It’s official.  There’s a ring on my left hand and marriage license paper work in my day planner.

It was very anti-climatic, as we’ve known it was inevitable - just something we needed to get around to doing.  On Monday, he came back from a fishing trip in time to accompany me on some chores and on a whim I looked up antique jewelry and jotted down a store that was on the way home.

(ST told me long ago that I really had to pick the ring out.  I would be the one wearing it, so I should really have the say in what it looked like.  While I get that that might bug some women, I wasn’t upset over the lack of surprise.  I’m very picky with jewelry, left-handed, and do lots of rough work in my day-to-day.  I needed to feel that the ring would hold up to the rigors of my life, and something that didn’t make me barf.)

(And a few weeks ago, I decided I really didn’t want a new ring.  They are, in my opinion, more expensive and with less personality.  Also, ever the recycler, there seems something green and less blood-on-my-hands about older diamonds.)

Anyway, the first store did not pan out but they suggested a few other places to check out.  ST was rather sore from fishing (deep sea), but wanted to soldier on since we’d gotten that far.  The second store and several beautiful pieces, but nothing that fit my lifestyle.

The last store, which it’s possible we walked past on our very first date, was more of a true jewelry store than antique.  But when I mentioned our criteria (not gold-gold and low settings), an estate piece was produced that seemed perfect.  Except the large middle stone had been removed so it was difficult to picture.  After a few fittings of gems (including a blue topaz), we chose a diamond and waited for it to be set.

He gave it to me in the kitchen when we got home.  Kitchens seem to be where I get proposed to.

On a side note, the aforementioned fishing trip meant that I had had the weekend to myself.  I had pleaded off ill from the sanctuary halfway through Saturday, but came home to do a mad cleaning as the realtor had called for a 5pm showing.

That wasn’t great fun, but it let me appreciate the condo again.  And left me with an immaculate home to veg out in for the rest of the weekend.

I enjoyed my time alone - afterall, I purchased this place for ME.  I’ve always felt comfortable, safe and happy here by myself.  And alone meant getting things done when I wanted, where I wanted.  It meant staying up until 11pm (!!).

It meant sleeping alone.  That second night, I tossed and turned.

I may be able to live with out him.  I may even be able to enjoy it.  But I certainly enjoy it a hell of a lot more when he’s here.  For other people, that may not be the greatest criteria for a lifelong relationship.  But for a loner like myself, someone who has never spent extended time with any person and not begged for a time out, it says a lot.

Maybe the pock-mark wasn’t on his left sideburn.  Maybe it was on his nose.

But I’m almost positive it was from measles.  Right?  Measles?

How is it that things I obsessed over are now no more valid than fiction?

I once kept a draft post in my email account for over a year.  It was to a boy, of course.  I believe one I wanted more from and wasn’t getting it.  I remember feeling so scared and free when I finally deleted it.  But now I could not tell you a single word it contained.  Or even who it was for with 100% certainty.

This weekend, I was contacted by the past.  My very first real boyfriend from when I was in the 7th grade.

It was through a site set up for people to connect like that, although I’ve never had anyone do that.

He’s suggested we catch up.  In offering direct email communication, he used the word “addy”.

I don’t remember him that way.  I don’t remember him in words at all.  I remember smells and touch.  I remember light brown eyes.  A jean jacket that I would rest my head on.  His digital calculator watch that I wore that summer.

I used to be the kind of person who hung on to everyone and everything in my life.  In that, I am tempted to catch up.

But I’m also scared.  Not about the present, but about how direct contact would abscure the past.  How much of what I remember is completely wrong?  How many memories will get re-written?

ST and I were on the Busch Gardens tram, heading into the park.  I looked to my right, and there he was.  NB.  It had to be.  That gelled hair.  The pock-mark under his left side-burn.

So I smiled, at first to myself as he was with a beautiful and skinny blond.  Then I smiled at him after poking him in the shoulder.

He looked at me as if I was a stranger.

I took the sun glasses off.  “NB?”

“No.  Sorry.”

“Oops!”

On reflection, the hair was too blond.  And he did not walk with the right stance when I saw him leave the tram.  But that pock-mark sure had me going.

ST slung an arm around my back, “Sorry dear.  But you can’t have dated them all!”

I was perusing a myspace account of an old fling. I don’t know why. He was also a long-time friend, but the aftermath of the fling probably makes that verb-tense just. I’d just seen two other very close long-time mutual friends. Maybe that’s what put me in the mind to check in on him.

His profile says he’s single. And in his description (or one of those random thingies you put on myspace), he said he was getting over a crappy relationship. I’m either happy or ashamed that I have no idea if this relationship was the one I knew him last to be in, or if there have been others between. As a friend, definitely ashamed. As someone glad to not have more twists and turns in her life than she has road maps, I suppose it’s a little nice to know I’ve managed to let this one slip off the radar.

