It was July 4, 1996. For more than two months, I had worked secretly on a unique way to propose to Jennifer Leigh Smith. No one—and I mean no one—knew my plan.
She completed a volleyball camp and stayed in a hotel in Clear Lake on July 3. I told her we were taking a day trip. I picked her up early on July 4, and we started driving. It took us an hour to get to Houston’s Intercontinental Airport. She still didn’t know where we were going…
Unfortunately, the ring box set off the security alarm, as she pretended not to notice. We took our flight to Chicago, but that wasn’t our destination. We then boarded the next flight from Chicago to New York.
We caught a cab to Ellis Island and took a ferry to the Statue of Liberty. I had a beautiful speech planned but at the base of the statue when I reached for the ring box, I don’t recall if any words came out, but we embraced, and ironically, standing in front of the statue of liberty, we both gave up our independence!
We don’t have videos, we weren’t surrounded by family, but we did get one picture of the two of us with the Twin Towers in the background.
Unfortunately, the ring was too big, so she couldn’t really wear it immediately.
We didn’t have long before we needed to catch the flight from New York to Chicago, and this was the brilliance of the plan. I held the plane tickets home. So, in a way, she was trapped…if she didn’t say “yes”, she’d be stuck in New York City!
After we landed in Chicago, we were able to call our parents from a pay phone. I’ll never forget Jennifer telling her parents, “You’ll never guess where I am and where we’ve been…”
We then caught the flight from Chicago back to Houston. On the flight from Chicago, we were blessed to see fireworks shows from probably half a dozen different cities. What a special moment!
I drove Jennifer back to her hotel and returned to my apartment, pleased with keeping a secret and creating a memory neither of us would ever forget.
Today, thirty years later, we’ve celebrated July 4th from New York to Washington, D.C. to Houston, Texas and now to Lamesa, Texas. What a fun 30 years it’s been! Love this adventure with Jennifer Leigh (Smith) Pyle!
