My wife, Jennie, turned twenty-one on March 31st, 1999. It was also the night that I asked her to marry me. Combining the two into something big was a challenge.

Of course, the twenty-first birthday in America is one of the most anticipated ones, since it’s the final birthday for which something becomes permitted, that was previously denied, because of someone being “underage”. While Jennie’s never been much of a drinker, she was looking forward to that birthday, and spending it with her college roommates and friends, as much as any other twenty year old.

So, imagine her disgust with the idea that I wanted to take her back home, away from her college friends, for her twenty-first birthday. Let’s just that, when I first floated the idea to her, she wasn’t particularly fond of the notion.

To get her to agree with the concept, I told her that I’d gotten reservations at one of the most prestigious restaurants back home, through a friend who knew someone with the proper connections. Jennie agreed to the idea, primarily because I promised that it was going to be a night to remember.

Boy, was it.

At this point, I was a newly minted alumnus from the University of Notre Dame, with some still pretty significant ties to the Notre Dame Glee Club where I’d sang as a club member for four years. I reached out to some of my closest friends who were still in the club, to assist me in proposing to my girlfriend. I told them to meet me at Applebee’s.

Now, as everyone knows, Applebee’s is not an exclusive restaurant. But, it was our favorite restaurant, Jennie and I, and it seemed like the perfect place to make all of this happen. I coordinated with the manager of the Applebee’s that we frequented back home to get things set up for that evening. More on that in a minute.

I got Jennie to agree to this whole thing on a stipulation that we would leave campus, come home to have dinner, and be back to campus as soon as possible. So, we left campus, drove home, and stopped at my parents’ house for a moment or two while I confirmed our reservations for dinner.

But of course, there weren’t any reservations.

When I got done using the phone, I hung it up and turned to tell Jennie, while wearing my best fake disappointed look, that there was a mix-up at the restaurant and that we weren’t going to be having dinner at the fancy and exclusive destination for which we’d left our college campus and traveled many miles to come home to visit.

You could see the dismay on Jennie’s face.

So, I scrambled to try to come up with a Plan B (wink, wink). I suggested that we should go to our favorite Applebee’s to try to make the best of things. It wasn’t what Jennie had in mind, and it was a very distant second choice for a girl who didn’t have any idea what was coming next.

So, we left my parents’ house and we headed off to dinner. Meanwhile, Jennie’s family was already on their way to the same restaurant.

During the trip to dinner, Jennie was despondent. She complained that she wasn’t going to get to be with her friends on her twenty-first birthday because I’d dragged her away from campus. She complained about the reservations that had fallen through and that she wasn’t even going to have that to enjoy. She couldn’t be consoled.

I, meanwhile, had a hard time keeping a straight face. I knew what was coming. I was, after all, driving a car with a dozen red roses and an engagement ring in the trunk.

The Applebee’s, when we arrived, seated us immediately at a corner table, and we ordered our meals and drinks –Jennie legally ordered her first drink in a restaurant and enjoyed getting to do that, at least. It was at that point that I remembered that I’d forgotten my wallet in my car.

Which, of course, I hadn’t.

But, it gave me the opportunity to run back out to my car, which I’d parked far enough away to be unnoticed, and pop the trunk, so that the several members of the Notre Dame Glee Club would be able to get inside to get the roses and the ring. Those members of the glee club, two first tenors, two second tenors, two baritones, and two basses
–an octet– got the roses and the ring and congregated in the kitchen with the restaurant manager to organize the reveal.

Then, I made my way back inside –wallet in tow– to be with Jennie while the plan unfolded.

She didn’t immediately understand why our food was delivered to the table by men in tuxedos. She didn’t immediately understand why one of them handed her a dozen red roses. But, when they arranged themselves around the table and began singing Let Me Call You Sweetheart in barbershop harmony, and I got down on my knee next to her seat, with the box that they’d given me, to show her the engagement ring, things became pretty clear.

And Jennie’s family, who’d been seated on the other side of the restaurant during the whole thing, came over to take pictures and bear witness to the event.

The glee club octet was so loud that I didn’t hear Jennie answer the question that I’d asked, so I repeated the question to her a second time. She confirmed, more loudly, her reply, and we listened to them finish the song. It was all so exciting that neither of us even finished the food that we’d ordered. Jennie didn’t even finish her drink. The glee club guys congratulated us and went on their way. The other people in the restaurant at the time were also warm and approving.

And then, we headed back to our college campus, arriving late in the evening, to Jennie’s friends and roommates who were excited about what had taken place and excited about Jennie’s birthday.

The whole story even ended up getting published in the newspaper when Jennie submitted it to the Wedding Announcements section of the paper. That was pretty cool, too.

I don’t know if I have ever done a worse job of meeting Jennie’s expectations for any of her birthdays, or if I have ever exceeded her expectations to a greater extent.