But, that’s not at all my point. Which of course you knew that if you knew me and understand exactly how many paragraphs I require in order to actually say anything.

A crappy relationship. It struck me because with him in particular, well, he’s the type of guy who is always getting over a crappy relationship. Except for the time when he’s in the relationship with someone who could be “the one”. It seems that once they’re over, all his relationships were crappy. Myself included, I’m well aware. Of course there were things to make it crappy. After all, we’re not still together anymore. He’s not still with this new ex-dame. If there were no downhill, there’d be no crap. But it puzzles me. Am I the only one who doesn’t hold grudges against exes? Am I alone in the thought that hey, we weren’t made for each other but that doesn’t make you a monster?

Yes. Some relationships were definite crap. Got birthday scars and memories of rocking on the kitchen floor while the phone was ringing to prove it to myself. But for the most part, I believe it’s just two cool people coming together who turned out to be not-quite right for each other. I mean, if I were to slander all my exes and call them scum, what does that say about my taste? I heart scum?

Why do so many people love to hate the ones they once loved?

ST and I had a wonderful Thanksgiving weekend together.  Lots of food, lots of love, and lots of sitting our asses.  I have yet again f*cked up my left ankle, this time the tendon sheath over the top, and I’m trying to rest it.

We had prepared for the long weekend by purposely holding off on our latest Netflix arrivals (The Lake House and Boondock Saints) as well as finally using up some Blockbuster money I’d had since June (Nacho Libre and Chronicles of Narnia).  But by Sunday afternoon, the movie well was dry. 

We’d just come home from the condo (I’d insisted we make a brief pass over it with a broom and dust rag), I needed to put the ankle up and veg for a bit.  So I popped a Sex in the City DVD in.

ST has never really watched any of the series, and was restless in that Sunday evening way that had him pinging from room to room with little tasks.  But who can resist plot lines where Virgin Mary statues replace vibrators?  Soon he had settled in next to me and we were watching the “Are we sluts?” episode.

When Carrie is all huffed that Aiden is in the bathroom for an hour, and it turned out he was drawing a romantic bath for two, I turned to ST and mummbled and gestured.  It was the type of comment that wasn’t meant to be articulated fully, the gist of it being fully formed on the television set. 

Except…

“What did you just say?”

“I said….why don’t you draw me a bath….with salads…”

“That’s what I thought I heard.”

“But I meant candles!”

“One bath with salad, coming up.”

We were doing the weekly grocery shopping on Sunday when ST spotted a buy-one-get-one-free ad for the generic 2-L soda.

“This is a good deal!”  I agreed that it was, then wondered why he was still standing there.

“So, can we get some?”

This isn’t the first time he’s asked; kowtowed to the crown of grocery shopping I was unaware bestowed upon me.  Oh sure, he may argue on points here or there (organic eggs, for example), but for the most part once we get in the door my list rules supreme.

The point of this story is my answer: Yes.

I often try to figure out or articulate why things work with ST that didn’t work with others.  Why we’re deeper in debt than I was with ex yet we don’t fight about money.  Why I never believed the phrase, “There’s no such thing as bad sex” until him.  How it’s possible with four cats, a dog, a guinea pig, and two forgetful people to (mostly) stay on top of the housework without so much as one raised voice.

 The easy answer is that we both say yes a lot.  Neither of us has gone without a foot or back rub anytime one was requested.  He’s eaten his first tofu dogs, I’ve had my first meal of deer burger.  Whatever our little hearts desire in the rhelm of food and/or entertainment are almost always instantly granted.

But…why?  Why is it so easy to say yes to each other when many people who know us might throw the words prideful and stingy into descriptions they thought would never get back to us?

I can tell you that in other relationships, I haven’t bothered to ask for much because I was afraid of that, “No”.  In other relationships, I’ve used excel spreadsheets to determine who owes who what and what day of the week with what moon phase I might be able to get what’s due.

With him, I am comfortable and content.  I don’t need a list to determine what I get can ask for; if anything I self-police that I’m not getting too much without giving enough in return.

If I could give any advice to anyone in relationship, it would be to ask yourself what’s your yes comfort-level.   

*The title is on a magnet the ex put in the Christmas stocking once. 

There are times I think I can’t do this.

I used to say that maybe it was me.  I meant it.  But what I meant more was, prove me wrong.  Be the one.  The one that changes everything.

He’s the one.  He has changed everything.  And I still have times I think I can’t do this.  It really is me.

And yet…I know that I will.  In part because I know he can read that and understand.  He knows me better than anyone in the world, he knows that too.

Today was one of those days.  Such silly shit.  Chores and money, time tables and to-do lists.  What to have for dinner.  When to take a nap.  How long to study.

But then, I’m taking a break watching TV and he’s already in bed and at the end of the show, I have to go to him.  I have to.  I would feel empty otherwise.

We giggle and stroke, sigh and climax.  He calls me perfect, forgetting that he once told me I could never be perfect (no one could), but that I was perfect for him.

