How It All Got Started

I asked for some questions to answer or story requests on my blog the other day. The first one I got was to tell about my engagement to Lori. I think she does a fabulous job telling this story so I won't completely rip her off. But I will tell you what was going on in my head leading up to the big night. At the time I was working a summer intern with the GDOT. The job site I was on was at the new interchange at what was soon to be the Mall of Georgia in Buford. For the past few months Lori and I had been wandering through malls, holding hands, being completely silly and looking at rings. When she found the "one" she tried it on, ooohed and aaaahed and then returned it to the glass case. That's when I had to start my planning. First off, how in the hell was I going to afford this thing? I wanted to spare no expense for my soon-to-be bride so I just had to have THAT ring. In my feeble mind I knew that the answer would be like so many other people's (that is until the economy recently crashed)....just put it on my credit card! Yeah, that was it, that would be perfect. I could put it on my card now and begin paying it off and would be done in no time. I mean really, I was approaching graduation from Georgia Tech, so I was bound to get offered a job right out of college making a zillion dollars or something like that. What was a couple of thousand dollars, right?

(At this point I am going to insert a little public service announcement. Credit Cards are Evil. Borrowing money is Bad. And this is true for two reasons. One, the bible clearly tells people how to handle their money and it says in Proverbs 22:7 "The rich rules over the poor, and the borrower is slave to the lender." Secondly, the credit card companies are not charitable organizations. They are in business to make money, and lots of it. How do they do that? By suckering people in to thinking that they can have whatever they want right now with no worries. What's 20% interest among friends, right?)

So anyway, back to my story of the purchase. I had one little problem. My credit limit wasn't high enough. Looking back on my life, that was one of those times when God whispered in my ear to tell me that mine wasn't the best idea, but did I listen? Nope, I just brushed Him away and kept on going. In order to get around this little obstacle I called my god-mother, who at the time, just so happened to be the president of a bank that I happened to have a credit card with. In no time, I had all the credit I could ever ask for. Now it was time to seal the deal. I asked the guys I was working for if I could take a long lunch so I could go pick something up. The agreed and off I went. I bought the ring, put in the little black box and hid it so nothing could happen to it. At this point I kind of felt like Frodo Baggins with my "Precious" ring that seemed to call to me to constantly. I knew I could not let this ring stay anywhere but on Lori's finger and I had to make this happen NOW! So I decided that Thursday was going to be the day. And, I was going to ask her to marry me at the same place where we first met, Zesto in Atlanta. I called Lori that evening and convinced her that we needed to meet to have desert. We agreed to meet at the Varsity since it was about half way from my parent's house in Duluth and her parent's house in Fayetteville. Once we got there I convinced her that Zesto would be better than a chocolate shake from the Varsity, so we got in one car and headed off. Once we ordered I made sure we sat in the exact same same spot where we met. I told Lori I had to run to the bathroom real quick. I ran in and unwrapped the ring that had been burning a freakin' hole in my pocket all night. I was a nervous wreck because I had taken it out of the little black box and wrapped it in tissue paper so it wouldn't be too conspicuous in my pocket. I slipped it on my little finger and closed my hand into a sweaty fist so I wouldn't show it or drop it when I went back out. I was gone for what seemed like an eternity. I went back to our stools, took Lori's hand and recounted the first time we met when I blurted out "Would you marry me?" because she knew who Dale Earnhardt was. At this point I held up the ring for her and asked her if she really would marry me this time. Her eyes lit up, then slightly teared up. She grabbed me and kept saying, "Oh, baby. Oh, baby" I think she eventually said yes once the shock wore off.

(Here is another little side note. I never saw the goofy man that looked like the ugly mountain jugs that had distracted Lori during this whole time. I was too focused on not throwing up my Arctic Swirl because of my nerves)

We immediately left Zesto and headed to Fayetteville to show the ring off to her mom. And the rest is history.