New Old History

My schedule has been suddenly, rather unexpectedly filled. I say suddenly, rather unexpectedly because usually my calendar is rather empty. Currently when I look at the calendar above my desk, I lament over the fact that three of the seven days have stickers on them for this week and next week and that some of those stickers extend a good few days. Such as the one for the twenty-sixth of March. The small maroon sticker that came with the calendar has a picture of a butterfly and the curling scrawl states that it is the start of my 'Vacation'. I'm not sure how much a 'vacation' my vacation will be but I hope to have at least some few moments of ease and enjoyment.

Normally, when I think of a vacation I think of leaving the city to visit someplace new or someplace well loved with family or friends or both but relatively, while there is an agenda, it is rather laid back. I can put on my jeans and walk around and browse and enjoy. Well, this vacation fill some of those criteria... partially. I will be leaving the city to visit someplace new (Bridgeport, Alabama); I will be with someone well loved and his family; there is an agenda and unfortunately it isn't that laid back. Especially since I can't imagine being laid back while wearing a hoop skirt.

That's right. I said hoop skirt.

Come the last Friday of this month, I will be travelling two and a half hours, give or take, to an un-well-known piece of Alabama close to Chatanooga called Bridgeport. If you're like me and have never heart of this little city, here's a little information about it. Courtesy of Wikipedia since there isn't a town run website on the place and shortened even further by me.

Bridgeport is a small city in Jackson County, Alabama. The town was originally named Jonesville in the early 1800s when it was settled but was later renamed to Bridgeport to reflect its ideal location next to the Tennessee River and a railroad line. Bridgeport was a strategic site during the American Civil War and on August 26th in 1862, Bridgeport entered a major skirmish. During the latter part of the war, Bridgeport became a source for building gunboats and transports for the Union navy. The USS Chattanooga was built there and became the famous "Cracker Line" which broke the CSA siege of Chattanooga in November of 1863.

And that's it. That's all Wikipedia or anyone else for that matter seems to have on the tiny blip on the map called Bridgeport.

On the other hand, though, the actual event does have a website, which can be found here. If you are interested, I urge you to join or at least come see the event. If the pictures on the website are to be understood correctly, apparently the Siege at Bridgeport was actually filmed and used in the movie Sweet Home Alabama. Having not seen the movie in a number of years, I don't know if this is true or not but I'm sure those of you wanting to know will undoubtedly find out if you search for it.

So wish me luck. This is sure to be an interesting experience. Due to the length of the trip, I am unsure if I will be able to make an entry on the twenty-sixth, the last Friday of this month. I'm not sure when I am to be picked up, by whom (his parents or by him), and I am still a little fuzzy on what I need to bring and what need be left at home.

Small Domestic Turbulence

Change. Change is something that happens every day. We change our lives irrevocably by deciding to turn left instead of right, wheat bread instead of white, heels instead of tennis shoes... small, insignificant things. The Butterfly Effect. I don't believe that sneezing causes tsunamis, however I do believe that our choices change our life. It's been proven time and time again.

Change happens often in my life. I make friends, I lose friends. I take classes and I either fail them or I pass them and that effects my future further down the line. Even small things, like changing my room layout around so that I am more efficient or less likely to break my toes from stubbing them on the feet of my daybed. So when someone balks so openly at change, I'm baffled and confused, especially when I think that my suggestions make perfect sense, that I've given several viable answers to the same problem. Or maybe just what I perceive to be a problem.

So yes. Very baffling.

Familiarity breeds contempt, or so Grams always told me and while my classmates may have complained when a teacher suddenly changed the orientation of the seating in a classroom, effectively almost bringing everyone to the front row and eliminating those who slept in the back of the class, I didn't complain. I rejoiced. I could thrive in that little bit of chaos because no matter where I was, I knew where I wanted to be. I knew I wanted to be to the right of whatever the focal point was so that I could recline comfortably in my chair, stretch my legs out into the desk across the way from me and toward the front because I tended to like to talk to the teacher. This is not to say that I was a teacher pet, however.

