The Ring Part I

Yesterday, I shared the story of how we met and started dating. Put on your Time Caps and jump forward nearly two years to October of 2009. We're eating dinner at a buffet, and S. grabs my right hand to gaze at the sapphire ring I've been wearing there since the Christmas before we met (a gift from my mother).

I freeze and try to keep my jaw from hitting the floor as he casually mentions that maybe after Christmas, we should start looking at rings.

For the rest of October, November, and December, I try not to wait for Christmas to pass so we can go ring shopping. I drop occasional girly hints to make sure he still means it and didn't forget. For us, this involves me attempting to veer into every jewelry store we pass on trips to the mall, and him grabbing me by the back of my shirt so I can't, reminding me we'd look after Christmas. This is also me testing his patience, probably. Okay, definitely. I'm a brat. He knows this. He still sticks around. We are made for each other.

Christmas comes and goes. So does New Year's Eve. Then, New Year's Day, he suggests we go look at rings. We've already hashed out what kind of ring we're looking for-- gemstone middle stone (aquamarine) with gemstone baguettes down the sides. White gold, because while I dearly love platinum, it was simply out of our price range. We think/know it will be a custom job and don't really want to buy from one of "those" mall jewelers, anyway. So we gear up for a big long day of shoppin' and drive around to private jeweler after private jeweler, haggling, negotiating, explaining ourselves to death and finally settling on the custom-designed ring of my dreams. Hurray! That was easy!

Not. By some cruel twist of fate (what, like you need holidays off, people?!?) they are ALL closed. Every. Single. One.

I... I should just get this out there now. I am not a patient person. I'm about ready to tear my hair out at this point. S. knows this and graciously suggests, hey, why don't we go look at "those" mall jewelers anyway, tonight? Just to do research.

Research. Okay. Tonight. Even better. I can handle this. I can get my fix and be patient again.

So we go the mall. There's one near us that has at least 11 jewelers. We visit each one, tirelessly explaining-- but never finding-- what we want. At long last, we reach Zales'. It was the 9th or so stop, so very nearly the last one. We again explain what we want, but without any luck, again. However, the salesman says as we're about to leave, I should just show you this to see if you're interested. He pulls out a beautiful setting; missing the center stone, but it has tiny round and baguette diamonds down the sides. It's platinum. It's 80% off.

!!!

I'm not supposed to know how much S. is spending on my ring, I know, but this whole shopping-together thing made it rather hard to not know.

Anyway, S. tries to keep me calm. I try to keep myself calm. We're not here to find my ring, I remind myself. It's a mall jeweler, I remind myself. It's the perfect ring, I remind myself. Wait, no, that wasn't a reminder. That just kept slipping in.

S. insists we go to the last two stores before we make a decision, and I convince the salesman to hold it for us until the next day. We go to the other stores, stare at the beautiful sparkly things they have to offer, but nothing else compares. In my mind, we've already found The One. And the ring, too. (Ha! See what I did there?)

So, when we're done, we go back and buy it.

Next up: the hunt for the perfect center stone begins. And ends. And I don't get to see my pretty completely finished til he proposes! ... three days later.