“When you recognize, you simply know.”
That’s what they are saying about good music, an excellent day on the water, and, after all, love.
For Nick Britt and Ashlee Hewitt, the confluence of all three led to their underwater engagement final week on the foot of the Christ of the Abyss statue in Key Largo, a couple of days earlier than the Key Largo Original Music Festival.
Britt was on the town to play the pageant that weekend however had arrived early, A person on a mission ‒ to get engaged to the love of his life, to complete up his divemaster certification and to play authentic music on the pageant, in that order ‒ he’d invited Hewitt on a little bit getaway trip. She had no concept that he was engaged on a plan along with his Nashville dive teacher, native Bobby Stoky and The Weekly.
On their very first day within the Keys, Britt and Hewitt hopped into Stoky’s boat, vacation spot secret to Hewitt. It was their first ocean dive ever, they usually had been blown away by the colours and wildlife. Holding palms your complete dive, they explored the reef at North Dry Rocks, making their method towards Key Largo’s most well-known statue along with his palms up in supplication.
“My coronary heart was pounding in my chest,” Britt stated. “I used to be not nervous in regards to the dive, however conscious that I used to be about to be engaged to probably the most unfathomable human I’ve ever met.”
Britt and Hewitt met on the courting app Hinge in April. Three weeks later, they met in individual for a primary date at a Mexican restaurant in Pulaski, Tennessee, the place Hewitt lives along with her son, Tuff, 8. The pair rapidly found a shared love of health, religion, music and one another.
“We by no means run out of issues to speak about,” Hewitt advised The Weekly. “We now have a lot in frequent. And, he’s so candy. He wakes up at 4 a.m. day-after-day, so he has six hours by himself earlier than I’m awake, and I get up to actually candy, well-crafted messages day-after-day.”
What else would you anticipate of a songwriter who’s received a number of Nashville Trade Music Awards, together with Artist and Album of the 12 months? Hewitt additionally is not any stranger to the stage or the mic. As a part of a up to date nation trio known as Submit Monroe, she toured with Martina McBride and was on “Nashville Star,” a tv singing competitors from 2003 to 2008.
As their relationship developed, Britt invited Hewitt to hitch him underwater and start scuba diving, his newest ardour. When the pageant was confirmed as on, Britt “couldn’t consider another place to suggest” than Key Largo.
“We’d simply gotten into scuba collectively, so I believed this was going to be distinctive, and with the statue, that’s symbolic of certainly one of our private shared foundations,” Britt stated. “Plus, if she stated no, it’d be straightforward to cover the physique,” he added with fun and a wink to Hewitt.
Britt confessed, “After I noticed the statue, I began to choke up, and I believed, ‘Jesus, don’t let me drown whereas proposing!’”
Once they bought to the Christ statue on that first dive, Britt motioned for Hewitt to kneel with him and pray. He confirmed her pre-written dive slates on his arm that requested: “You’re the love of my life and I’ll serve you, Tuff, and Jesus endlessly….Ashlee Rose, will you marry me?”
“I began getting emotional once I learn that,” Hewitt stated. “However, he didn’t give me a selection! ‘Sure’ or ‘sure’ had been the one choices to level to. He didn’t give me an choice.”
Britt smiled again, “Mama didn’t elevate no idiot.”
Hewitt didn’t say no. Britt pulled out a turquoise ring safely tucked right into a GoPro case to indicate his new fiancee, they usually surfaced to share a kiss within the waves.
“The middle stone is turquoise, native to my area of the nation,” Britt stated. “After I noticed this ring, it jogged my memory of dwelling, and I knew that once I positioned it on the hand of somebody who might love me as fiercely as I like her, she would turn out to be my dwelling.”
Again on the boat, Britt performed a track over the boat audio system that he’d written for Hewitt known as “Lovelee.” It was launched on Spotify timed only for the pageant and proposal.
The pair laughed because the lyrics famous that she “style(d) like espresso and wine,” and hugged nearer as Britt sang, “I’d at all times hoped anyone such as you would knock me off my toes and I’d make her my spouse.”
The remainder of the week, the pair accomplished deep and night time dives in direction of Hewitt’ superior open water certification and Britt’s divemaster and took a bike trip all the way down to Key West and again, Hewitt bought a tattoo of a palm tree and the phrases Key Largo, and Britt performed the pageant.
Sharing her track on social media, Hewitt famous, “I’ve by no means been cherished so laborious by anybody, Nick Britt. You amaze me.”
The following day, the pair drove again to Nashville with a truck stuffed with scuba gear, music and love.