So I guess it just leaves me a little stunned every time I run into opposition from Jerry about something. True, this goes against what I just said, that I like when things are shook up but when you have learned enough about a person, you tend to form an idea of how they'll react, how they process things, and how they reach the conclusions that they do. Now, in some ways, this is a terrible thing that we're all guilty of because this pattern that we start to discern makes it easy for us to manipulate that person. We know what buttons to push at what times, whether it's to elevate a fight by being hurtful, sooth calms by reminding them of their favorite memories, or cheer them up by getting them a little surprise. You can even know how to word something in such a way to bring them around to your way of thinking. So it's good that he shook things up so that I don't fall into this comfortable, perfect pattern.

That doesn't mean it still didn't throw me for a loop. Upon viewing some pictures of his house in it's various stage of construction/deconstruction, I was voicing some of my opinions out loud since eventually he and I will be married and while concurred with a lot of things, other things he became defensive about. Now, a part of me should have known better, especially when he says something to the effect of 'It was a gift from so and so and I've had it for this many years' that I shouldn't poke and prod at it too much. Unfortunately, hindsight is better than foresight any day and instead I poked and prodded. Then I had the gall to argue with him in terms of the placement of objects and here he gets (and rightfully so) a little defensive. He states that he's been here for seven years and he's tried things different ways and this is the way that it's worked for him.

Yes, he appreciates my fresh perspective and he wants my input but now there are some base rules. Such as I have to give him more time to process things - longer than two heartbeats - and he isn't dismissing me when he says 'It's a thought...' It means he's weighing it with past experiences and is either trying to figure it out in his head or trying to figure out how best to put it to not disappoint/agitate me. It isn't fair that he has me figured so easily and yet with him the rules are still morphing because my understanding of him is still morphing...

We'll work this out, as always, but currently I am left a little disheartened about the actual weight of my opinion or ideas and I'm pretty sure it's all in my head, which is making me feel worse. We had an off day today. Maybe later will be better...

The Best Dream I Ever Had

I know I will not remember it all. Even as I write this, the bits and pieces are fading that strung together so seamlessly just moments before but it really was a most excellent dream. It was a dream about a book, one that by was written by a Sarah Braussen, who does not exist. I remember the dream as if I were reading the book and the story was being told by someone who was always there – I could feel their emotions – but who was not a main character and so was not interacting with…

The story itself is very muddled. I can remember walking up a street which is not unlike a street that I used walk up to take a back way home – to cut through their backyard while no body was home. Except this time, I was being invited in by a girl that the main character knew, at least vaguely. The girl seemed to be in some sort of medical scrubs and unsure of the main character, the girl, but she introduced her to all of her siblings (little sisters and little brothers) as they made their way down the stairs, past the kitchen, and into a work room of some sorts.

There on the workbench table, the girl presented to the main character a small belt of blue plastic that had clear pockets that housed small octagonal shapes with different portions cut out and they were made to be linked up in different ways, any way a kid could imagine to make a shape. On the table, there was a 2-D dinosaur made. The girl who lived there said that she has just bought these, that she remembers playing with them at some time before but not where or when. When the main character states that she’d seen these before, she had played with them during her childhood, the girl became rather confused and turns to ask someone else if she remembers her playing with them during her childhood…

The rest is starting to blur here. There is some organization trying to stop or start something from happening and they know the main character is the key but they are determined to keep her away from the source. They seem to be scientists, mostly elderly women and bearded men. They spend a lot of time talking and scheming, they take the main character and her friends and separate them but somehow the guy, her best friend, escapes and goes through a couple of doors, a couple of small while rooms barely big enough for the tables in them, and finds her, and drags her out. He lies smoothly to whoever gives him an interested look as to why she’s there, free…

Then they’re in some sort of command center, some sort of control room where there are women and men monitoring the status of the source that they seem determined to keep the girl away from and she talks to them. She convinces them that the reason they were told to keep her away from it is because it didn’t want anything but her (or something to that effect). They believe her, and they lock themselves into the control room, with their uppers banging at the door that they’re fools and not to let her into the room – and then she’s in.

