Proposals

I have never been proposed to. Considering that I’ve never been engaged and/or married, I didn’t think this was at all odd. Proposals = engagements = weddings, right?

Then, I was out with a single friend who mentioned “one of the guys who’d proposed to her.”

“One of the guys?” I said. “How many people have proposed to you?”

“Three, I think,” she said.

“You think?”

“Three sounds right.”

“How long had you been dating this particular guy?” I said, going back to the original proposer to try and make sense of it all.

“A few months, but he had the ring before he met me. He was looking for a wife. He wasn’t necessarily looking for me.”

Fair enough. We discussed the other two proposals, and life went on. 

A few weeks after that, I ran into someone else who talked about her engagement rings. As in plural.

“How many people have proposed to you?” I said.

“Just the two,” she said.

"Just two" still seemed high to me (not in a bad way, just an unexpected way). I mean, having zero proposals under my belt, I’m easily trumped by any number, but still. Two drunken boyfriends (at different times) each said, “I’m gonna marry you,” but I don’t think that counts when you consider how many beers were involved.

Admittedly, my type before the age of 25 was unemployed and emotionally unavailable, but I still had no idea so many men were running around with diamond solitaires out there. (Is this what EHarmony is for?)

Mulling the subject over for the bit, it finally hit me – I had been proposed to! The only problem was that I was nine at the time.

In third grade, our elementary school welcomed a new student, and he became rather instantly smitten with me. (I only wore red, black or white and had a perm. I’m sure you can imagine what a catch I was.) Years ago, I vowed not to use real names in my writing, and you have no idea how much that is killing me right now because this particular boy had one of the most awesome names ever. I hate having to replace a rhyming name (complete with alliteration) with Harry, but a rule is a rule.

What I remember about Harry is that he loved to wear a yellow Starvin’ Marvin t-shirt, and he had no qualms about making his love for me known. He referred to me as his future wife on the playground and brought me lots of gifts like erasers and colorful pencils.

One day, before lunch, he asked me to marry him. Now, before you dismiss this story as not counting as an actual proposal, I need to add one key detail – he had a sapphire and diamond ring with him. And that ring was far more impressive than the plastic happy-faced ring he’d presented me with the day before.

I was all set to give my usual “no” when I saw the sparkles. “That’s nice,” I said, instantly entranced.

“Please, please marry me,” he said.

“I need to think about it,” I said. What I really needed to think about was how to get out of being betrothed before I got to junior high and managing to hold on to that ring. Mulling it over with my best friend, I said, “Can I say ‘no’ and keep the ring?”

Clearly, I was a sensitive child.

While I was still wrestling with whether or not to marry for money, Harry’s mom called the school. It seemed it hadn’t taken her long to connect the missing ring from her jewelry box to her son’s classroom crush. I guess Harry had (correctly) realized he wasn’t getting my attention with the trinkets he could afford – erasers, colored pencils and smiley-faced rings – and stepped it up a notch.

Unfortunately for me, before the end of the day, the ring (which was beautiful) was locked away safely in Mrs. Treater’s desk drawer until it was time for our parents to pick us up. Harry had some explaining to do when he got home, and my dilemma was over.

While I know I can’t count that as a real proposal, I am changing my number to a .5. It seems fair to me, and this is my blog. So there. (Oh, how the sensitive child has matured in the passing years …)