Halfway through the 2018 New York City Marathon, a runner scooped up an engagement ring.
Runner Kaitlyn Curran, a nurse at St. Barnabas Hospital, was chipping away at the 26.2 miles of her marathon at mile 16 in New York City when her boyfriend, a firefighter from Jersey City, N.J., surprised her with a proposal, according to NBC New York.
As she swerved to greet him, he knelt down near the Queensboro Bridge and asked her to go to the distance with her. Delighted by the proposal, she said yes, getting a warm reception from spectators and fellow runners excited about the moment.
Online, everyone wasn’t as thrilled. Some voiced the viewpoint that it was the wrong time to make the move and interrupt her run. His cousin said he “wanted the proposal to be special.”
But she didn’t let love slow her down too long. After she gave him the go ahead, she kept running.
Curran finished her marathon with a time of four hours and 24 minutes.
Correction, Nov. 7
The original version of this story misstated Kaitlyn Curran’s marathon completion time. It was four hours and 24 minutes, not 28 minutes.
- Volodymyr Zelensky and the Spirit of Ukraine: TIME's 2022 Person of the Year
- Mickey Guyton Is TIME's 2022 Breakthrough Artist of the Year
- The 10 Best Nonfiction Books of 2022
- Column: What Elon Musk Gets Wrong About Free Speech
- The Forgotten Story of One of the First U.S. Soldiers Killed Overseas After Pearl Harbor
- Why You're More Likely to Get Sick in the Winter, According to New Research
- Column: What the Protests Tell Us About China's Future
- 18 Last-Minute Gifts for Everyone on Your List