Now here the room feels skewed. It’s almost as if it’s coming from a giant’s perspective and the people you’ve come to know all through this journey – they’re just dolls. The room is huge and somehow it maintains the size well with the rest of the people who file into it. It’s grand and dark and gold like a palace and not well lit. The girl climbs onto some sort of mantle while others mill around staring at her. Up there there are four items (I don’t know why four, they just are) and there’s someone guiding her – some old man who keeps asking her all these hard questions about the things she picks up that she us unable to open until she answers his questions – he’s guiding her. She opens one box and her memory returns. She turns, showing the people behind her a miniature of her room, where there’s a work bench, and she declares she grew up in a palace, and this was my room. I created those interlocking toys that you like so much at this work bench right here. With that memory another item opens and as she goes down the line, the old man is nodding, pleased. When she’s done, she turns back to them and declares her remembrance.

She remembers now her history, her story and her purpose. That thing that she had been searching for the most – her purpose. Finally found. She was their creator. Not the creator of everything but of this generation, she was their creator, which is why they felt drawn to her and why some things confused her because they were not made of her, by her, so she had no knowledge of them… So on and so forth, grand little speech that leaves them in awe. The upper management bursts in, sees that they are defeated and then she feels it, as people start to leave. That it’s her time, that she’s going to die and not stay anymore. She walks out slowly with the old man at her side and she tries to come to terms with this short existence into reality – whatever reality it was – and she grieves over the things that she’ll miss.

As they leave the facility, a shot rings out and the old man stumbles, then crumples. She turns him over onto his back and another sort of understanding passes. He was an extension of her, had been there the whole time and had been her silent protector (that’s right, it’s you, which is why the prologue is told in a different way than the rest of the book) and he dies. She’s left feeling more alone than anything because no one else could see him but her, her conscious made into a flesh and form only her eyes could perceive…. But now he’s dead and there’s vengeance to be had for someone having killed a part of her.

It closes with her yelling to the pitch black, at the retreating form of killer and her generation. Closing the book, searching the author’s name on the internet, come across the next book and you read the beginning excerpt where the heroine tracks down three guys and interviews them briefly until she’s sure it wasn’t them… and then I woke up. The dream itself, when living it, was the most interesting, intriguing, thought provoking and vivid dream I’d had in a while and the best written, cohesive one I’ve ever remembered. I didn’t do it justice on paper but it was spectacular in the play by play movie. It was a novel from start to finish and then some and it was… The best dream I ever had.

Fishing for Answers

I realize now why I am always so aware of wherever Jerry is whenever it comes to attending a party or being around his family - it's because when all else fails and I've said something stupid or embarassed myself to no end, I know that he's there and he loves me. It's because no one else understands me to the extent that he does and it's comforting.

Needless to say nothing about this day was comforting with him gone and me left rather defenseless with his younger sister and mother. I will be brief for unlike last night, I actually wish to escape into oblivion tonight.

First, his mother was actually on time. That alone made me nervous. It wasn't that I wasn't ready for her it was just that no one in my family, especially a woman, is ever anywhere on time despite our best intentions. No one. Second thing that put me a little on edge was how excited both women were to see me. Whenever anyone is that chipper (and they hadn't had their sangrias yet), it tends to make me shy away. While the drive over to the mall in Cool Springs was rather uneventful, we did pass several houses and we all ooo-ed and aaaahhh-ed over some of their architectual detail. I found myself easing into it a little as they dropped the volume of their tone a few notches and settled in for the twenty minute drive. At one point I made a comment about how I wanted a house with a lot of land around it and his mother said something to the effect of, 'Well, I hope you're marrying a millionaire then.' I bit my tongue and didn't say what I was thinking - 'No, I'm just marrying your son.'

We spent the rest of the ride after that comment discussing room designs and open floor concepts.

