Wrangler Dani

I started this blog a couple months ago and never finished it, but Love and Marriage have been under attack lately, so I felt it was high time to finish this story.

So here’s the weird thing about one’s hands. When one is hot, they’re big, when one is cold, they shrink. Inexplicably. Ok, so I know it’s not really inexplicable to most, but it is to me. Don’t talk to me about biology or bones or the square root of anything. Journalism major here, folks.

Anyway, my hands have gotten a little chilly lately, (thanks, arctic office,) which makes my ring a little more slippy than we’d prefer for true peace of mind. Adam still won’t tell me what he paid, but even if he’d traded an old couch and a bag of cat food for it, losing it would break my heart. So, we decided to resize. This sounds so easy. All my engaged/married friends know all about it, went through it, and totally understand it. This doesn’t make it any less scary. Kind of like going to the “girl doctor”. Totally normal and yet completely terrifying.

Also, to add to the panic, the jewelry place that has been in the Shops at Mission Viejo for 35 years, the place that assured Adam that they weren’t going anywhere, that they were as reliable as the Sun itself, is closing. So we had to bite the bullet and resize the dang thing. YESTERDAY.

The guy at the jewelry place remembered Adam (he made multiple stops by, “just to visit” during the process of purchasing the ring) and called me the “lucky girl” which made me blush and Adam grin with pride. It all happened so fast – before I knew it the ring was off, signed for, new size tried on, gives us a carbon copy receipt, tells us it will be two weeks, waves good-bye, and I’m standing on the sidewalk outside the mall, eyes brimming with tears and my left hand feeling oh-so-naked. Adam is squeezing me, half-sad that I’m sad and half over-the-moon about it, since these tears mean that I REALLY LIKE HIS RING and I kinda want to marry him. Y’know. Maybe.

He tries to buy me a fakey ring, you know, the kind you wear home from Spring Break junior year to freak out your mom, but I refuse, absolutely sure that I can tough it out. We go to Chili’s and I don’t even make it out of the car before I cry again. (“But I loved this sweatshirt with the ring..*sob*sniffle*) Side note: Getting engaged completely sets off your its-okay-to-cry-about-this-meter. EVERYTHING is okay to cry about.

We make it through dinner and the rest of the night, and I think I only teared up once (*cough *six times*) more. The next night Adam came over to the Bower for dinner, and I was cooking in my tiny kitchen with my back to him.

“Hey,” he says

I turn around and he’s on one knee in between the counter and couch, holding up a ring box and very sparkly replacement ring, eyes shining, smiling up at me.

“Will you marry me?…. Again?” he asks.

Guess what I said.

I wore the fake ring for two weeks, and I have the real one back now. But anytime I take it off or Adam holds it for any reason, I see that image in my mind – once on a snowdrift in Sequoia, once in my kitchen in Dana Point – the love of my life asking (for the privilege! Ah!) of being with me, forever. And even if he asks a million times, my answer will always be, Yes.