early, and went down to the beach. We walked along the coast one way, and then turned back.  Mike was quiet, but I assumed he was just jet lagged. When we were about to turn back up the path to our hotel, Mike asked if I wanted to walk a little further, out onto some lava rocks just past the beach. [Interjection by Mike: At this point, I was a ball of nerves, and I didn’t know how or when to pop the question. So by asking Ally to keep walking I was just trying to give myself a second to catch my breath and get ready for the big moment.] This was a risky question, as walking on lava rocks qualifies as hardcore hiking in my book – and I am usually extremely opposed to hardcore physical activity of any kind – but I didn’t want to go back yet, so I agreed.  We walked over to the rocks and started climbing around.

I found a dead crab, named him Stan, and buried him in the sand, using my flip-flop as a shovel. I made a quick speech about what a good crab Stan was (out of respect), and then turned to leave (because I was convinced that Stan’s crab family was going to come after me… I might have been a little jet lagged myself).

But Michael stopped me, thanked me for being so patient with “the whole marriage thing”, and said he was ready.

He had the ring in his camera bag.

He didn’t get down on one knee (he says it didn’t feel right – but I think it’s because he was also scared of Stan’s family).

I said yes.

(Of course.)

Then we walked back to the hotel and my mom turned into a blubbering mess of a human.

It was a happy time.