When we sat down to lunch - and I'm still not sure how we got on to this subject but I can almost garauntee that this time, it actually wasn't me - we began discussing weddings. I remember his mother asking me where I wanted to get married and I told her the truth, that I wanted to be married outside. I mentioned to her that my mother had found a dress for me that she thinks would be perfect for my wedding dress and then I pulled it up on my iPod to show them. They agreed and said it was very fitting. A few bites of bread were taken. We started discussing something else but then were almost immediately back on the fact that the cake I wanted was a pillow design with a thistle and some rings instead of a traditional three-tiered cake. It continued down hill from there - and I say down not because it was bad but just because it snowballed. Sometimes I felt like they understood that I was going to marry him and at other times I felt like his mother would hear a detail (that he and I had discussed and agreed upon) and there would be this dismissal like I wasn't ever going to marry him because of whatever I had said in response to her probing.

The shopping trip went much the same way. Dishes, patterns, plates, food, and every topic they could think of was touched upon, even the fact that I am considering breast reduction when his mother insisted (well, the saleslady convinced her) that I should be fitted for a bra and that a good bra would cure all back problems I was complaining of. Bullshit.

Anyways, it's as the saying goes - nobody suspects the Spanish Inquisition!

At least I think at one point I drove the point of my permanency home to them... His mother was explaining something to me, a term that she had used - thunder pup. Someone young who had a lot of ideas of how things should be done and was very set on these ideas. It was a term from a book she was (or still is) reading. She used this term to describe her son and used an example I had almost heard him use. Apparently, according to her, he wanted his wife barefoot and pregnant. I just smiled rather serenely and told her that I thought I could manage that.

What a day... It is a relief to be home and to be silent for a little while. Even if I am guilty of buying a dress and tank tops that I didn't need with money that wasn't really mine to begin with and probably saying things that I shouldn't have, today wasn't as terrible as I had feared - and yet, in a way, it was worse. Oh well.

Mall Madness

I know this is going to sound silly and for those of you who have listened to me complain before about my nervousness with his family, feel free to ignore...

I've known Jerry for nearly two years. Just a few days after he and I became an 'official' item, I joined him and his family and friends at a German restaurant downtown to celebrate what was then his twenty-fifth birthday. I wasn't particularly expecting to meet his parents and sister. While I feel that I dressed well, I can distinctly remember mentally kicking myself for not having worn something spiffier (though at the time, I didn't really own anything spiffier) and mentally kicking him for not warning me about his parents.

Now, I will make this disclaimer - I'm not sure he didn't tell me about his family coming. In fact as I type this, I seem to recall the fact that he was unable to pick me up because of the fact that he was picking his sister up in the RX-7 and the convertible didn't have four seats, it only had two since he had started making 'repairs' on it.

Anyways, we met, we chatted, we tried not to be absolutely awkward and afterwards, Jerry, his sister, and I piled in the back seat while his parents climbed into the front of their truck and they drove me home. I don't know where I got the idea but once we reached the house, I asked if they wanted to come in. Some polite etiquette from someone somewhere told me this was what I was supposed to do and I wish I had kept my mouth shut and just said 'Thanks for the lift.' But I of course didn't and my parents had no warning. And that's how Jerry's parents met my parents after just a few hours of getting to know me for the first time.

While it has been nearly two years since that time, there's still that linger dread in seeing them again because of the awkward conversations that are held whenever I'm around. The ones where I'm not quite sure what to say or to what extent or if what I say will make them happy or completely turn them off to me - after two years! Jitters! The saving grace of these shinanigans is the fact that Jerry is always calmly at my side, deflecting when necessary and saving me from the brunt of his mother's repetitive questioning.

Well not tomorrow. No. Today ushers in, as if my weekend hadn't already, my spring break. This week also happens to be the week that his sister had taken off from her job as a nanny and his mother had taken a week off to spend with her daughter from whatever work it is that she does. Well on Sunday, the fact that I was on my spring break slipped out and it was as if his mother could not latch on to the idea fast enough because earlier today I received an invite to go to the mall with them tomorrow. I, of course, said yes because I didn't want to be rude and because Jerry was secretly, and not so secretly, enjoying my discomfort and fretting to him earlier about how I would be alone with his sister and mother. He mentioned that they wouldn't eat me and I told him I wasn't so sure about that.

