“Remember to look up at the stars and not down at your feet. Try to make sense of what you see and wonder about what makes the universe exist. Be curious. And however difficult life may seem, there is always something you can do and succeed at. It matters that you don’t just give up.”
-Stephen Hawking
Engaged on 09.28.19
We got engaged on Saturday, September 28th 2019. Matt and I booked an AirBnB in Wellsville, NY (a.k.a. middle of nowhere, NY) the last weekend in September so that we could take photos of the Milky Way at the astronomy field in Cherry Springs Park, PA, which was about 1hr away from our AirBnB. Cherry Springs Park is known for being the darkest spot on the East Coast; i.e. an ideal setting for seeing the stars & Milky Way during the new moon.
Matt attempted to propose on Friday evening while we were at the astronomy field but it was very dark and chilly with lots of people around so he decided to wait until later in the night. When we got back to the AirBnB, he threw a log in the wood stove and I instantly felt the wave of sleepiness hit me, like when you come in from a full day of skiing and need to immediately pass out on the couch in front of a warm fire. Matt attempted to get me up stating he had “another birthday present to give me”, but since my birthday was 2 weeks prior (the 17th of September), I told him, “I don’t need any more presents, I’m tired and going to sleep.” So we went to bed and the weekend continued…
On Saturday, we took a hike around the property with Matt’s dog, Apollo, and cooked burgers on the campfire. We walked around town and checked out the local brewery. When we came home that night, Matt poured us some wine and asked me to come out on the deck with him so he could give me my late “birthday present”. I disregarded his continuous asks because I figured he was just kidding around or surprise! it was just a glass of wine (LoL).
That night, there were several cicadas flying around so I took my time to make the proper “preparations” (i.e. long pants, sweatshirt, bug spray, full body suit, etc.) before joining Matt outside. After finally making it out to the deck, Matt told me to check out our website “pennylyss.com” that we had purchased some months before… I thought this was an odd request (i.e. how is my birthday present on a website?) but continued as asked.
When I opened up the website I saw that it read, “Will You Marry Me?” and “Countdown to Wedding: 365 Days” in the center of the screen…
I turned to my right, in both confusion and shock, as he held out a blue Tiffany’s box in his left hand and asked out loud, “Will You Marry Me?“. I began to repeatedly say, “Oh. My. God. Whhhattttt??!! Is this FOR REAL? Is this REALLY HAPPENING RIGHT NOW? Wait, are you SERIOUS?!?!” about 50 times in a row, followed by “I mean, YES!!!”.
…And we were ENGAGED!