Sometimes we journey on a bus chartered for one destination.

We buy our ticket knowing where we want to go, how much it will cost and about how long it will take to get there. We pack our clothes. We lock our doors. We get our affairs in order and we go. We plan for some contingencies, but it’s a safe journey, a reliable one.

Sometimes we chart our lives the same way.

We’re focused on our goals, and we’re determined to reach our destination. We choose our bus carefully. If we truly know where we want to go, it’s in our nature to take the shortest route. No-stop trips are preferred.

Picking up other passengers can cost us time. Side trips to see the sights can cost us time. Breaks for food can cost us time. We don’t want to be late. We don’t want to miss out.

But some stops are inevitable. We need to get out of the bus and walk around, fill our stomachs and empty our bladders. We are, after all, a people of diversions and choices. And as such, we often need to reevaluate, to decide again, if we’ve picked the right bus, if indeed our destination is still appealing.

And sometimes, things happen beyond our control. Our bus could break down through no fault of our own. Our driver could take ill. Our road could be blocked.

Or we could fall in love with someone on another bus.

I don’t know why or how it happens. Maybe it’s the journey itself, a journey that tires us, makes us hungry for the embrace of someone real, someone special.

Regardless, your buses have to stop. You both get out your maps and chart a new course. You may take different routes initially, but the destination must be the same. Some call it an engagement.

I was one of those who didn’t think my bus would stop — at least not for a while. I had, after all, been cruising rapidly and had thus far avoided lengthy breaks in travel.

And then I met her.

And suddenly I wasn’t so sure I wanted to ride alone anymore. Suddenly my destination, a destination that I had never before questioned, didn’t look so appealing. It wasn’t because I was dissatisfied with the journey, my bus or my driver.

But the hope of something better, the call of a deeper connection to share, to live and to experience proved too powerful. No longer was I content to travel alone. No longer was I wholly satisfied by my own passions, my own journey.

Staring blankly into the world through the windows on my bus, listening intently to the hum of the road while awaiting my destination, I realized that my journey meant little without her. I realized that while content to voyage alone, I wasn’t complete.

So that’s why I asked her to marry me. That’s why I stopped my bus. And that’s probably why she did the same. It’s probably why she said yes.

There was a lot of things to consider. Would my bus run as well after a lengthy lay-over? Would I have the energy to get back on the road? Would I have the same passion for my destination? Would she want to ride in my bus? Would she want me to ride in her bus? Would we maintain two buses? What would our drivers say?

These, and others, were all important questions. But in a larger sense, they were trivial matters of detail, not of substance. And in the end, they didn’t really matter at all, because it came down to only this:

Her name is Haley — and I love her.

---

Chris Miller is a senior in journalism and mass communication from Marshalltown. He is editor in chief of the Daily.