Proposals!

On Facebook, a few weeks ago, there was a hilarious video that went on for a few seconds.

A young couple walking past a jeweller's. She was in front. The lady in the window was putting on a huge, very expensive diamond ring on the front display.

At that precise moment, he got down on one knee to tie his shoelaces. She looked back, not realising about the laces and just saw him on his knee.

She was so excited! Oh yes, of course I shall marry you!

He told her he was only doing his laces, and she screamed and went NUTS!

Very funny and well-acted by both of them!

As my handle implies it happened in 1967, the summer of love. I decided to move to the south coast and he visited every weekend. We were in a pub garden on the beach and he said he didn’t want to go back to the city, loved the beach and me and how did I fancy a summer wedding. No actual will you marry me proposal but we were only 17/18 so not worldly wise. He went back home and the following weekend he stayed on and we booked the wedding for August 15th, the day the pirate radio stations were shut down on the instructions of Tony Benn. I eventually forgave Tony Benn. And had a fabulous entertaining marriage. Although I have been widowed five years six months and eight days I still feel married to him. If I hadn’t moved to the coast to get away from city life I wonder if we’d have ever married.

I don't think there was any sort of proposal. We'd been going out for a few weeks and then it was just understood that we would get married. We married a year later and it lasted almost 49 years. Still miffed that we didn't make it to 50. I'd never been out with any boys for more than a week, but we just seemed to have a connection that I didn't feel with the others.

Celeste, my dress was hired. I had drawn what I would like but couldn't find one anywhere to buy. We passed a hire shop on the way to the bus and popped in on the off-chance.

I subsequently hired quite a few 'posh frocks' from there afterwards.

What a lovely photo.
We met in 1969 when I was still at school and he 'proposed' after about 6 weeks, " I'm going to marry you" but we had to wait for three years for a formal engagement as I was so young the then we had to wait till I had finished studying to marry as by that time he'd had to move south with his parents .
All the waiting was well worth it 😁

Kittylester

Your dress was very similar to mine but I made mine using a Simplicity pattern. My Mum sewed lace round the fairly long train. I was delighted with it. Our reception was in The Silvertrees Hotel in Bothwell which actually closed the weekend after we went there to celebrate our silver wedding in 99.
We've had a wonderful 51 years of marriage, with 4 grandchildren,& hoping for many more years together

I'll keep this very short. We met on a night out. Two weeks later he asked me to marry him (we were just sat on the couch at my parents' house watching tv). He just said "How do you fancy getting married" lol. I didn't even have to think about it and just said yes immediately. Married 39 years this year!! So sometimes whirlwind romances do work

We worked at the same factory, he on Maintanance and I on a huge lathe facing wheel nuts for Ford tractors.
Strange but he serviced my machine many times but it still kept breaking down.. My friend worked the machine opposite so on our break, we would sit with the maintenance boys..on one of my breakdowns our boss went by..he stepped back and suggested 'if you two were to get married we'd get some work done about here', grinning as he said it.. he looked at me saying shall we!! Not a romantic proposal. We got engaged the next Christmas and married the following December. We were married 63½ yrs. He passed away nearly 4 yrs ago. He adopted my little boy and loved him like his own. We never had children together. He was the kindest man who worshiped us both. I miss his so much..

We met at Christmas. Engaged at Easter on holiday with friends. Married that Christmas. 40+ years so far

Met at a disco, my friend and I were bopping and he and his friend asked us to dance. I decided he was not my type, but he asked me on a second date to visit a pub about ten miles away. This was when I discovered he owned a little red mini. The only person I knew with their own car. Of course I said yes and several trips followed. I was definitely in love with the mini, despite the fact that the passenger footwell filled up with water every time it rained. Six months later and we were going steady, but the little red mini was not. A wheel fell off when we were negotiating a roundabout on the A1 and bowled down the road ahead of us. Luckily I had been given a Morris Minor for my 21st (it cost £50) and we set off the next summer with a two man ridge tent with a broken zip to have a look at Europe. We drove so far we went over the Alps and ended up in Yugoslavia. Then ran out of money on the way home and didnt eat for two days. Having survived the trip we mutually decided to get engaged. We celebrate our 50th this year.

