Well, it has been quite a while since my last post, but I've been a busy lady. I got engaged about 2 or 3 weeks ago, which is interesting considering my first couple of posts. I'm excited and happy and on edge all at once. Luckily, we've opted for a long engagement for two reasons. One reason is to actually enjoy the engagement and congratulations' for a while before the planning has to start. The other reason is for my own mental health. I can be prone to panicking in stressful situations that involve dates and times and waiting and going places... so I want to spend at least part of my engagement not anticipating an anxiety attack. Preliminary date: Summer 2010.
Even though we're doing the long engagement thing, I couldn't help myself but to start looking at some locations and gathering ideas. It may turn into business later, but right now it's just fun. I've started making a list of people to invite because I really can't do any kind of planning or budgeting until I know how big this thing is going to be. Luckily, it looks like we may be able to stay under 100 invitees, which would be great. Fiance and I both have pretty small families and a large group of shared friends, so it looks like we'll have about half and half friends and family. Maybe even more friends than family members. Is that weird? Is it common or is it inappropriate to end up with a wedding that has more friends than actual relatives?
If you want the engagement story, here it is:
We begin about a week before it happened. I came home from work and E (my fiance) was at his evening job. I happened to notice a strange FedEx package sitting on the table. Now, we never get FedEx at home. UPS, sure, but not FedEx. In fact, I use FedEx almost exclusively at my job, so seeing this package on my table was like coming home to your work phone and a stapler mysteriously sitting on your bed, waiting for you. "Holy crap, it followed me home!" Needless to say, I walked over to the box cautiously and tipped it a little to see if it was empty. It lifted up pretty easily, and I really didn't want to touch it anymore so I figured it was E's and he had already opened it. Maybe it was the Obama shirt he ordered a while ago.
Anyway, I made dinner and brought it to him at work. When I asked about the package, he definitely gave me the deer-in-headlights look and said, "yeah, I got a package."
After a pause I asked, "...and what was in it?"
"Nothing... books! Books for class." (Keep in mind this was during the last week or so of the semester.)
"Oh, okay."
"But don't look in it, because I bought a book for you, too, and it's a surprise."
"A surprise book?" I asked.
"Yeah, so don't mess with the box."
"When do I get my surprise book?"
And then with a sly smile, "I don't know, I have to wait until the right time."
So, we moved to another topic of conversation and I was pretty suspicious. The next day, we made plans for the weekend and he really wanted to do some walking around downtown, which I am ALWAYS up for. We were planning on parking downtown and then walking around until we saw a place we wanted to eat, then going to Stubbies or Market Street Pub, and perhaps some late-night martinis, apps, and hookah at 101 Downtown. This was a lot of stuff. I thought maybe this was going to turn into a celebration after a possible proposal at dinner, but I was still really cautious with my thoughts since I tend to jump the gun with stuff like this. Once we parked downtown, E started walking in a very specific direction. He wasn't walking towards where all the restaurants and bars are, so he really seemed to have a specific place he wanted to go. Of course, we walk straight over to Dragonfly and he says "Oh, look, Dragonfly! Let's eat there." As if he hadn't planned it. So at this point, I'm getting really excited because Dragonfly is so upscale (for Gville). We had a great dinner. I won't talk about that now, but it was delicious. We were sitting in the patio outside as the sun was setting behind the Hippodrome, and a cool breeze kept us comfortable. Suddenly, that breeze picked up. It wasn't so much a soft chill as an icy smack across the face. We were done eating, so we paid our bill and thanked our good timing. It started raining just as we left the restaurant. We didn't think we'd have time to go to Market Street, so we walked around the corner to 101 downtown for hookah. As we walked, I thought maybe it would happen here. It's a pretty fancy place, too. Unfortunately, they were out of hookah (How do you run out of hookah?), so I told E I didn't mind getting rained on and we wandered out toward Market Street for drinks. I figured E wouldn't propose to me in a bar (or I would be very, very angry) so I started to relax and just have a good time. We had some drinks, watched people do karaoke, and had a great night. Their club side wasn't open, which disappointed me a bit, but I got over it.
After a while, we went back home and I got ready for bed. I must have been imagining things. I get into pajamas and go to bed. As I'm falling asleep, E wakes me up. I'm grumpy and telling him to let me sleep, so he literally drags me to the side of the bed so I sit up.
"Whaaat?" I ask in the most complainy voice I can muster.
I can't remember exactly what was said since I was sleepy and buzzed, but it went something like this.
"You know we've been together for 1,158 days," he said.
"You counted? Wow, that's a long time."
"Yeah, it is. And, you know, I love you and I think we should keep it going."
"I agree."
"So, should we make that official?" he asks and pulls a ring out of nowhere! He told me later that he was so happy to see I was grumpy because that meant I was definitely not expecting it. He did a good job hiding the box, but I was so sleepy I don't think I would've noticed if he had walked over to me balancing it on his head. So, the usual gushy excited stuff ensued and I was very happy. I immediately looked at the clock to see if it was too late to call people, which it was. I think it was between midnight and 1am. It was all very cute and very "us."
So now you know.
Friday, July 11, 2008
Subscribe to:
Comments (Atom)
