Even though the proposal may not have been exactly what April Powell had planned, the result was still the same: a yes.
Powell and Marquita Gonzales got engaged Jan. 2 during a trip to Williamsburg, Va.
Powell intended to propose to Gonzales the night before at the Christmas Town display in Busch Gardens, amid the holiday lights, but the couple was delayed and got to the park too close to closing time. Powell readjusted her plan and popped the question while touring the Governor’s Palace garden in historic Colonial Williamsburg.
“We were walking around and there’s this part where the trees all criss-cross and we’re taking pictures and next thing I know, I turn around and she’s like, ‘I love you. It took me a long time to get to this point but I appreciate every step we’ve taken and I want to spend the rest of my life with you,’” Gonzales said. “And she got down on one knee and I just burst out crying.”
Gonzales said the moment was so intense, Powell had to double-check Gonzales’ answer.
“Even after it was said and done and I had the ring on my finger, she looked at me and was like, ‘I just drew a blank: Did you actually say yes?’” Gonzales laughed.
The women met online in December 2013 and connected in person later that month on a double date.
Gonzales said they waited about three months to begin a formal relationship.
“She’s honest about this, she wasn’t relationship material at first,” Gonzales said. “She didn’t know how to deal with the stress of arguments or things like that. But she gradually started building me into her future and we knew it was time for a relationship; when she was planning vacations, she’d plan me into them, or if she was planning a group activity with her friends, she knew she wanted me included,” Gonzales said. “After a while, she fell in love and felt like she belonged, and it was the same for me.”
Gonzales, 28, works in hospice care for Main Line Health, and Powell, 26, is a registered nurse at both Main Line Health and Thomas Jefferson University Hospital.
The Philadelphia residents plan to get married in June 2018 — and Powell already has her dress.
Powell saw a dress she loved and Gonzales, unbeknownst to her fiancée, bought it and had it shipped to their home.
“We went on a trip for our anniversary and when we got home, I was on the phone arguing with UPS and the truck had just pulled away so I ran out the door and two blocks down in a rainstorm to get her wedding dress,” Gonzales laughed. “I came back, sat it down and said, ‘This is your engagement gift.’ I recorded it when she opened it. She gasped so loud you can hear it a mile away.”
