The Empty Box

On this date, sixteen years ago, my husband proposed marriage to me.

And boy did he blow it.

On November 13, 1991 my husband and I were juniors in college. He was a cadet at an aviation college one whole state away from were I was a softball player at a women's college. I had driven out to visit him for the weekend because he had a special event to attend. His ROTC detachment was having a Dining Out. (Think of a Dining Out as a formal event with cocktail dresses, dress uniforms, and more silly traditions hat you can count.)

His friends had been telling me for a month or two that he would propose to me in uniform. We had been talking about getting married after graduation for a while. By then there was no doubt in our minds that we belonged together.

So when I realized that he would be in his handsome dress uniform that night, I started to get my hopes up. There would be a romantic saber guard to walk through on the way into the event. There would be dinner and dancing and plenty of opportunities for him to pop the question.

As was usually the case with him, he was organizing the whole event and needed to go to the hall early to help set up. I stayed in his dorm room to primp and get ready.

When I went to brush my teeth I realized that I didn't have any toothpaste, so I went looking through one of his drawers for a tube.

That's when I saw it. A pink, velvet ring box.

I slammed that drawer so fast the wall shook. I concentrated on squashing all of my romantic fantasies while I got dressed, skipping brushing my teeth all together.

I drove over to the hall. I walked in and met him. He was busy but after a bit, he asked me to walk back out to the parking lot with him so we could enter through the saber guard.

This was it. I just knew it! This would be our moment. He offered me his arm, we walked though the saber guard and...

Nothing.

Okay. I figured there were plenty more moments for him to ask me.

We had dinner. Nothing

We danced. Nothing.

He got up to make a special announcement. Nothing. He was just selling sweatshirts.

As the night wore down I got more and more disappointed. And I'm not good at hiding my feelings.

On the car ride back to his dorm room, after much imploring on his part to explain my mood, I finally explained my disappointment. He just grunted.

When we got to his room he asked me, "What color box did you see?"

"Pink," I answered.

So he opened his drawer, pulled out the pink box and handed it to me. This is was my moment. I opened the box and found...

Nothing.

He gave me an empty box.

In my despair, I actually threw it across the room and burst into tears.

"No, no no!" he panicked. "I have another box!" Since I was sobbing into my hands, he passed it over my shoulder and stood behind me. And there in a black, velvet box was my engagement ring.

"Well?" he asked me.

"You haven't even asked me yet!"

I was still crying and he was still standing behind me, but he asked me anyway. "Will you marry me?"

I cried harder.

It took me a while to say yes.

I was more than a little mad about his botched proposal for a couple of years. I got over it, but I've never let him live it down. I can finally see the humor in it.

And he has finally accepted that whenever we meet new people and exchange stories, I will tell them about my empty box.