Sarah and Kyle Part 4- The Engagement

Beneath the air of autumn, she took him by his hand
And warm within the ardor, she took his heart instead
And high upon the mountain, he asked her for her hand
Just for her hand 

Bebo Norman- "A Page is Turned"

 It was the fall of my junior year and Kyle and I had discussed and prayed about marriage and had reached the conclusion that this was, in fact, our vocation. Kyle had taken my dad aside during Parent's Weekend in early fall and gotten his blessing again, this time to ask me to be his wife. During a trip to Houston to visit Kyle's family together we had visited Kyle's family jeweler and worked together to design a ring. It was perfect. Now I just had to wait for it to be ready and for Kyle to pick a time to propose.

All around me people we getting engaged. I would call my mom to talk about when my turn would be and she would say, "Just be patient. God and Kyle have your perfect moment planned." Then one fine fall day in November Kyle showed up at my dorm to pick me up for an off campus mass. He was on the phone and as I tried to approach the door he waved me away. Immediately I went around the corner to where he could not see me and began bouncing around, "I'm getting engaged! I'm getting engaged!" I figured that it MUST be the jeweler on the phone telling him the ring was ready. After all, household date night was the next day and we were, once again, headed to Light It Up night in Pittsburgh.

The next day I watched to see if he left campus for any extended period of time. He didn't. Or so I thought. Turns out he had skipped class without my noticing and had gone while I was in mine. Sneaky, sneaky man.

He picked me up that night and I could tell he was a bit... off? I started to get my hopes up again and I excitedly skipped off to his car. We were going to dinner in downtown Pittsburgh by ourselves and meeting up with the rest of my household and their dates later.

When we got to the restaurant Kyle was acting REALLY WEIRD. For instance, he refused to give the hostess his coat. He also took his coat with him every time he went to the bathroom. And that night he went to the bathroom at least three times (which I learned later was when he was calling his household brothers, but more about that later.) During one trip to the bathroom I pulled out my cell phone and called my sister. I told her, "Lauren... I THINK IT'S TONIGHT." She started squeeling and went off to pray for me.

After the meal was over, Kyle told me he thought it would be nice if we stopped off at Saint Mary's on the Mount first. It was a little Catholic church on top of a cliff overlooking the city of Pittsburgh. We had gone their often to pray when our dates had taken us into the city. Besides being beautiful, there was a specific reason he had chosen this church in particular.

When we had started dating I had bought him The Jeweler's Shop by Karol Wvotilja (later known as John Paul II). It was, as described in the intoduction, a meditation on marriage in the form of a play, and it was one of my favorite books. "Study this." I had told him, "if you even think you might want to marry me someday." Flash forward months later and we were praying in the St Marys on the MOunt. At night they kept the church opened but only the back foyer which was seperated from the main part of the church by a big glass wall and a door. The kneelers were behind the glass wall so people could pray there at night and see the Tabernacle. That night I had commented to him, "This reminds me of the Jeweler's Shop, the part when Theresa and Andrew had approached the jeweler's shop together to pick out their rings and they had paused at the window and noticed that while they could see their own reflections in the window they could also look through and see the jeweler, who represented God, as well. Here we are and I can see our reflection in this glass wall but I can also see the Tabernacle which holds the True Presence of Christ." He told me later than he knew then and there that this would be where he proposed.

As we pulled up to the church there was magically a spot right in front but what I noticed were the candles lining the stairs to the church and the statues of Mary and Joseph on either side of the door. I started to shake like a leaf as he took my hand and led me up the stairs. Inside the room was filled with more candles and rose petals were everywhere covering the entire floor. He took a small box out of his pocket and dropped to his knee.

Sarah, I pledge my life to you. Will you be my life's companion?

He had even used part of the proposal from the book because I had talked about how perfect those word's expressed marriage to my heart.

I ripped the glove off my hand and said, "YES!" And then started to grab the ring. Then I said, "No you do it!" and he slipped the ring on my finger and stood up to kiss me.

The joy and the love!

The BLING!

We walked out of the church hand in hand and there were fireworks and crowds of creaming and clapping people. I'm not even kidding. There were fireworks going off and an entire youth group of hundreds of teenagers were outside cheering. Kyle's household brothers were waiting around the corner because they had been there to set the entire room up and I hugged and thanked each of them. We then took off to find my household sisters and slow off my new BLING!

The Ice Skating Rink where it all began

When we got back that night Kyle dropped me off at my sister's dorm (she was a college freshman) and I dropped to my knee and asked her to be my Maid of Honor. Kyle took off for bed as the two of us girls started to plan the wedding.

Celebrating with my little sister, my maid of honor!

We set a date nine months away and began to plan, not as much for the wedding for our life together. A wedding is one day but a marriage is a lifetime and we realized that preparing for this should be our top priority. We took Natural Family Planning classes, Marriage Prep, and made plans for the future. We grew in our relationships and individually as God used this time to shape and mold us into people who could share in a journey that will hopefully lead each of us to heaven someday. We fell deeper in love. Still it seemed like our wedding day would never come.

Or so I thought...