So tomorrow I get to enjoy for hours their company without my handsome buffer, without his hand rubbing up and down my back comfortingly. I will be left on my own to sink or swim with the womenfolk of his family and I dread it. Not because they're poor company or because they're mean or anything like that - but because sometimes, I speak before I think and backtracking is almost impossible where his mother is concerned...

I'm almost afraid to go to bed because that means that tomorrow gets here sooner... Report to follow tomorrow.

Crossroads

I'm at a crossroads in my life and I can't even see clearly the paths in front of me. I see what I could do, what I could be but I can't see how to get to the end. There are too many options, too many possibilities, too many sights unseen and too many things left undecided. I'm at a crossroads and I don't even really truly know what my options are and so I'm lost, dazed, confused, and left grasping at straws with my heart aching in my chest.

There are so many choices. Choices that we think are good, choices that we think were initially bad but turn out to be good, choices that end up changing our life forever for better or for worse. Choices that we don't even know are choices until they're upon us and we have to make a quick, sometimes drastic, decision. Then there are those you know you're supposed to make for whatever reason that drives you but they don't actually make you happy so you wonder why you bother but you can't think of a logical reason why not - but you neglect to realize that the fact that you even wonder why bother is reason enough.

Sometimes... sometimes you have to go with the flow and trust that the flow will lead you somewhere where you want to be or need to be, whether you know it or not. If you try to control the flow, you usually end up hurting things that you didn't mean to and make life miserable. So just... go with flow. Go with it and when you need to make a decision, the paths will be clear. Or at least, hopefully clearer than it is with me right now. Because I know they're there. I know they're there, lingering and hovering, waiting for the right moment to strike and cripple me or perhaps finally give me the wings I need. We'll see.

Right now I just know I'm at a crossroads and I just want to find the paths...

My Poor Little Car

Believe it or not, it's only been a year since I got my drivers license. No, I didn't fail my driver's license test - in fact, I got my motorcycle license at age seventeen. Two years later, I took the driver's license test. So no, I'm not unlucky, I just had no reason to need a car license. After I passed the test, my parents graciously allowed me to use one of their already paid for cars. In this case, it was the only available paid for car that wasn't in use - the PT Cruiser. Yes, it's a 2005 model but one can't be too choosy - more or less free car.

I remember the first time I put a dent in that car. It was around August, I was just leaving my place of work at the time, after picking up my check. It was a Friday, just before I got to spend a weekend up at the lake with Jerry and his family camping. I was backing out of the parking space, turning to go to the little stop sign. I remembered to look out for my back end while I was making the turn but then I failed to take into account where my front end was. So I scraped along the front passenger side fender against a the concrete around a light pole.

I had a fit. I absolutely cried. I knew my father was going to have a fit and when the lady who worked the shift before me came out and asked what happened, I told her and she held me while I cried. She told me to call Jerry, whom she had heard so much about and to tell him what happened, ask him what he thought to do. She said that because I thought daddy might kill me. She had met daddy before, as my sister had once worked at that same place. So I called Jerry, Jerry said he would take a look at it when he got there to pick me up for the weekend and to not bother to tell my parents until they got back. His reason: Why ruin their weekend with worry when there was nothing they could do about it from where they were? So simple, so logical.

Of course, when they got back they had a fit. Just like I thought they would.

When someone put a dent in the front bumper, driver side at a mall parking lot - not even bothering to leave a note and there were no cameras or security around - I cried. I found out by my dad coming in, early in the morning, turning on my light and demanding what happened. I of course couldn't tell him because I had no idea what happened. I had no explanation. I ranted, I raved, I felt sick to my stomach and fretted all day about it. At least this one wasn't my fault but I was outraged - someone had done this to my car! I wouldn't have done this to someone else's car and not tried to contact them!

And with this latest escapade, I just... feel bad for my poor little car. It has had nothing but a hard life under my ownership and I hate that. It is a good little car and can't help that at times its bad.

