Team Koford: February 17th 2012

The day started like any normal Friday... I dragged myself out of bed and got ready in my "professional clothes." I walked out the door at 7:30 so I could pick up Kellie and we could head to Springville for our dreaded three hour math class, and hoped into The Blue Car. As I got to the exit of the parking lot I was thinking about how it was so much easier to see if a car was coming when it was darker and they had their headlights on. I remember looking to see if any car were coming, not that you can really see around the SUVs and trucks parked on the side of the street, and determining that I was good to go. Wrong! Five seconds later I was getting slammed into. Having never been in an accident before I did not know what to do so I did the logical thing. called my mom. I don't think I got two words out before I started bawling- typical girl response. That was the first of many teary phone calls to follow that day. After standing in the freezing cold, first waiting for the cop to come, then waiting for the cop to do whatever cops do in their cars (I think they take their precious time or just hang out in their car for the sole purpose of making people more nervous), I was able to drive The Blue Car back to my parking lot. Let me tell you, The Blue Car looked a lot worse than I thought she should have. My accident partner said he had just pulled onto the road from the lot right above mine... He must have accelerated quick to make the damage he did. Who knows what was going on in his car before he hit me.

I spent the next few hours waiting for insurance people, talking to claims, googling various body shops, and, of course, crying. Finally I was sick of sitting around and decided to go to a body shop and assess the damage. Hating to talk to strangers alone, I asked Stephen to come with me. We drove to the first shop, and after waiting and watching him type things, he gave us the estimate and the bad news- The Blue Car was probably going to be declared totaled. Not totally wanting to accept the estimate amount and that news, we went to another body shop. They basically told me the same thing, but we decided to leave The Blue Car there for them to look at more closely until the insurance decides the fate. Then Stephen and I started our new habit of walking everywhere and walked the two miles back to my apartment. At this point I had to hurry and get ready because we had a dinner reservation soon that we had to walk to. I desperately needed some work to cover my red, puffy face as a result of all my tears. Luckily I was able to look presentable quickly, and I only changed my outfit three times.

We walked to the Communal, a cute little restaurant on University Ave. that we had brunch at the week before, and got an awesome table by the window. We ate a pretty amazing steak dinner with a huge bowl-full of fries. Looking back, Stephen was acting a bit weird during dinner. He kept spacing out and staring out the window; he was texting someone, which he never does when we are on an official date. The older lady sitting at the table next to us kept giving him evil looks for texting. He told me that Blake was asking if we were going to the volleyball game after dinner, which seemed like an acceptable reason because we had talked about it. After they took away our dinner, our waiter started to put out silverware for dessert. I thought this was kind of strange because we hadn't ordered any dessert, or even been given the dessert menu. Next thing I knew, our waiter was putting a dessert tray down in front of me. It took me a few seconds to realize what was happening. In front of me was a vanilla pot de creme with an M&M-made heart on it and a cute jar full of the red, pink, and silver M&Ms. On the various M&Ms were a picture of Stephen and me, a ring, "Team Koford," and "Will you marry me." I turned to look at Stephen and he was down on one knee asking me to marry him. Surprisingly I did not cry, I just teared up (maybe my tear ducts were low on water from the rainstorm I cried a few hours before). Of course I said yes! He put the gorgeous ring on my finger and people in the restaurant clapped for us. Stephen's roommate Blake was standing behind me filming the whole thing, which explained the texting, so we were luckily enough to get a video and pictures of the proposal.