I Want To Grow Old With You

A Truly Romantic Thanksgiving One evening about a month before Thanksgiving in 2003, I was over at my boyfriend, Dave’s house about to sit down and watch a movie. We had just finished taking a run, so I went up to his room to change my clothes. As I was picking my clothes up off of the floor, I saw a flight itinerary casually lying on the ground. I glanced at it and saw our names on it with a destination of California for Thanksgiving weekend. Setting it back down, I recalled a rather recent conversation with Dave about how we were going to stay in our area, the suburbs of Chicago, for Thanksgiving and have a feast with some friends. Immediately I knew what I had accidentally found. Lying on the floor, ever so casually, was his plan to propose to me. I was at a loss for words. I knew that men were sensitive about having the perfect plan to propose, and I had just found at my boyfriend’s plan! I resolved to not say anything to him and in a month give an Oscar worthy acting performance. Three weeks passed, and there was no word from him about this upcoming trip. He made up a menu with our friends for Thanksgiving dinner. He kept on complaining about how much work he had to do over the Thanksgiving weekend, and how we would not have much time together. I began to think that I had imagined the plane itinerary that I saw in his room almost a month ago. The Wednesday before Thanksgiving rolled up, and my boss asked if I would be willing to drive him to O’Hare that morning as he was going down to Florida to visit family. As we drove along the interstate, I did not know if I was going to find Dave waiting for me or not. I played through a thousand different reactions in my mind and quietly began to smile to myself. As we pulled up to the sidewalk, Dave was indeed standing there with a big grin on his face. I got out of the car, coyly smiled and asked what he was doing there. He told me that he wanted to fly me somewhere and asked if I knew where. I lied and said I did not have a clue. He took tickets out of his pocket and handed them to me. I looked at them, read the flight information and gave him an inquisitive look. The Departure and Arrival information read Chicago-O’Hare to Montreal and Montreal to Paris-Charles de Gaulle. He began to laugh and unfold another piece of paper. I looked at it and saw that it was the same plane itinerary that I had seen in his room. He laughed again and asked if I thought we were going to California! A thousand unpracticed emotions all came up at once in that moment! He truly had a plan and he had me “hook, line and sinker” in it. So, we flew out to Paris on Wednesday and arrived on Thursday morning. We dropped off our things at the hostel he had set up and began to tour through the city. We went to the Louvre at lunch to find that it would be reopening in an hour, so we strolled out to the gardens. At the end of the garden, we sat on a bench where we could see the Louvre, Eifel Tower, l’Arc de Triomphe and the Concord statue. Dave had brought along his Baby Taylor guitar. He took it out and began to play the Wedding Singer song, “I Want to Grow Old with You,” to me. After that he got down on one knee and proposed to me. Leaving me no choice, I accepted joyously. We spent the rest of the long weekend traipsing through the city as a truly romantic Paris couple in love.

 

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