So, when we left off, Eric and I were on our way out of town for a weekend getaway that was supposedly about taking in the gorgeous fall foliage in the high country, but that I suspected (read: knew) was really about him proposing.
We spent Friday evening and Saturday afternoon tooling around the Rockies, awestruck by how beatiful the aspens are, especially when a soft breeze blows and their golden leaves shimmer in the sunlight. We explored ghost towns and took about a gazillion photos from about a gazillion scenic overlooks. We spent Friday night with a friend on the western slope, but had “other plans” for Saturday night. Plans he wouldn’t tell me about.
Coming down the mountain toward Carbondale, there is a teeny-tiny town called Redstone, which is one of my favorite places in all of Colorado. It’s a place where earlier in the summer, we’d sat on a slab of marble next to the Crystal River, had a picnic, and talked about our plans for the future – which were very much up in the air at the time because he’d be laid off only two days earlier. As we approached the turn off for Redstone, I thought to myself ‘if he’s going to propose, he’s going to do it here’, and held my breath in anticipation. But he kept on driving – right past the turnoff – and I exhaled, thinking ‘ok, maybe I’m totally off base and he’s not planning to propose this weekend at all.’
A few minutes later, we arrived at a bed and breakfast in Carbondale – a big, beautiful Victorian mansion with four-poster beds and clawfoot tubs and the best homefries I’ve ever tasted. As soon as we arrived, I laid down on the bed to rest (because, you know, I was exhausted from spending a day and a half sitting on my ass in the car), and Eric joined me.
And now is probably the right time to tell you that Eric’s name is really Jon, because now is the time when that fact matters, and now is the time when things are about to get really funny.
So we’re laying on the bed, and he says “ouch, there’s something poking me in the leg.” I thought he meant there was a bedspring sticking out of the mattress, so I started patting it down, and he says “no, I think it’s something in my pocket.” Subtle. But I’m totally clueless, and reach into his pocket where I feel something hard and round and…ring shaped. Before I pull it out, I ask “is this what I think it is?” and he screams…
“WHO WANTS TO MARRY JONNY!!?!??!?!?!”
Seriously. That was the proposal. Who wants to marry Jonny.
I like to say it was my first “I DO.”
I later found out that he’d been planning to propose at the top of Independence Pass the next afternoon. A friend had told him about a lovely stroll that takes you through an arch of aspens to a scenic overlook. He’d written a poem and planned on getting down on one knee and proposing in the usual fashion.
But he couldn’t wait. When we arrived at the bed and breakfast, he got excited, said fuck it, and hence…”who wants to marry Jonny?”
And you know what? It was perfect. In fact, a friend later reminded me of a conversation we’d once had wherein I said “I want to be proposed to in bed.” Why? Because I really, really, really love to sleep. Like a lot. And bed truly is one of my favorite places in the world. Like I said. Perfect.
That night, while we were celebrating, Eric/Jon told me he almost pulled into the turnoff for Redstone so as to propose on the slab of marble next to the river, but he didn’t because he thought it’d be too obvious. And he was right. And a stroll through a grove of aspens at the top of Independence Pass? Probably also would have been to obvious. In bed after a long day of driving? Not obvious.
So yes, I knew it was coming. But at that exact moment, it was pure shock and awe.
It is so very, very plain and quite unlike his original wedding band, but it’s also 100% hypo-allergenic surgical steel and therefore 100% safe for wear.