Today my car started sounding like it was being run by rodents running in a wheel instead of by an engine. When I accelerated, it sounded as if the rodents kicked it into high gear. I felt bad for the little rodents so after getting my lunch, I let the car sit in the parking lot while I went to my other class. After class, I started the car again and unfortunately, the poor rodents were still there, trying to power my car. Sighing, I made my way across the campus parking lot to the red light that would take me home. I was almost to the stop sign before the red light when the check engine light came on - and stayed on. My dad is on speed dial so I called him, he told me to pull over, it sounded like I had thrown a belt so just park it, he'd be there after work. Well, by this time I was already to the red light and unfortunately, he wasn't patient enough to have me explain.

So I calmly hung up, turned around, and parked in the parking lot. I went and told security I was having car troubles and told them it may have to stay overnight, just in case it actually did have to, but that no, I didn't need their assistance, my dad was coming to take care of it after work. And so I waited. He and mom came, I popped the hood, he took a look when I started it and told me to start clearing the stuff out of my car - it was going to have to go to the garage. So I did. Hopped in the Jeep with my mom and dad drove my car to the garage just a few blocks away, Eddie's.

Well today we got a call with a preliminary 'Here's what's wrong.' Turns out that the water pump had been leaking onto the timing belt and causing that noise that I heard. They found this out because they stuck it inside the garage over night and when they came back in the morning, it had peed green fluid all over the floor. That narrowed it down, they said. Turns out that the hesitation that I was feeling in the car was because the spark plugs that my parents had paid the dealership to be changed were never changed like they were charged for. In fact, the spark plugs had been there since they drove the car off the lot - in 2005! They were cracked, rusted, and everything else under the sun so my parents asked them to put the spark plugs in a box so they could take them to the dealership to complain...

So the rough guess is I get my car back in the middle of next week but until then I have to drive my sister's rather cruddy Aveo (long story, too much to explain my disdain). At least I have a car to use and my car is being fixed, courtesy of my parents. I am grateful. I'm still sad for my little car though. Poor little car...

Le Sigh

I don't really have anything to say here. I have two exams, one on Thursday, one on Friday. I have two papers due, one on Friday and one on Sunday, believe it or not. Jerry is sometimes too good for me (more like almost always too good for me). My room is a catastrophe which is unlikely to be fixed until sometime next week during spring break (my surprise break). I'm not sleeping well and I'm afraid I'm trying to come down with something. Hopefully it'll clear up and I won't actually get sick. I'm very much looking forward to the weekend and all the potential that it holds.

Head hurts, going to bed. I'll see you tomorrow.

Pride and Prejudice

One of the greatest love stories of all time, Pride and Prejudice, has been on the screen of my television for the better part of the evening. This would be the 2005 version of Jane Austen's 18th century classic, starring such big names as Donald Sutherland, Brenda Blethyn, Penelope Wilton, and Dame Judi Dench.

Now most women, I am sure would probably liken themselves to Jane Bennett, the beauty of the family, the elder sister who is intelligent if not rather subdued or to her more outspoken younger sister, Elizabeth Bennett, who is the heroine of this story. After all, both are rather strong female characters, especially that of Elizabeth Bennett who goes up against not only her mother in matchmaking, but also Lady Catherine de Bourgh and essentially society all in the same breath. Then, she goes up against the hero of the story head on and ends up inevitably falling in love with Mr. Darcy. Jane is strong also, but in a rather subtle way. She possesses the much finer quality of the two Bennett sisters, which is poise as well as grace. While an exceptional beauty, Jane also possesses the good sense not to let it go to her head as some other young lady at the time would have. When Mr. Bingley leaves Netherfield to return to London, Jane shows her backbone as well as her own strong will and exceptional wit by not letting the slight affect her so publicly as others might have.

Both strong female characters to be sure.

