How Jim Proposed

[oceantheorem]

Typed up nearly verbatim from my paper journal...

Monday, 25 April, 2011
Holy. Crap.
I am engaged.
I guess I should back up and write about the whole weekend.
Friday I picked Jim up in Lansing. We went to gaming at Jeff's and had a really pleasant evening.
Saturday Jim took me to the Toledo Zoo so I could see the elephants. It was a gorgeous day - really the first nice one we've had this spring. At one point I made him sit down on a concrete bench thing, and I laid down next to him and put my head in his lap and just drank in the sunshine. It was So. Nice.
We spent some time in the reptile house, and I lingered by the elephants for a while, but we ended up not really being at the zoo very long. On the way out, Jim bought me a stuffed giraffe, which I've been pestering him for two years to do. (It's adorable, by the way, and now sits by my computer.)
We went straight from the zoo to Jim's parents' house for Easter dinner. It was a smallish gathering - me, Jim, his parents, his brother and sister, his sister's fiance, and his cousin's soon-to-be-ex-husband (long story, but the family has decided to "keep" him, even though the cousin isn't).
Anyway, dinner was really nice. It was homey and comfortable and warm.
Sunday, Easter, was a nice quiet day for us. I don't think Jim even realized it was Easter (we don't really do the holiday thing, particularly for the religiousy ones). We slept in, had an easy lunch, watched some TV, and cuddled a little. We went in search of a Kindle for Jim, but the Best Buy was closed, so we stopped by Barnes & Noble and I lectured Jim on how he should give fantasy novels another chance.
Back at the apartment, I had just started up Minecraft when Jim picked up his car keys and said he was going outside for a few minutes. My reply was a slightly confused "Umm, okay." And then I went back to playing Minecraft.
About 20 minutes later, I got an IM on my phone, from Jim, asking what I was up to. When I replied, "mining" he sent back, "Come find me."
After a little back-and-forth, throughout which I mostly tried to be difficult, I got in my car and drove to the nature preserve two miles from our apartment. At this point I was honestly a little annoyed. He'd wanted to go for a walk earlier in the day and I had refused - was he trying to force me into walking with him?
I had expected to have to wander the paths in the nature preserve for a while until I found Jim, but as I pulled up in the parking lot I could see him through the trees. And as I  walked toward him, I thought I could see something green behind his back. At that point I stopped being annoyed and started being confused. What the heck was going on?

Finally I came around the first curve in the path, and Jim stepped out of the trees. He handed me what he'd been hiding behind his back - a single gorgeous red rose, wrapped in green tissue paper. My first thought was, "Wow, this is sweet, but kinda weird. Is this because I hassled him about not getting me flowers for Valentine's Day?"

He said, "The last two years have been the happiest of my life." I thought, "Awww, sweet."

Then he dropped to one knee and pulled out the ring, and the whole world kind of crashed through my head as I tried to grasp what was going on. I'm fairly sure he said, "Will you marry me?" and obviously I said yes, but all I really remember is throwing my arms around him and hugging him.

 

Within two hours, the cat had eaten the rose.

 

(this is me-now again, not me-journal)

Over the next week or so I went through a pretty crazy emotional rollercoaster. I told my friends, I told my parents, I told my coworkers. My coworkers were the only ones I got to tell in person, which was a little sad (why are all my closest friends online??). I got used to wearing a HUUUUGE piece of gorgeous jewelry on my left hand. My ring finger developed a sore and healed again. I  began envisioning the perfect outdoor Santa Cruz redwoods wedding, picked colors, picked a location, picked a date, discarded the date, discarded the location, and decided again I really do like the colors. It's amazing what the female brain does with the sudden onset of "impending wedding". The last two weeks have made me immensely grateful for Jim's influence on me - he has this ability to take my emotions and just let them roll over him until I'm calm and sane and things make sense again. He wrote a rough draft of our vows and let me start a spreadsheet to manage our guests (once I had a spreadsheet, everything seemed better).

 

We told Jim's parents about the engagement in person, a week later, at another Saturday dinner. Telling Donna in person was so far, by far, the most fun part of telling anyone. She actually squee'ed and I think she might have jumped up and down a little. It was awesome.

My mom also approves, and told me she thinks Jim is a great guy and a good match for me. My dad called Jim and didn't give him too much grief about not asking for my hand, which, from my dad, is a pretty glowing welcome.

 

I'm happy. :-)

Comments

(Jim commenting... it's being dumb and not letting me log in)

[(Anonymous)]

:)

So, I thought I'd add my side of the story, because apparently Kara missed half of it while she was in the OMG OMG OMG stage. :P

**This is the background story, and I'll add the proposal story in a second comment.**


After I first met Kara, we both knew about a month in that we'd be married one day. She's fantastic, and everything I could have hoped for in a woman- beautiful, brilliant, and wonderfully endearing. We complement each other wonderfully- I keep her emotionally balanced, and she makes sure I don't forget everything, lol. We're on the same wavelength in all the important areas, and we rarely have cause to even get upset, let alone argue. Honestly, she's been the best thing that's ever happened to me and I can't imagine ever finding anyone better.

