(Parts 1-6 below this post.)
As the spring semester of 1999 came to an end, I began to get a little obsessed about getting engaged. As much as I put on a happy face about him moving to California, I really wasn’t thrilled about it. We had always said we didn’t want to have a long engagement, so I figured if he proposed, we wouldn’t be apart for longer than 6 months. That thought made me happy.
One night, just a few weeks before graduation, Derek’s band had a gig at a local coffee shop. “This is it.” I thought to myself. I just knew this was the night he was going to propose. I was absolutely sure that he had written me a song and he was going to pull me on stage, serenade me, get down on one knee and ask me to be his wife. I was giddy with excitement, and could hardly sit still as the show began. It would be the perfect engagement. Most of our close friends were there, and we had spent a lot of time at this coffee shop over the past year. Yes, this was certainly going to be it, the moment that I had been waiting for.
They played song after song after song, and my heart began to sink a bit with each passing moment. But I perked up when I realized that surely the big moment would be during their last song. As the final chords played at the end of the final song, I realized that this was, in fact, not going to be it. There was no special song, and no engagement. I tried to hide my disappointment, and I wondered if he would ever ask me.
Graduation came and went. No engagement. Two of my very best friends got engaged, my brother got married, Derek’s best friend got married, but still nothing from Derek. He moved back home for the summer, and I left for 6 weeks to work as a camp counselor at Camp Olympia. When I returned home, I knew it had to happen soon. But maybe I was wrong? My parents loved Derek and thought he was great, but they weren’t exactly thrilled at the idea of us getting married right then. Maybe Derek was putting more stock in their opinion than I was. There were so many thoughts swirling during those weeks of summer, but eventually I stopped obsessing over it. I loved him, he loved me, and we wanted to spend our lives together. It would all work out in God’s perfect timing, not in Megan’s perfect timing. Even if he left for California and I didn’t have a ring, that would be okay.
So when the engagement actually happened, I was quite surprised…
that is just mean..you had to stop there!