It is these times that I think, how can anyone not do this?

Everyone has certain tricks - wiggling their ears, burping the alphabet, something that makes them unique and strange.

Me?  I talk to sleeping people.

I don’t know if it’s the timbre of my voice, or that I’ve honed the exact right amount of questioning that should go into a conversation, but give me someone in blissful slumber and I can give you an interesting dialogue.

Me:  Honey, is there anything I can get you?

ST:  Money.

Me:  Money?  Why do you want money from me?

ST:  I need fifty cents for milk.

(ST hates drinking milk unless it’s a newly opened carton.  He drinks chocolate or soy.)

Me:  Where do you get milk?

ST:  Everyday.

Me:  No, WHERE?  Do you get milk at work?

ST:  Kindergarten.

(Pause for my laughter.)

Me:  Kindergarten?

ST:  It’s retro.

(Pause for me to try and ascertain if he’s truly asleep or fucking with me.  Asleep.)

Me:  I was thinking of giving you sex, but if you want fifty cents for milk…

ST:  I’ll take the sex.

Me:  Then how will you get your milk?

ST:  Through the Internet.

Me:  How will you get milk through the Internet?

ST:  The INTERNET.

Me:  No, HOW?

ST:  Through a big pipe line.

There you go people.  Internets got milk?

Shortly after this conversation, I yelled at the dog for drinking out of the toilet and ST asked what was going on.  When I explained, he jumped in with this helpful statement, “Little Dog!  You get in here under this license plate!”

Indeed.

Living with ST is amazing, but in some ways un-noteworthy in my mind.  I was pretty convinced we’d get along well otherwise I’d have never made this decision.

I do a lot of the housework right now, since I’m unemployed.  It might become an issue when my schedule tightens up, but I doubt it.

I know he thinks we’re careful and respectful of each other based on our previous experiences living with others.  That might be so, but I also think we’re just getting too old for that shit.  Yes, we’re set in our ways.  But we also are fairly certain of what we have to have, and what we can let go.  Not everything is life or death, a power struggle, or signs of devotion/descent in the ranks.

So far, the biggest problem has been his schedule.  He’s still going into work around 1:30am to try and “manage from the floor”.  (Warehouse floor, receiving starts at 2am.)

This means that anywhere between 6 and 9pm, he turns into a pumpkin.  While I can entertain myself, I’ve known for a long time a huge flaw of mine is wandering.  My mind, my body, my hands…I’ve lived in apartments where I’ve kept exactly one door shut - the front one.  Every other closet, pantry, nook, and cranny must be open and available for multi-tasking at all times.  Today I tried to fold laundry but decided I really had to start cooking the chicken in the middle.  I get thirsty and on the way to kitchen I sweep the bathroom.  Sad that I can’t even blame this on MTV since my parents still to this day do not have cable.

So, I feel a bit like I’ve had a hand tied behind my back with the bedroom door closed for most of the evening.  Not to mention the only working toliet is in there as well.

But ST is also a bit of a romantic.  He doesn’t like to go to bed without me.  This can sometimes mean I go to bed at 6pm, or he falls asleep on the couch refusing to move until I do.  Again, this isn’t so bad now.  But soon (Thursday?), my nights will be needed for studying. 

And it’s quite possible I’ll start to notice the sleep I’m losing when he gets up at 1am - that’s half the reason I’m able to accommadate him now, I’m sleepy myself.

In fact, it’s 9:15 and I’m feeling a bit peaked.  Think I’ll go lie down… 

Heh.  I realized driving home from class that this morning’s post might have spawned a few questions.

About a month ago, ST and I had a conversation that every Rules writer would say is death to a relationship and everyone who knows me personally won’t believe actually took place.

Me:  Can I ask you a question I’m not supposed to ask?

ST:  Yes.

Me:  Do you think we’re going to get married?

ST:  If we continue on this path, yes.  Definitely.

Me:  Me too.

Some follow-up:

1) No, we are not crazy or desparate.  We’re not rushing to get hitched so we won’t die alone.  We’re not rushing period.  We want to live together and talk through A LOT of circumstances before making it official.  It’s just that we know the goal of this relationship.  This ain’t no party.  This ain’t no disco.  This ain’t no fooling around.  (Whoo!  Party-less, disco-less marriage devoid of fooling around!)  Knowing that, it brings all those things I was babbling out to the forefront in my mind so I enter a marriage knowing how I feel about it.

2) Yes, he will make it official.  There will be some knee-bending, some sky-writing, or at the very least a poke in shoulder with, “You know that thing we mentioned?  Wanna make it official?”  Although regardless of whether I take his name or not, he can probably twist the above conversation around so that he follows in the footsteps of many men in my family who claim the women did the asking.

3) While we want a marriage, we have no desire to have a wedding.  Vegas baby.  All.  The.  Way.