But I - I am not like other women. I do not find myself as beautiful or as desirable as Jane, nor as subdued and as elegant as she, either. Her younger sister, Elizabeth, I could probably say I have more in common with but I fail to sport her wit or her balls, so to speak. Instead, I possess a similar bull-headed stubbornness. No, the Bennett that I connect most with would have to be that of Mary - the sister that is usually a forgotten side character that fills in the role as contrast to the other outlandish Bennett women. I say outlandish for I have no love at all for Kitty Bennett, who follows her sister Lydia blindly - not an original thought in her entire head. I also have no love and would say out right that I rather despise Lydia Bennett for her utter stupidity with being swept up and away by Mr. Wickham and finding no fault with the circumstances of such a union before, during, or after with the afore-mentioned Mr. Wickham.

So why Mary? Why the little sister who sits and practices the piano forte though she has no great skill at it? Why the little sister who wears more subdued clothes in comparison to her rather immodest sisters Lydia and Kitty? Who embarasses herself by singing badly at the ball of Netherfield? Why her?

Because I know what it is like to be the younger, forgotten sister. And while she and I both do not possess the grace of her elder sister(s) nor the intelligence of her elder sister(s), we both try very hard. We seek knowledge and while not witty, we try to apply our knowledge when it is warranted and we both seek to accomplish something though we never do. While I am not as plain as she, she and I have much in common.

There is another thing that she and I differ on. While I may not necessarily be the leading lady in my own life, I have certainly been able to obtain the leading gentleman. How I managed to obtain him, I am still at a loss to explain for every day when I am away from him I find myself less and less able to believe in his actuality for he is too good to be true at times. The fact is, though, that he is real and while I am no Elizabeth Bennett, he is most certainly my Mr. Darcy. And while he and I may not have a love story that lasts two centuries like that of Elizabeth Bennett and Mr. Darcy, we will at least have one that spans decades and that is enough for me. He is enough for me.

Emerald and Diamonds

For something so small as this, it was greatly missed. I say 'was' because I merely gave it to a jeweler down in The Village to have it resized. Happily, it is back on my ring finger where it belongs. When purchased from the website that sported this image, the size five and a half was unavailable so we bought a size six instead. Sure, we could have waited to see if a size five and a half would turn up but we were both a bit giddy when we purchased it.

Before my parents dropped me off at college last year, we stopped in at Gatlinburg for a night since the hotels surrounding Johnson City were booked for the Nascar race that was happening at Bristol that same weekend. Since we were short on time and had spent many a year up Gatlinburg during various seasons, we made our way easily to The Village there which is by far our favorite place to go. Not only is it beside the most wonderous breakfast nook ever - which I am happy to say we have it's sibling here at Hillsboro Village in Nashville - the Pancake Pantry, but it also houses the Ole Smokey Candy Kitchen as well as my favorite store, the Celtic Heritage. Over the years, the fare has been rather consistent at all places, in terms of what is sold and what isn't but upon this occasion I had decided that I would like a ring. The ring, I decided, would be symbolic of my commitment to Jerry and my love for him, to be worn at all times, no matter how much it might irritate me. Naturally, then, I chose a silver Claddagh.

The Claddagh, as pictured above, is traditionally depicted as two hands clasping a heart and upon the heart there is a crown. The three elements correspond accordingly - the two hands represent friendship, the heart represents love, and the crown represents loyalty. According to Wikipedia, when the ring is given there is an expression that is said: "With my two hands I give you my heart and crown it with my loyalty." I'm more familiar with the other phrase associated with it: "Let love and friendship reign forever."

Not only is the ring symbolic but also the way one wears the ring. When worn upon the right hand with the crown facing toward the body, then the wearer is not seeing anyone but is looking for love. When worn with the crown facing away from the body, then the wearer's heart has been captured by someone. When worn upon the left hand with the crown facing inward, the wearer is engaged. When worn with the crown facing away from the body, then the wearer is married. Since I was unlikely to encounter anyone who remembered with such accuracy what the ring meant when worn a certain way, I decided to wear it on my left hand, with the crown facing away from me. That is the way that I wear it even now, but not for the same reason as I did then.

