Roxanne and I had had a long-standing agreement that at the first major snowfall we would hike Rock Canyon together. As such, going on a hike in the snow was not only not unusual, but actually expected. After having prepared the engagement snowman, I hurried back to my apartment. She arrived a few minutes later, and we embarked on our hike. Right as we stepped off I told her we were going to take a detour up our favorite hill. We had just been up that way the night prior, but I insisted that the view in daylight was amazing (it was, in fact). We got to the top of the hill and kept moving around the circle up to the corner where lay the snowman. She noticed the note by the road and stopped to stoop down and read it. It read "Dear bystander, Please help the poor snowman, his heart has been turned to stone! Gain access to the heart stat! -The Snowpeople." She mentioned that being interesting, and that someone else can take care of that. I pulled out her snowgloves (which she had given to me just prior to this) and handed them to her, an expectant smile on my face. She said "I'm not even qualified to perform heart surgery! One of us would have to be certified. You're not certified, are you?" I told her "actually, I am a certified snowman cardiac surgeon. You may perform the operation under my supervision." Thus, at my insistence, she proceeded to pick away at the snowman's heart. That was slow-going and became impossible as the snow was too hard-packed, so she began to kick and pick at the snowman with her foot. Soon she dislodged the bag (which she believed to contain an actual stone) and she raised it victoriously to the sky, only to discover (to her horror) that it contained an engagement ring box. Thrusting it in my direction she demanded "Gabe, do you know what this is?" I recall thinking "what an odd question. Why yes, I do know what this is—it's your engagement ring." Instead, however, I simply took it from her, opened the bag (dropping to one knee), and then opened the box.