Lovely photos of you all on this thread.

BlueSapphire

After reading about marriage proposals in the Good Morning thread, I thought it would be fun to read stories of your proposals!

My late DH proposed in a Chinese grocery store in Singapore in 1969 - we were both working there at the time, me as a teacher in a British military school, and DH for the British Foreign Office, both in our mid 20s.
We had been dating for about 6 weeks, but it wasn't really a surprise as we had been spending every spare moment together. He said he knew instantly! Me, it was more of a slow burn.
The next week we went to a jewellers in the city centre where we chose a ring together.
We got married three years later when we returned to the UK at the end of our tours, and were together till 2018, when DH sadly died.
I miss him so much.

aww a fabulous couple , but he will always be in your heart

We met at a mutual friend's 21st birthday party in a village hall. I was 22 and he was 29. He lived in a London suburb at the time so it was a long distance relationship throughout. He proposed in a very jokey manner just over a year later and we celebrated in Wimpy the next day - no expense spared! having bought my engagement ring in Ratners (remember them?). We were married the following August on a baking Saturday - the last hot Saturday of a very hot summer - and had our reception in the same village hall that we met. It will be our 37th anniversary this year. Goodness knows where all that time has gone. I remember my grandparents celebrating their Ruby anniversary when I was thirteen and thinking what an impossibly long time forty years was and now we are only a little over three years away from ours.

I worked in a solicitors and had to visit a bank to do their financial stuff.
My to be husband was a teller then. When walking to catch bus home from work we just met up and he asked me out. We didn't live in same town and after about a year when he was taking me to my bus stop afrer a night out he suggested if we got married we wouldn't have to go our separate ways after a date. We married 15 months later. Had 56 years together.

Makes me glad Cosmopolitan magazine was around then - and I was certainly an avid reader of it. Hence probably part of the reason for thinking "Sex is obviously part of dating now - must get sorted then" and, as far as I recall I read a "Which" or similar article comparing the pros and cons of various types of contraception. Straight off = there was simply no contest after reading that article - I needed 100% effectiveness and it probably flagged up as 99.9%. Decision made - "I'll have that one then - backed up by an abortion if I come up on that 0.1% thing". Any personal opinions doctors or anyone else had were totally irrelevant and treated as such - "My body my choice" in the best feminist tradition. Nobody ever ever tried gainsaying me on that - apart from the English doctor I asked just before I went to Denmark and his refusal was the last time I saw him. Cue Denmark - cue sorted.

To me - it was a totally emotionless/fait accompli type decision and taken in exactly the same light as any other "business" decision. It was absolutely the same mindset as years later buying a house at last - and the normal multiple one could borrow was 2.5 times salary at that point. Cue for me thinking "There must be a 'Which' type magazine on this", I bought it, scanned the tables of all the building societies and went off to the one that was basically loaning applicants 3.5 times salary and said "I'll have my mortgage with you please and I need that absolute maximum loan". Job done = sorted. A totally equivalent purely pragmatic decision.

I always regarded it as purely and simply my decision. The only input I would have required is if I came up on that 0.01% failure - at which point the boyfriend concerned would have been told "I've checked the cost of that abortion. 50% of that cost is yours - as I've done my bit to ensure that didnt happen but the Pill let me down". I never ever discussed any of that with any boyfriend ever - they got told at the outset "Sorted/dealt with/end of that concern then....". and that was that.

My ex DH proposed in the most romantic way possible with no expense spared, but the marriage didn’t last.My DP didn’t propose as we both agreed not to marry and he doesn’t have a romantic bone in his body, but he’s good looking, kind, patient and loving and we have a wonderful relationship.🥰

He went down on one knee in a train carriage coming from Darlington to Southport . Gave me a silver cross and chain and I gave him a very small gold one . We were both student teachers was 1971 and he had asked my dad’s permission first .

