Although I often view Justin & I as meeting in the fall of 1997, we actually met on 2 previous occasions, one of which doesn’t stick out to me for reasons Justin will gleefully explain. I do remember one snowy night driving to Bolton Landing to see a band with a friend. I remember a hippie musician – not at all my type (except maybe the musician part…)

In 1997, I had relocated once again for work – this time I found myself in Indianapolis . The mid-west was clearly not for me and I was looking forward to the day when I could return to NY or at the very least somewhere with a little quicker pace. My friend and former boss Tracie was marrying the singer in that band from Bolton Landing. At the time I didn’t make that connection. About a week or so before the wedding, I learned that they had fired the caterer and I was to assist in the rehearsal dinner preparations. It was a small kitchen with insanely high cabinets. I know I made a few things, but I specifically was being asked to prepare stuffed cabbage without a recipe. This was not something I’d ever made before but I gave it a whirl. I remember Lisa standing on the countertop trying to reach a knife in the cabinet way over our heads. Justin came in with the assist. I wasn’t in the wedding party so right after the preparations were over, I left for a hair appointment.

The wedding was the next day at Tracie & Timur’s 3-story brownstone in Albany . I was supposed to have a date. My date stood me up. Not being particularly happy about this, I found solace in cranberry, vodka and stray cats on the front steps. Eventually I came around – great food, great company and then there was the dancing - the dirty dancing contest. Having watched the Dirty Dancing movie about 200 times in college, I grabbed Justin for my partner and somehow we won! At some point, not clear on if that was before or after the dancing contest, I found Justin’s ear and dumped all my dating sorrows on him. I can’t believe he didn’t run to the nearest exit. The evening went on til the wee hours of the morning. It was cold and icy but we went from one end of town to the other – the Big House, Hollywood ’s…we all crashed at the house. I got up in the morning and headed back to Indianapolis never expecting to see this man again. A couple days later, beautiful roses were delivered to my work. That stuffed cabbage, or perhaps my dancing ability, must have made an impression. Resourceful guy that he was, he hunted me down. Over the next several months, we ran up insane phone bills, he came to visit me, helped me move back to NY and made numerous trips to Syracuse before I eventually moved back to Albany . Of course, I won’t recount the 10+ years that followed, but let’s just say the rest is history.

Well my proposal story starts months before the actual date. I started looking at rings in December 2007, but couldn’t find exactly what I was looking for. During the winter months, I enlisted the help of my Cousin Susan and my Aunt Arlene, who own a jewelry store in Georgia. I found what I thought was the perfect diamond and just needed to find the perfect setting to match. Weeks went by before I found a setting that I knew Denise would love, but by then the stone was sold! After a little more searching, we found an equally impressive stone and the ring was ordered. I had hoped to have the ring so I could propose in April or May, but with all of my difficulties the ring didn’t arrive until Memorial Day….
Denise and I had made plans to go on our first ‘big’ vacation- a 9 day cruise from NJ to the eastern Caribbean. I decided that I wanted to propose before leaving for the trip, so we could celebrate our engagement on the cruise. I tried several times in the days prior to leaving, but the timing was never right. We were both anxious to start our vacation and I honestly couldn’t get Denise to relax long enough so I could pop the question….
Now it’s the morning we leave for the cruise. All I want to do is propose, give Denise the ring I took so long to find and officially start the next chapter of our lives together. Of course getting Denise to stay in one place when she’s on a ‘mission’ is no small feat. We had everything ready to go and I asked her if she’d give me a hug and take a moment to enjoy the start of our long awaited vacation together. She gave me this half-hearted hug and told me she was so hungry all she cared about was having something to eat. Soooo, I let her finish her Eggo waffle and then tried to corner her again. Now she’s all about adding songs to her iPod! Finally, I grabbed her in the kitchen, hugged her, told her how much I loved her and that I was looking forward to all we had to celebrate on this vacation. I knelt down on one knee and the rest is history…