Michael's proposal to Holly on The Office - PERFECT!!

Friends is one of my all-time favorite sitcoms. I watched almost every episode when it was newly aired, and I still watch them in syndication, almost every night. The show is still funny and touching and real to me. I don’t think I’ll ever get tired of it.

One of my most favorite episodes was when Chandler and Monica got engaged. That episode was perfect. Joey was running around in his Mr. Beaumont outfit. Chandler called Richard a “big tree” and yelled at him because he “made my girlfriend think!” Monica was all torn up because Richard finally loved her enough to marry her when all she really wanted was for Chandler to stop talking about pig sex and propose to her.

How could it have gotten any better than Joey telling Chandler that Monica had left, Chandler falling quickly into depression, only to be bowled over when he found Monica in their apartment with about a hundred candles burning? When Monica said, “You wanted it to be a surprise,” I got a lump the size of a baseball in my throat. I thought that was the epitome of TV marriage proposals.

I was wrong. Michael Scott – and the rest of The Office – upstaged Friends this week.

I’ve been rooting for Michael and Holly ever since Amy Ryan walked on the set. They are absolutely perfect for each other and no matter what else you can say about Michael Scott, the guy deserves to be truly loved. He’s wanted it - and worked for it - for so long.

When Pam asked to see the engagement ring and Michael popped the lid open on the ring box, Pam and I both about collapsed. The ring was as big as a robin’s egg. Pam said (what I was thinking), “Is that real?”

Michael looked at Pam and said, “Yeah. Three years’ salary, right?” I knew then the proposal on Friends was in danger of being knocked off its pedestal.

I don’t know if I could pick a favorite part of the episode: Michael’s bad ideas for the restaurant proposal that Pam, Jim, and Oscar talked him out of; Michael’s bad idea of getting a corpse that was supposed to be him falling off the roof and losing his head over Holly; Michael stopping Holly from proposing to him. Yeah, those were all great and made me belly laugh, but they weren’t the best part.

The best part was the actual proposal. It was so typically Michael, so sweet, so weird, so from-the-heart. When he opened the door to the kitchen and everyone in the office was standing there with a candle, the guys taking turns asking Holly to marry them, that lump in my throat started growing again. When Michael and Holly made it through the kitchen (without Holly accepting any of the other proposals) and into the annex, when Michael popped open the ring box and asked her, in Yoda-speak, if she would marry him and Holly answered yes, in Yoda-speak, I heard the distant tumble of Monica and Chandler falling from the perch they’d held for so long. And I wiped my eyes.

I can’t really imagine The Office without Michael Scott. But if he has to leave, I’m really glad he isn’t going alone.