My boyfriend Neil and I have only been together since last October, but while I was home in Australia and away from him for six weeks, I thought about us getting married (usually when I was really missing him). Even mentioned the idea to my Mum a few times. During my stay in Australia, I had also been to court to finalise my divorce from my previous marriage, so it was amazing I was even thinking about doing it again! But I really love Neil and think he’s worth the effort.
We were out with friends the other week and our housemate was jokingly planning weddings for all the couples, as he wanted lots of parties so he could drink loads of booze. Somebody asked if we were engaged and Neil said “Noooooo”. I jokingly took offence at the way he said it and had a go at him. Later on that night, he said he didn’t mean it that way and would marry me in an instant. That got me thinking.I read the stories on confetti about the ‘Leap Year’ women who had taken the woman’s prerogative and proposed. I wasn’t sure if Neil would ever ask me, especially as I’d been married before, but it seemed a good bet that he would say yes.
I liked the idea of one girl who had asked her boyfriend to marry her by writing it down on a card. So on 13 February, I wrote my message on a piece of card and put it with a gift voucher – one of his Valentine’s Day gifts. Then I decided I didn’t like cardboard as we would want to have it as a keepsake. In the end, I bought two cards and a packet of blank invitations and wrote out a card and an invitation. Thought the card looked best, so I inserted that into the gift voucher envelope and tried to forget about it (yeah, like that worked!).That night when I got home, he gave me my presents and I panicked and gave him the gift voucher envelope without the proposal card in it. I put the card in my jacket pocket and we went out to dinner.We had a lovely Italian meal with a bottle of Champagne. I still didn’t know if I could do it. But just before Neil had finished the last of his Champagne, I told him to close his eyes.
I took the card out of my pocket, folded it in half and told him to read the message (Dear Neil, I love and want to be with you forever. Will you live dangerously, take a risk and…) and then I told him to close his eyes again, once he had read it. When I had worked up the courage, I turned the card over and the other side read “…marry me?” He was gob smacked (his words) and said “Yes” after a few seconds (seemed like ages!) So we finished the Champagne in celebration!
He couldn’t stop smiling and was shocked into silence for most of the evening after that. He was amazed and even more amazing was the fact he said he’d been thinking about it and even looking at rings. We are yet to set a date, but I have high hopes for soon and a small wedding (eloping sounds good), but as Neil knows just about everybody in Milton Keynes, it could turn out to be bigger than Ben Hur!)Wish us luck!
