When I (Marisa) started planning to propose, I knew Jolie had a few dreams in mind. For one, she frequently talked about wanting to hide in the bushes to take someone's engagement photos—so I knew I had to make that happen. She also asked me often if I was going to propose during our upcoming vacation—so I had to find a way to throw her off my trail. I told her I was sorry, the ring wouldn’t be ready in time, and I didn’t want her to be disappointed. But all the while, I was making plans for the night before we left. Under the pretense of a regular date night, I told her to meet me in Washington Square Park—where we had our second date. We return there every season of every year—it’s the place that’s seen us through each step of our relationship. The morning-of was nothing out of the ordinary—until about 3pm, when Bob from State Farm sent us a JOINT EMAIL about ring insurance. Can you say “cover blown” five times fast? Somehow, I kept my cool and pretended I didn’t see the email. By 5:30, our dear friends Nikki and Kathryn were stationed to take photos. Jolie texted me that she was a couple of blocks away much sooner than I expected. But in classic Jolie form, she happened to put the wrong park into Uber and ended up at Gramercy Park by mistake... Seven lifetimes later, she arrived and was immediately suspicious. She walked up to me and said, “What are you doing?” I replied, “Nothing? It’s nice to see you too?” This went on for a few minutes, until I told her I had something for her. “Do you want to see it?” I asked. “No!” she said. “I don’t want anything!” Well, sorry not sorry, Jo. She has always said “you could propose with a ring pop and I’d still say yes.” So, I took out the ring pop-shaped ring box and got down on one knee. Tons of onlookers at the park clapped (including patrons of a protest that was about to start—we love you, New York), while Jolie ran away from me. Yes, ran away. Technically, she said “nononono” first. And then she said, “YES!”

When you’re already engaged to your fiancée, you might think there can only be so much surprise—but don’t worry, I (Jolie) managed to give away almost every aspect of my proposal. I wanted to propose during our favorite game, something that brought us together and that we’ve had so much fun with throughout our relationship. Here’s the cliff notes version of what didn’t go to plan: first, Marisa picked up the mail the day the custom set of dominoes I ordered arrived. She may have also been suspicious when I asked her in advance if we could play that night and then proceeded to insist we start the moment I got home from work. And when I had a ring-shaped box in the pocket of my sweatshirt. And when I took my phone out to record the whole thing. In case I wasn’t sure how obvious I was being, she made it crystal-clear when she said, “I know what you’re doing.” But, I had to give it the old college try. The thing is, though, she kept losing at dominoes. (Let the record show this was the only time I've ever been mad about winning.) And she kept NOT picking the tiles that said “will” and “you” and “marry” and “me” on them. Eventually, I had no choice but to intervene and hand her the tiles she needed to flip over…. She said, “I knew it!” And then she said, “DUH! Yes!”