She Said "Yes"

The Proposal took months. I knew I wanted to marry My Betrothed embarrassingly early in our relationship. She wasn't even living in the same state as I was yet, but every once in a while one of us would "accidentally" make some comment about our DVD collections merging, or how many theoretical children each of us would theoretically want, and so on and so forth. It just all grew so naturally that I cannot even put a finger on exactly when I decided yes, yes, this is the woman I am going to marry. I can tell you for sure that by the time I helped her drive all her belongings down from Portland to Phoenix I had the Love Bug so bad that there was no coming back. I would have to propose. That was all back in December 2008. In late June 2009 I started looking around for jewelers. That's a lie. She doesn't know this (well, I guess now she does) but I popped into one or two jewelry stores before Christmas last year and was immediately overwhelmed and intimidated by the saleswomen. I ran screaming. I wasn't ready. It's not that I wasn't ready to propose. It's that I wasn't ready to shop for an engagement ring, let alone able to afford one.

So by early July 2009 I had found a jeweler I wanted to do business with. On Independence Day I sent them an email. Of course, my email was immediately buried in an avalanche of other emails because the lady who was in charge of the custom jewelry was out of the office. People often are around holidays like July 4th, and in Summer in general. I didn't hear back. I sent another email. I didn't hear back. Eventually I called, left a message, and got an email back. Allison, the custom jewelry lady, asked me to clarify some things from my original email, which I did, and then I didn't hear again for a month. So I sent another email.

Originally, all I wanted was an estimate on price. I needed to know how much to save up. But by mid-August it was looking increasingly likely that My Betrothed would have to move for work. To a place 6 hours away. In just two months. Suddenly I needed to get that ring on her finger. But my emails, once again, weren't being returned. I was perusing the website of the jeweler again one day when I saw the suggestion that if there was an emergency, customers should write "urgent" in the subject header. I'd noticed this before. But to me, "emergency" means someone is in imminent physical danger, or about to become homeless. Writing "urgent" in any email on the topic of jewelry seemed to me to be overly dramatic.

But you know what? It worked.

Suddenly I had an order number, and then a price quote, and soon enough I had an estimate on the ring's completion date. And then, finally, the ring itself. When it arrived on October 2nd I rushed right out, bought some champagne, some flowers, and the makings of a nice dinner. I planned to roll things out gradually over the course of the weekend. I knew that she knew it was coming eventually, and once things really got started she'd probably know that "eventually" was "soon." But I wanted to drag it out, tease her a bit, drive her nuts. The plan was to give her the flowers Friday night, make her brownies on Saturday, and then make the nice dinner on Sunday night, followed by a moonlit walk that was her idea in the first place.

So I showed up Friday night with the flowers. She'd had an awful day, and they helped cheer her up. She mentioned that a coworker of hers had suggested the two of us go on a picnic the next evening at the site where she'd be working, which is quite breathtaking at sunset. I knew I wasn't going to be able to wait until Sunday. The picnic idea was perfect. Except, of course, that the pasta dinner I'd had planned for Sunday wouldn't work. It didn't matter. I'd bring Thai food (her suggestion), the brownies, and the wine, and propose at sunset.

Which I did. And she said "yes." I made the pasta and stuff the next night anyway. And when we went for that nighttime walk, her smile outshone the moon.

On the way home, she drove us by the CVS, and bought a bridal magazine. Suddenly, I felt it. I was an Impending Groom. ~G2B PS - More about that Ring next time