Exclusive! THEIA's Don O'Neill Is Engaged

by The Daily Front Row

Aw alert! THEIA designer Don O’Neill celebrated 20 years with his partner, Pascal, by jetting down to Miami and popping the question. Here’s the play-by-play… 

“South Beach, Miami. It’s the morning of Sunday, April 28th, our 20th anniversary. I woke up all a flutter. Today I was going to propose to Pascal. Everything was planned. The airplane banner would fly over South Beach between 10:15 a.m. and 10:45 a.m. The photographer due to nonchalantly pretend to be a sun bather next to us was arriving at 10 a.m. Butterflies fluttered in my stomach. 

At 9 a.m., we set up on our beach chairs soaking up the sun when Pascal decided he wanted the umbrella up, obliterating the view of the sky. Concealing my panic, I played cool for all of five minutes before convincing him to close it. The beach was filling up and I’m thinking, ‘I should have planned this for 9:30!’ I fidget and fuss as Pascal tells me to relax and enjoy the sun because it’s our last day here. Sonia (the photographer) arrives and sets up a few loungers down from us. I coyly acknowledge her.

At 10:15 a.m., my heart is racing: ‘What if the plane doesn’t come? What if they mixed up the dates!’ 

At 10:25 Pascal declares he is going for a swim to cool down………PANIC!!! I tell him he has two minutes as my dad is calling us at 10:30 a.m. to wish us a happy anniversary. As he strolls down the water, Sonia mouths to me: ‘Where is he going???’ Suddenly in the sky behind Sonia I see in the distance a plane with two love hearts on the banner. OMG, panic. I yell at Pascal to get out of the water. Dripping wet, I don’t give him time to towel off, and ask him to sit down. I yank his anniversary card out of my beach bag, rip it open, and thrust it in his face to read quickly. He asks me what’s wrong. ‘Just read the card,’ I tell him. Pascal admires the outside. ‘Aw, how cute is this!’ he says. ‘Just open it, and read it,’ I bark! I hear the plane approaching behind me. In the card I had written everything I wanted to say, like how special he was to me, so I wouldn’t forget. But it was too late, so I started to tell him as I reached behind me into my bag for the ring box. My emotions got the better of me as I tell him how much I love him in tears. He thinks something is terribly wrong. Then in tears, I tell him to just look up at the plane, which was flying behind me, its beautiful banner announcing ‘Pascal Je T’aime! Will you marry me?’ As he reads it, I open the red leather ring box and presented him with the ring. Then it all becomes slow motion, a blur of emotion. Pascal said yes with tears streaming down both our faces, and everyone on the beach around us erupted in cheers. Suddenly the photographer comes into view to take pictures as the plane continues to circle South Beach and the cheering continues—both of us literally float high above all the excitement to take up residence on cloud 9.”

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