Usedtobeblonde

Contraception of a reliable method was certainly hard to get in the 50’s /60’s ,it was the time of a family planning clinics and you either had to be married or on the verge to be seen.
The same thing with the pill I believe in the early days.

I don't recall pills being discussed until well after we married. But as Catholics, no consideration of pills, regardless availability.

Contraception of a reliable method was certainly hard to get in the 50’s /60’s ,it was the time of a family planning clinics and you either had to be married or on the verge to be seen.
The same thing with the pill I believe in the early days.

Spot on, Kitty😁!

True dat....from what I can see as an outsider to that.....and can believe there are indeed "ups and downs".

My "could have been mother in law" that is still a friend of mine all these years later told me that one in some detail - ie "What you see is not necessarily what you get - and things can have been very different at times to now and there have been downs".

I think lots of us meet 'the one' but that doesn't mean that you don't have periods when even being with 'the one' requires working at.

Abcdefg

Found a house we wanted to buy but needed both our salaries to be considered. In the early 70s they'd only include mine if we were married. Call the registry office on Thursday married Saturday. Plus you could get the pill if you were married.

Did that depend on what part of the country you were in - ie getting the Pill regardless or having barriers put up?

I took the precaution of asking to go on it when I lived briefly in Denmark in 1973 and was given it with no problem whatsoever. So when I came back to England in late 1973 I just went to the doctor round the corner from first house of bedsits and said "I'm on so-and-so Pill and I need a new prescription now please" and again there was absolutely no problem and prescription handed straight over (and I didnt even have a boyfriend at the time - but was just being pragmatic and thinking "I'm that age - so I need it now") - so I don't know whether there was no problem whatsoever about it then because I was clearly already on it (from Denmark) or it was a university city and I could easily have passed for one of the university students (ie he didn't want an academic argument LOL). Probably a bit of both......

paddyann54

He came to work at the studio where I ran a department (I was 20) I was his boss he was almost 19 .We spent every day and evening together then 4 months in decided we,d get a flat together .
Glasgow in the early 70,s wasn’t like anywhere else ,or so I,m told We went to several agencies …not one would consider us as tenants without a marriage certificate .!
So we decided to get married bought an engagement ring 5 months to the day from we met and told our parents we were getting married after New year .They went ballistic and insisted on a real wedding so we waited until the July and a year from our first date and the parents arranged almost everything.Except the church ,that was our choice.
We,ve been married for over 50 years and worked together every day for the 51 years since we met.
Must be close on 100 years of a normal marriage and I love the bones of him and he of me.He makes me laugh every day .

Aw!!

Which I find reassuring that I made the right choice for me - ie never to marry anyone other than The One. Having never met The One = I never did get married (or even live together).

But you've reassured me that some of us at least do meet The One and so the rest of us should hold out for them - even if we do land up like me never having met them.

Can't say I didn't have my chances - though a couple of the times I think they were more "assuming we were going to - rather than asking". I did have one "proper proposal" - which went "Will you marry me and come and live on a boat with me?". The reason that I turned that one down so easily was I was thinking "Isn't there something you've missed saying here?". In hindsight it shouldn't have come as a surprise to me - given that he'd suggested we visit his family for a few days in Essex and so off we went and stayed with grandma, met his father and the second wife, met his mother and I got on with all of them. Took years for that penny to drop as to why he'd done that.....

So - it's reassuring that some people indeed do get "the Real Deal" so to say and I was correct to hang out for that personally.....

Mines a cautionary tale. I met him at agricultural college. We dated for a year then he went to a different college 70miles away! So I got a job nearby and lived in digs for a year. I moved back home and he carried on at college. When he graduated he got a job with a tied cottage. No romantic proposal, just said one day “I suppose we better get engaged” so we did. I bought the ring as he had no money! We married and then ran our own, rented, smallholding for a few years. Had two kids. Gave up the smallholding and moved a couple of hundred miles away from family. I was happy but he clearly wasn’t as he had an affair and we divorced!

Found not floundered !!