Love is in the air… proposing is in the water

Five days ago, my focus was on the trip I had planned with the PH. We had booked a flight to Fort Lauderdale and were looking forward to four days of sun, sleeping late and romantic dinners.
The night before the trip, my friend Amy called to report that her boyfriend Andrew (they go together as well as their names do!) had popped the question. The two have been together for nine months and as much as Amy knew he was “the one,” I was surprised by how quickly the proposal came. I’m incredibly happy for them and know they will have a wonderful life together… but I was still shocked.
Nonetheless, we packed up and headed off to Florida on Saturday. There were a few jokes made about a surprise proposal on the beach (by me) and some threats to never propose (by the PH) but, other than that, it was a normal vacation… until 8:30 on Sunday morning.
That’s when my phone rang and my younger sister shared the news that her boyfriend, Mat, had proposed just a few minutes before! The engagement wasn’t entirely unexpected– they’ve been talking about marriage for most of the eight months they’ve been dating– but the timing was ironic. It was a rough way for the PH to greet the day and his congratulations to the happy couple sounded a lot like, “Gee, thanks, Mat.”
Seeing how pale the PH had gotten with the news, I assured him that I didn’t know anyone else who was expected to get engaged and told him the rest of the vacation would be spent not talking about engagements or weddings or anything similar.
Well, God had the last laugh when my phone rang while we were at breakfast on Monday morning. My best friend from high school, Lisa, was calling to announce her engagement to her boyfriend of more than three years, Jeremy. He had popped the question on their vacation in Mexico.
I couldn’t stop laughing at the irony. I haven’t had a friend announce an engagement in more than a year and suddenly, I got three calls in one weekend. Two of the weddings may actually take place this fall (for those keeping track, that makes five weddings for the PH and I this year) and Lisa will probably do the honors in Las Vegas in the spring (how fun is that wedding going to be?!?)
The PH, for his part, was able to get the rest of his breakfast down, but he did look a little green around the gills, as they say. I figured the best approach was to just ignore all the news for the rest of the day and have a good time on our vacation. Which is why I was shocked half an hour later as we walked toward CVS to buy suntan lotion and the PH pointed out the jewelry store next door and asked if I wanted to check out engagement rings! So that’s how we spent our morning… trying on diamond rings.
While the PH and I have had plenty of discussions about getting married, and we know we have found the person to spend the rest of our lives with, we both feel it’s too soon in our relationship to get hitched. He has always joked about having a year (until our lease is up) to propose and even said he thinks he’ll be ready in “two or three years.” But he gave himself away by suggesting the ring shopping.
Don’t get too excited… we agreed to put the issue on the back burner for awhile. We’ll let the excitement from the eight bajillion engagements from this past weekend die down before anything happens. Besides, who can afford a ring with all the wedding presents we have to buy?!?