When I started wearing it that way then, it was meant to merely put off those who would otherwise try to engage me in an romantic involvement. People tend to notice when one wears one ring over and over and over again on the same ring. The problem I found was that no matter that I wore it day in and day out, in the shower even at times so as not to misplace it, people still failed to take ring very seriously. Agreed, the band was plain and not studded with any type of jewel, but at the time I liked it that way. When things began to become more serious between Jerry and I, we began to search for a more 'convincing' ring to take it's place and later to become my engagement ring.

When Jerry surprised me for Valentine's day last year, we finally stumbled across a ring that gave us an idea of what we were looking for. Before I had been too specific, unsure of what I really sought because I had no notion of what kind of ring I wanted! No, I didn't want gold, no I wasn't a big fan of diamonds even though it was my birth stone, I thought them too over used. No, I didn't want anything modern and I didn't want anything plain but I didn't want something dripping with gems either. And so we searched until nestled in a ring box, in a case, in a little Irish shop that is sadly now closed, there it was - the perfect ring. A part of me will always want the ring although I am very much aware of its ridiculous price. I am also very much aware that if I were to actually have it I would be frightened to wear it for fear that something may happen to it - and that's not the kind of ring to have. It was simple, elegant, and was merely beautiful knotwork with just a handful of tiny diamonds and emeralds. The band that went with it was plain but instead of just a row of diamonds, it had emeralds and diamonds to match the other. A stunning combination that left a wanting in my heart.

After seeing it and finding out what company produced such a beauty, we began the task of finding something similar but the months stretched on and we came to a few conclusions. We knew what my perfect ring was and we knew we couldn't afford it. We knew that it would be impossible to find anything as extragavent as that beautiful set so we would, for lack of a better term, settle for something else. It was with these few hard facts that made finding the one above rather... simple. It was this past summer, believe it or not, when we decided to look a few things up on the internet while we took turn with video games. It was my turn and we had been talking about rings so it seemed logical to look for one on the site we were on, which happened to be Ebay. After a few pages of rings that bored me, I tried refining the search, which turned up more pleasant things. I narrowed it by stone, then by engagement or wedding until finally I found it. Just looking at it a part of me was a little stunned. One, because it was so cheap - believe it or not - and two, because it was just absolutely lovely. It was simple but elegant, an eye catcher without being a bank breaker and it simply pleaded with me. Which made me in turn plead with Jerry as I showed it to him. He too was struck speechless for a moment as he studied it.

We looked at the specs of it, where it came from, how it was made and it had everything - everything! - perfect. It's hallmarked, for one, handmade in Ireland, with an emerald center and eighteen tiny diamonds. There's on on the crown, three in each cuff of the hand, and eleven around the emerald itself. It's silver, not white gold, which means it will age nicely, and shipping wasn't bad either. We made the purchase right then and there and with that, a thrill went through me. We were moving forward. We were making progress.

I waited with great anticipation for the arrival of my ring. I would ask him daily as the date of the approximate arrival neared and it was with great frustration that I was made to wait. I had hoped it would arrive before the weekend, when I spent time with him but by the next weekend it was there. It was mailed in a padded envelop in a tiny bag, wrapped in more padding. When it was first taken out and shown to me, I was almost afraid to handle it. It looked more delicate than the picture had depicted it but there it was, in my warm hands, sliding across my finger with cool precision until it rested, nestled up against my knuckle. That first day and the day after, I kept taking it off to play with it, examine it, marvel at it and criticize it. But by the end of the weekend, I loved it. It took a little convincing, since I gave it back to him the first night, for me to take it home to enjoy it - it was mine after all - but since I said yes, not a day goes by where I don't look at it and love it.

Although my parents know that it's mine, it has yet to be formally given to me as my engagement ring. Nevertheless, I wear it as if it is. Some of his co-workers are already calling me his little wife, because I call him every morning, try to talk to him every lunch, and check on him when he has to stay late for work. Some are even saying that we will be married before the year is out and that there will be a baby soon to follow. Everyone seems to be expecting it, our union, and we aren't going to disappoint. Not because we feel pressured, but because we feel so moved to. What a joyous day it will be when my ring is not just my engagement ring but also my wedding ring. I look forward to that day, whenever it may be, with great anticipation.

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