She said YES!

 She said YES!

Last night was fun, swinging in hammocks under a thatched roof listening to distant thunder. At one point the was a little rain too. I slept like a baby, that is, until 3am. You see, as a few of you are aware, I set out this trip as both an adventure and with the intention of proposing to Emily.  This has been a long time coming. I had let my parents know months ago and I recently flown to Seattle to celebrate Emily's Match Day and ask for her parent's blessing and fill in my siblings. Over the past few months I began the search for a ring, given the innate nature of the endless learner I endeavored to learn all I could about diamonds. Mr. Cohan, the father of my Cheif resident is a gemologist and we spent several days together pouring over textbooks and looking at different diamonds, needless to say it is an expensive, i mean, extensive field. After scouring the East coast and flaunting my amateur knowledge of diamonds I found the perfect one. So had a simple ring made and decided our adventure through Colombia would be the perfect time to propose. I was looking for something secluded, majestic, and intimate.

As I fell asleep last night I realized that we were with a bunch of early 20s travelers who have probably never gotten up early enough for a sunrise in their short lives (they probably didn't know sunrises existed). So I had my plan, wake up early take Emily out to the far outcropping of rocks mentioned earlier and propose at sunrise. 

I awoke at 3am nervous as ever and not wanting to fall back asleep as I could miss the sunrise. So waited nervously, and waited...and waited. Time had never moved so slow. Bats whizzing around looking for a place to sleep before sunrise, a few roosters getting an early start, and the gentle ambient noise of crickets were my only company for the longest two hours of my life. Well, and Emily will kill me for putting this in here but, she has the cutest little snore, it sounds like one of those little pug dogs' snores as if one were lying on its back on a comfortable couch.  Anyways, I started to notice the sky transforming from a dark canvas speckled with stars and a hazy moon to a deep Royal blue. I gently rocked out of my hammock and lovingly stroked Emily's thigh to wake her. Her eyes shot open and she leapt up in terror hands flailing, "$&#*!" she exclaimed (remember we are sleeping in an open air hut in the jungle). After a minute of letting her catch her breath and regain her composure I asked if she wanted to see the sunrise with me. After the I'm-going-to-kill-you expression slowly dissipated she nodded and merely remarked, "babe we've got to work on your wake up technique." And off we went into to darkness holding hands.
I have to pause here in the story to interject a second small story; The Chronicle of the Ring. You see I decided to propose in Colombia. While we were backpacking, this meant we would be in close proximity and in each other bags all trip. So I had to hide the ring and I couldn't lock it up with our other valuables because she would be keenly aware of its presence. So I wrapped it in a lintless cloth and hid it in my earphones case.

For the majority of the trip it remained with me in my personal bag or  locked up when we could lock our bags up. Occasionally it was left in my back pack in a lobby (terrifying), in the back of a bus (more terrifying), or, as you may have read before, carelessly tossed about like an ordinary earphones case. There were also several near miss moments as we would both go through security check points and they would rifle through our belongings in search of contraband. Let's  just say it was one panic inducing moment after another with this little surprise.
Now back to the main event. As dawn took shape we softly marched forward inundated with sounds of an awakening jungle. We made our way to the cove and ducked under a sign in Spanish that Emily deftly ignored while I quickly interpreted some of the words in my head as reading "danger"' "do not pass" and "you idiots can't you read!"   That last one may have been translated incorrectly, and I could imagine my good friend Matt saying, "really?!? 3 YEARS in a Spanish speaking country and you still can't speak Spanish, Puchíca!" But we pressed on and arrive atop a large boulder on a tiny peninsula surrounded by rolling waves deafeningly hurtling themselves at the rocks.

I searched the ground and found a soft spot that would be ideal for kneeling but Emily had other plans. She pick a spot higher on the rock with a crevasse at our feet. We sat together awhile. Normally I love winging speeches, I am a talker and a story teller, and I consider finding words my forte. But for one of the first times in my life I was speechless, I couldn't think of what or how to proceed. As the sun rose so did my panic. Eventually I went for it, I wish I could remember what I said, I know it included several versions of, "I love you" and culminated in "Emily Kathleen Eck will you marry me?" while awkwardly kneeling in front of the love of my life un zipping my little earphone case with the sun rising behind me. Being the absolute luckiest man alive, this teary-eyed beauty gave the one answer that made my heart soar and universe pause for a whole second. She said emphatically, "Yes!" Then a lot of mushy stuff happened next then I put the ring on her finger and we sat in each others arms and watched the sun rise.

Emily Eck: It was strange because he is usually very verbose and great with adjectives but he was fidgeting and strangely awkward. "You know how much I love you right?" He asked. I replied, "of course I do! I love you too". Then several minutes passed and he asked again, "You know how much I love you right?" Strange. Then, "I have something important to ask you," and he got down on one knee awkwardly fumbling with his earphone case and then I knew. (I imagined I was more suave than that)

Elated and starving we strolled back to grab breakfast. No one knew, it was our little secret piece of history to hold and cherish (at least until we were back on the grid). The day was a blur, we hiked back through the hellish jungle caught a bus back to Santa Marta, showered, and took a late bus to Palomino. When we arrived I splurged and got the private sweet we drank, laughed, ate, and were the merriest people in the whole world. Me with my large mouth told everyone who would care to listen and those that didn't. The staff pitched in and brought us a dessert and a whole bottle of wine! Unfortunately I cannot in good conscious write any of the following events though just before crashing my last thought was, I don't know how to spell feesnce....fiencee...fiance... Damn the French!