How We Met
Austin and I met during my freshman year of high school in science class thanks to assigned seating. We quickly realized we had three other classes together that year and became pretty fast friends. He was clearly better at science and math than me, and I found English and Spanish class to come to a lot easier, so we split up our work for most of the year which led to us talking pretty much every day after school. Everyone around us knew I had the biggest crush on him but he never did anything about it. Austin is very shy when he first meets people and I am the opposite, I am loud and talk to everyone, it’s probably why we always got along so well, the perfect balance.
The next year we didn’t have any classes together and our friendship hit a stalemate. Fast forward to junior year and we had multiple classes together again and we picked up right where we left off. This time I made it clear I wanted to date him and he FINALLY asked me to be his girlfriend. The rest is history!! We’ve been together for almost ten years and survived 4 years of undergrad at different schools as well as another 2 years of grad school for him. We’ve had so many adventures together and it just never gets old. It’s always been easy with us, we are a team in every sense of the word and it’s made for the most amazing 10 years.
How They Asked
I travel a good amount for work and I was away for 6 days for a trip. Austin had also been away for a few days before I even left so we had been apart for about 9 days. When I returned from my trip he asked if I wanted to go to brunch so we could catch up on the prior week. It is not out of the ordinary for us to go to a nice brunch, we enjoy going to restaurants and are big foodies, so this was par for the course. Since we’ve been together for such a long time I had not been subtle about wanting the ring sooner rather than later, but I had also made it clear I wanted my parents and family to be a part of the day in some way.
In my head, I was trying to figure out what weekend he would do it because that’s the type of person I am, and completely wrote off Saturday the 25th because my mom had written in her calendar she and my dad had a flight to California that day. My mom is old school when it comes to this calendar, she lives by it. She doesn’t use her iPhone, she writes everything down, so once I saw this, that day was out of the question.
Everyone else had been lying to me as well, I was under the impression we were going to a surprise party in the city for our friend whose actual birthday it was that evening. That morning my parents even texted me, “Boarding the plane, will text when we land,” so I was completely thrown off. I threw on an outfit that would work for brunch and then a birthday party in NYC and was out the door.
Austin and I had a lovely brunch at a restaurant near the water in Jersey City, complete with spicy margaritas and lots of bread, and then took a walk on the waterfront because it was such a beautiful day. He proposed to me with the most gorgeous backdrop of the Freedom Tower and I lost it. My cousins were incognito in hats and masks taking pictures of the whole thing and then he pointed to my family hiding behind a tree.
Every surprise threw me more and more and I basically collapsed. He gave me the ring of my dreams and then brought me to a bar where all of the people that have supported our relationship for the past 10 years celebrated us. It was one of my favorite days ever and I truly hope everyone gets to experience a day like I did, where you feel loved from every angle.
