DEREK DAVIS '03

Sarah (Thompson) Davis ’03 and I started dating in early November and everything was going just great, but the problem was that I had to leave for Europe on this trip. Well, Sarah and I had been friends for three years and we knew each other very well. So, at the time that I had to leave, we had only been dating for two months. It was hard to leave, but I had to. Heck, I paid a lot of money!

So anyway, while I was in Florence, Italy, I threw out the idea that I would buy an engagement ring and take a picture of me proposing in front of the Eiffel Tower. Sarah and I joked around with me proposing in front of the Eiffel Tower with her, but she was back in Blair. I thought that the picture was the next best thing. Once I got to France I had Crystal Cordes ’03, who went on the trip, too, take a picture of me proposing.

So the plan was set! I was going to take Sarah on this big elaborate date with a carriage and violinist in downtown Omaha by the lake. Then I was going to open some French wine that I brought back and have her open this picture I took that was now framed. After she looked at it, I would say, “I always told you I would propose in front of the Eiffel Tower. Will you marry me?” But … it didn’t happen that way.

Instead, when I got back, we talked with my parents about how we were wanting to get married. (Sarah didn’t know I had the ring.) My father and I talked upstairs separately and I showed him the ring. Unfortunately, when we gathered together again, my dad opens his mouth and without thinking, says, “Did you see the ring yet?” I tried to get his attention and divert Sarah’s attention and change subjects.
After we left, I’m thinking to myself, well, she probably knows so now’s as good a time as any. I walked her to her room in Argo and I set up my laptop in her room. (I didn’t have time to print out the picture.) I had a digital picture up on the screen of me proposing, and when she came back in she saw what was on the screen. I walked up to her and got down one one knee and asked her to marry me. She was so happy that she didn’t even look at the ring.

We’ve been married now for a year and a half and living happily ever after.

—Derek Davis ’03
Blair