On the morning of Friday July 12, 2002 we left for Virginia Beach, VA. It takes about 9 - 10 hours to get there. Nice ride down, no problems and hardly any traffic. We must have left at the right time. It was just my girlfriend and I. Now we've been planning this trip for over a month to see the Dave Matthews Band @ VA Beach and have a nice long weekend with Friday and Monday off, drive days basically. Little did she know I've been planning a little something myself.

Alieta and I had been dating for 4 years and have talked on and off about marriage and all the life details that go with it. The thing is she didn't expect it would happen now. I'm a huge procrastinator as most of you know. We also have friends/family getting married soon so the attention is on them as it should be. But not this particular weekend.

So we're on are way down to VA Beach. I have a million things going through my head. What plan of action I'm going to take, on the beach, during DMB, Fri - Sat or Sunday. So I'm thinking Friday night on the Beach with the Sunset and all. Timing was great. We hit the Chesapeake Bay Bridge right before sunset. Then, *sirens* right on the side of the bridge a cop appears. Flips the lights on and I get pulled over for speeding. License and registration, the whole bit. The cop comes back and says I was doing 85 in a 55 zone. First off no way. Second, We're missing the Friggin Sunset!! He comes back to give me the ticket and I say can I speak with you officer. I was very polite and informed him what was going on and how we were watching the sunset. He actually did hook me up I guess. He gave me a ticket for 72 mph. instead. The 85 mph would have been 500.00. So needless to say I was bummed at this point. We missed the sunset and I got a speeding ticket to boot. So I say to my sweetie, how about we get up real early and see the sunrise? The back up plan. She laughs and says yeah right you get up early. She knows me too well. Now we get to the hotel and I've had two dozen white roses sent to our room. I called ahead the day before and asked the clerk to set them up in the room. We check in and I see a box on the dresser. Unopened and it's like 9:30 now so they've been sitting in this box for hours. I go to open the box and I hear shattered glass all inside the box. The crystal vase was broke. I suspect the hotel did it since FedEx would have marked the box damaged and the guy probable thought, flowers and tossed it on the hard counter. So now I'm even more disappointed. The flowers were still beautiful. She had a very hard week and I wrote something light hearted on the card to cheer her up. So she was beaming just to see them. We ended up putting them in a trash can filled w/water our new vase. I suggested let's go to the beach anyway. It was late and we could just watch the waves and see the stars. I said to her take one rose and grab the camera. I didn't want to leave the ring in the room so I brought it with us. Good thing. As we walk across to the beach, fireworks start. Talk about timing. Now I had no clue of VA Beach having a firework show but it worked to my advantage quite well.

As we lay on our blanket watching the fireworks, I think to myself, now's the time. It was just so pretty. The stars, the crashing waves, the fireworks lighting the sky it was just to good to let go. I say to Alieta, "I'll be right back I'm going to ask this couple near us for directions someplace". I go over and tell the woman, "I'm about to propose to my girlfriend. Can you take some pictures please?" She was so happy for us and said of course. So I gave her my camera. I come back over and Alieta is lying on the blanket relaxed and holding her single white rose. I say " Hunny, I bought you a little something". I gave her this box that in no way looked like a ring box, so she was totally not expecting it. As she goes to open it I get down on one knee. She looks to the left and the woman is three feet from us with the camera. At that point Alieta feels something is up. She cautiously opens the box and I say "Alieta, will you marry me?" Her jaw drops to the sand in awe and says, "Oh my God! Yes! Of course I will marry you." The fireworks finally were just going off at that time too. It was absolutely perfect. She was trembling with excitement and smiling from ear to ear. All that worry for nothing. It all worked out great.

So that's my story, long but happy. Thanks for reading.