My goal was to pay off our credit cards and get us financially stable, then ask her to marry me. About two years into it, we were soon approaching that point, and I began seriously looking at rings. I had taken her out before to get an idea of what she liked, and filed that info away in my mind. She likes emeralds, she likes smaller rings that don't overwhelm her hand, neither of us likes the diamond industry, and a few other details.

Anyway, a couple months ago, while I was planning what I was going to get her, she corners me and starts asking me if I'm ever going to marry her. I, wanting the entire thing to be a surprise, start getting wishy-washy and trying to dodge the question. She mistakes this for me being afraid of commitment (I think). She finally weasels out an answer, and I tell her "within the next year". She leaves, happier than I had thought she'd be with her very imprecise answer. :P

So, I decide upon a 3-stone design, with emeralds on the sides. NOBODY makes this. I scour the world looking, and I think I found one ring with emeralds on the sides and diamond in the center, but I don't like the setting. I look into having a custom ring designed, and discover it will cost triple the amount. Then, during my search, I find a setting that I absolutely adore, and discover that, while it's not available with the emeralds on the sides, it IS available as just a setting. So, after figuring out gem sizes, and doing some more searching, I decide to buy the setting, then buy the emeralds and center stone separately. The emeralds were fairly easy, but the center stone wasn't. After much deliberation, I settle on a company that makes cubic zirconium gems that are extremely well cut, and infused with diamond, which solves the problem of CZ being porous and getting dirty easily. So yay, no conflict diamonds or supporting the DeBeers Corporation's evil monopoly, lol.

So, I order everything separately, which results in 3 boxes showing up at the door. Kara inquires what they are. I, having failed to come up with a cover story, simply refuse to tell her. This does not go well, but I digress. I have a jeweler mount the gems, and then spend the next few weeks pondering how I'm going to ask her.

(Jim again)

[(Anonymous)]

Okay, the proposal!

I fuss and ponder over how I will ask her for quite some time. I plan out what I will say and set up situations to ask her. None of them feel right. I fuss some more. I want it to be special. I want it to be romantic. I'm a guy and romance is hard. I try anyway. I finally yell at myself, come up with an idea, grab the ring, and charge out the door, muttering about needing to go take care of something outside, and leaving before she had a chance to question it. I head out, luckily finding a flower store that wasn't closed, and pick up a nice red rose. I wanted to propose in something... not the apartment, preferably surrounded by trees. I settle on the nature preserve near our apartment, for lack of any better options considering my rather limited time home each weekend with my job. I'd prefer a weekend away in the redwood forests of Santa Cruz, or hiking across the Swiss Alps, but such romantic getaways will have to wait a couple years.

Anyway, I arrive, and ponder how I will get her there. One may notice, at this point, that planning is not my forte, and that I prefer to shoot from the hip. Still, I have a rose! I am determined! I decide to send her a text message, and to get nice and snarky about it. She likes that. :P

Rough transcript:
"What are you up to?"
"Mining"
"Come find me!"
"What's going on?"
"No questions, just come!"
"Why"
"What did I just say about asking questions?"
"(grumbles) okay"

So I wait, and suddenly curse myself for not putting on nicer clothes in my haste, or demanding she put on a dress.

She shows up, and I wait for her to head over. I smile and hand her the rose. She looks confused, but accepts, and hugs me. I whisper in her ear, "The past two years have been the best of my life. I love you, and I want to spend the rest of my life with you." I start reaching into my pocket for the ring, and I watch her suddenly peace together what is going on in her head. She begins shaking, and inhales sharply. I feel her entire body quiver as I step back slightly, drop to one knee, and present the ring to her, asking "Will you marry me?"

She says yes, and I watch her explode with emotion, hugging me and putting on the ring. We kiss, she cries, she squeals, she makes other adorable noises, and examines it. We spend the next 20 minutes between there and the car, kissing and hugging, and being ridiculously adorable.

Then her mind suddenly snaps from, OMG OMG OMG I'm GETTING MARRIED~!! to OMG OMG OMG I need to tell EVERYONE!

I step back, chuckling to myself- this process is fun to watch. :P I am relieved to have finally asked her, and intrigued by how her mind reacts to this new development. Within hours she has told tons of people, and pondered how best to tell the rest. By the next day, she had a silly amount of wedding ideas planned. This process is amusing indeed. :P She is great; I love her; I look forward to spending the rest of my days beside her. :)

I love you Kara. You are my adorable little banana slug. ;)

[(Anonymous)]

This is orio.... omg to two are too cute!... I will write more later when I am not at work.

[fieryminge.livejournal.com]

Oh my god. Your half of the story combined with Jim's half of the story is SO ADORABLE!

I'm happy for you sees. You deserve this! Congratulations to you both!!

[(Anonymous)]

LOVE the two stories together. And I am so excited for you, Kara! You seem to have found someone who matches you very well, and you both seem supremely happy. Congratulations.

-Lalani

[ljsolditssoul.livejournal.com]

Congratulations!! You two make an awesome couple. Love you!