I wrote this last night when I was sitting on the couch bored to death on our 2nd snow day. Sorry for the length, but there are just so many details that I felt needed to be included:
This had been a long time coming. The whole thing started back in June and July when I was trying to figure out a way to talk to Amanda's dad Tom about asking for Amanda's hand in marriage. I had been having breakfast with him once a week since January and everyone thought that's what was going to happen but what some of you don't realize is that I'm a really big chicken. I mean I had even been going up to the house once a week during the past month to help him stain the house and just couldn't find the opportunity to ask him. They were there, but I just didn't take them. So here we are having breakfast one morning and he asked me if I've ever gone hiking. I like to go on occasions and we picked a day and decided to go for it. Now I haven't been hiking in a few years and thought that this was going to be a really easy one, you know hike for a mile or so and then come back down... boy was I wrong. We hiked Mt. La Conte and from what I remember that was an 11 mile hike. 5.5 in and 5.5 down. Now the only reason I bring any of this up is to say that while we were hiking, I mentioned to him that we did need to talk about somethings and we both decided that hiking wasn't the time. So one of the next times we went to breakfast I finally asked him and he said yes.
Then came the hard part... looking for the ring. Now some of you would think that this would be the easy part, you know she told me what she likes and doesn't and we maybe even went and looked at some... nope. We hadn't done any of that and the only thing I knew was that it was my choice and she didn't really like one certain cut. So here I went ring shopping. I know nothing of wedding rings just that they look nice and are supposed to sparkle when the light hits them. My journey started at Jamison Jewelers in Franklin and I saw a nice marque cut solitaire, but something was telling me to move on. I walked up the street to Stewart's and looked around saw some pretty solitaires, but nothing the struck my attention until they pointed me to the estate pieces. There it was, the piece that I knew I was looking for. It was beautiful a solitaire with 4 smaller diamonds around it. But of course I had to get a ladies perspective so I asked my best friend Jenny to come and look at it. After eating lunch she looked at it and said and I quote "Robert, Amanda is going to love it!" So the process of buying it started. I worked a few different band camps and saved my pennies to get it.
The process of deciding how to propose was actually quite simple to start with. Chonda Pierce a christian comedian had come to the SMCPA last year and I had gotten Amanda and myself tickets on the front row. Amanda got me backstage to the meet and greet and during the 2nd act she joked with me and Amanda about how we should be married by the next time she comes around. So I thought it would be perfect to propose when she came back the next time. She was scheduled to come back in November. I asked Scotty to help me out he said he would email her. Word came that Chonda had a scheduling conflict and would have to reschedule, I got bummed. Then I had another plan. We were in rehearsals for Jekyll and Hyde and I thought it would be cool to bring Amanda out on stage during the bows and ask her then. Thinking about it I decided that wasn't a good idea seeing as how I don't like large groups of people, but then thought it would be cool to do it during a dress rehearsal and have Scotty have the stage crew practice coming out since they never came out during the curtain calls. I had mentioned it to Scotty and he said that it may be better to do it before dress since more people would be out in the audience to watch. I had to agree with him and since the theatre was so special to us I wanted to do it then so that they could share in the special day with us. Now the really funny story is that Amanda had choreographed a small dance during the appropriately named Engagement party where we were set to dance together (thanks Scotty). So I had a plan all I needed was a date.
I don't really know what made me decide on November 2nd only that it was before dress rehearsal and I had always said that I would never propose on a "typical" day like Christmas, Valentines Day or a Birthday so election day was just right. So I went the Friday before and finished paying for the ring and they told me they would have it ready by Tuesday. Tuesday comes and I get no phone call or anything from the jewelers so I'm freaking out trying to figure out how many quarters I'm going to have to spend in order to get a ring out of the machine that looks like what I would have actually gotten (joking people I really am). I finally went up to the jewelers and they had the ring in the machine cleaning it as I got there. So here it is sitting on the passenger seat of my car. My hearts racing and I'm questioning if I'm doing the right thing and I have to keep telling myself that I still have 3 hours before rehearsal even starts. I go back to the school to try to finish out the day (Buddy was a God send by keeping me calm till he had to go to his bus), then to my Relay for Life Committee meeting where I really don't remember a lot of what went on, but I do remember being there. Then it came time to go to rehearsal. Now to explain the planning that went into this rehearsal would take a while, but with the help of Scotty and Nikki we had everything planned so Amanda's parents could be there without it looking suspicious. Her mom was going to be there to videotape the rehearsal so Scotty could see the blocking for the songs he was in and her dad was going to come and get the keys to her mom's car at the right moment to see things happening.
Now I normally sweat a lot on stage during a show, but at this rehearsal it was worse than normal. Scotty told me that Kathi and he would start singing their song and that when I felt the moment was right to just interupt them. Now being the music person I am, I couldn't just stop them in the middle of the song so I waited until the end. I found out later that everyone that knew what was going on thought I was going to chicken out. As the music was ending and Amanda was getting ready to walk away, I stopped her and told her that I had a question. She looked at me like I was strange and then I don't really remember what all I said, but there were people with cameras and just kind of staring at us. I do remember pulling out the ring out of my pocket, getting down on one knee and asking the love of my life to be with me for the rest of it. My favorite part of all of this was her first word after I asked... "WHAT!?!?!?!"
Scotty had gotten us a cake which is pictured below and after taking a couple of minutes to regain our composure, we started right were we had left off. After rehearsal we went to Fatz to celebrate with my roommates and the rest is as they say history. It's been an exciting couple of months, but I can't wait to spend the rest of my life with her.
