I have a younger brother, Greg, whose oldest son, Bryan, could always be counted on to be the life of the party. He likes to tell funny stories, he does great impressions and best of all, he has a contagious laugh which quickly spreads to anyone within the sound of his voice. My kids all love him and always look forward to hearing about his latest adventures, which usually have a strange and hilarious twist to them.
“That kid is going to be the death of me yet,” exclaimed my brother when he learned a few years ago that Bryan had signed up to teach English to young Japanese students in Japan. “I hate airplanes, and now my oldest son is going to fly off all the way across the Pacific on one of the darn things.”
And so he did, with my brother somehow figuring out a way to track every inch of Bryan’s flight on his home computer, fearing that Bryan’s plane would surely drop out of the sky at any minute. But much to my brother’s surprise, not only did Bryan make it all the way to Japan, he stayed there for 22 long months. And about halfway through that stay, he also fell in love – which brings me to my little story.
Her name was Yumi, and just like most everyone who has spent any time around Bryan, she was immediately attracted to him by his sense of humor and his fun way of looking at the world. And when Bryan finally returned to Sacramento to start his high school teaching career, Yumi soon followed.
“Wanna guess what Bryan has gone and done now?” my brother asked me the other night over the telephone.
“What?” I asked with interest, sure that whatever it was, I would end up laughing.
“He and Yumi are now officially engaged,” said my brother, “but you won’t believe how the whole thing went down.”
“Wow, Bryan gave her a ring and everything?”
“Well,” said my brother, already starting to laugh, “he at least tried to.”
“He tried to?” I asked, slightly confused.
“That’s right,” said my brother, trying hard to get through the whole story without breaking up, “he went out and got Yumi a very nice ring, that had to cost him more than a thousand bucks, and took her all the way to San Francisco to pop the question. But before he got the ring on her finger, he somehow managed to drop it into the Pacific Ocean.”
“What?” I asked, trying again not to laugh myself.
“You’ll have to call him to get the whole story,” continued my brother, “but the short of it is that he made reservations at a very nice restaurant where he and Yumi were going to have dinner, but before they got there, Bryan decided to get romantic, and he took her down to the ocean to see the sunset. And just before he was going to pop the question, the ring and the box it was in somehow got away from him, rolled down a steep cliff, and ended up in the sea. Now can you believe that? Well, it’s Bryan, so I guess you can. I’m calling him Ringo now.”
So, as soon as my brother and I got off the phone, I quickly put a call into Bryan.
“Yumi’s engagement ring is at the bottom of the ocean?” I asked him in disbelief.
“I’m afraid so,” admitted Bryan, surprisingly cheerful considering the circumstances.
“Now how in the world did you manage to do that?”
“Well,” explained Brian, “I had this really perfect day all planned out for us. We were going to ride a tandem bike in Golden Gate Park, have a great dinner, and spend the night in a fancy downtown hotel. Plus, I wanted Yumi to see a beautiful San Francisco sunset, so I took her down to the ocean and we had to walk about 30 minutes or so to get to the top of this cliff overlooking the sea. We could see the Golden Gate Bridge off in the distance and I immediately knew it was the perfect place to propose to her. So, I slyly took the box with the engagement ring in it out of my pocket, but before I opened it up to put the ring on Yumi’s finger, I just had to give her a big hug and kiss, and that’s when things started to go wrong.”
“What happened?”
“Well,” continued Bryan, “I didn’t want Yumi to see the box with the ring in it before I finished hugging and kissing her, so I put it between my legs and tried to hold it there with my knees, and suddenly it slipped out, and before I knew it, it was tumbling down the cliff and headed for the rocks and water below.”
“So, then what did you do?” I asked.
“I started running after it!”
“Down the cliff?”
“That’s right – down this really steep little dirt trail. I was completely out of control most of the way and I guess I’m lucky I didn’t fall and break my neck.”
“And what was Yumi doing?”
“She was carefully following me down, yelling in both Japanese and English, `Bryan, why are you running down this cliff’?”
“Then what happened?”
“Well, when we both finally got all the way down, I told Yumi what had happened and then we spent the next 45 minutes or so trying to find the ring until there was no more light. I did find the box, but it was all broken up and wet, so I guess the ring fell out on its way down and ended up in the ocean.”
“You know, Bryan, I gotta tell you, I think that’s probably the most incredible engagement ring story I’ve ever heard.”
“Crazy things sure do seem to happen to me, don’t they?” he said.
“How’s Yumi taking it?”
“Pretty good, actually. The sad part is that I showed the ring to my parents and everyone else when I first bought it but Yumi never got to see it, and I’m sure she would have loved it. I told her that I was just trying to give her a day she would never forget.”
“And what did she say?” I asked.
“She said I had definitely given her a day that she will never forget!”