Diamond Dreams

Wow. Who knew that finding an engagement ring would be such a difficult process? But two months later, we're still looking! I told Michael last weekend that he should have got one before he proposed--whatever it was, I probably would have loved it just because he got it, and we wouldn't have to worry about it now!

Part of the difficulty has been that our schedules have been in such opposition that it's been hard to find enough time to see each other at all, never mind a date to go ring shopping. And of course, we have to go all over trying to find the right one...it's not like we can do it in one day! I'm also having difficulty finding a ring that looks good on me...none of the rings I've seen have really "hit" me. So far I think I like the vintage-looking ones like the Tacori styles best. Which, naturally, are more expensive. And then there was the lovely $27 000 ring I tried on in Naples last weekend. Oh, the joys of having expensive taste on a plebian salary!

And then, being librarians and all, we need to make ourselves diamond experts before we can go shopping. If you're going to spend that much money on something, you should at least learn enough to make sure that what you're getting is worth it, right?? :) There are actually quite a few good education sites online, like pricescope and good old gold, which are helping us in our quest.

So, who knows what we will end up with. I'll try to figure out how to post pictures, so once the ring is actually bought we can show you all what it looks like!

After long silence...

Well, it's been quite a while since we posted here. Mostly because so many of our attempts to make concrete plans have been thwarted! Everything seems up in the air right now. We don't have engagement rings yet, because we never seem to have time to do any research or go out shopping. We thought we had picked a firm date two or three times, but other factors--possible visa issues should we still be in Florida, timing conflicts with family--kept getting in the way. And then, just to make things more complicated, we both applied for jobs in the United Arab Emirates! Should we get positions there we would need, for cultural and Islamic-law-compliance reasons, to get married before we left for the Middle East. Whenever that might end up being--from our informal discussions, it sounds like formal interviews won't even take place until September.

Whew.

So, the only new information we really have to share is that, unless we end up going to the Emirates after a quick trip to city hall, we have tentatively decided to get married on Sunday, August 7th, 2005, in my parents' backyard, in a small celebration with immediate family and friends. Nothing is really finalized yet, though, so until we've got a clearer idea of what's going to be going on in the rest of our lives in the next half year we can't say that's definite.

It's frustrating, because we do really want to start planning and spreading the news and generally getting on with this new stage of our lives. However, our relationship has often been somewhat complicated logistically, and so I guess that in one sense it's just a variation on a long-established theme!