Love conquers all, or at least it does in the case of Neil Bush and Maria Andrews. President Bush's beleaguered brother and his girlfriend became engaged in France earlier this week.
Details are sketchy and the betrothed couple are not talking, but Houston friends say Bush popped the question over a romantic dinner in a château in France's Champagne country.
Bush ordered champagne and chocolates (Andrews' favorite) for dessert and used the interlude of sweets, we are told, as the moment to propose. She said, "Yes."
Bush said from Paris that he had other pressing matters on his plate at the moment and that discussing his engagement and marriage plans was "not appropriate."
The romance between the reluctantly high-profile love birds has survived press scrutiny into their personal lives, a nasty post-divorce battle with Bush's ex-wife Sharon Bush, paternity tests to prove that Neil Bush is not the father of Andrews' 2-year-old son, and endless rounds of gossip.
Andrews moved to Paris in late summer with her three children for a long-planned year abroad. She and ex-husband Robert Andrews had agreed that the children could benefit from learning French in Paris.
Bush has been a frequent visitor, spending Thanksgiving in Paris with Andrews and her children.
Even if they can't have an Iraqi reconstruction contract, at least we know France, part of Rumsfeld's "Old Europe," had a real turkey for Thanksgiving.
Let us all join hands and give thanks for Shelby Hodge, society columnist for the Houston Chronicle.
