Ah... my pretty :)
So we're been engaged for about a month and three weeks now. It's very easy to calculate that when you got engaged on New Year's Eve.
In that time we've had not one but TWO engagement parties (more on those later) and found an engagement ring.
As soon as we got engaged and started calling our closest friends and family, we almost instantly started getting asked 'did he have a ring?'
I'm finding it very interesting, to discover the semi-conservative attitudes society still has towards relationships and marriage. I consider my circle of friends to be fairly left wing, forward thinkers yet for years I have been batting off questions from, not all, but some of my friends as to when we would get married and when I would be made an 'honest woman' of.
AA was shocked at the question of whether he asked my father's permission before asking me to marry him. He was appalled at the idea, afterall in this day and age we come to marriage as a decision between the couple and the couple alone. As a bride I'm not property to be negotiated over with a dowry, thank the lord!
So after the initial excitement of deciding we are going to get married, and the almost instant but fleeting fear as we sat there blinking at each other shocked at what a grown up decision we're making and how scary it all is, it also very quickly became evident that weddings are loaded with traditions, ceremonies and expectations that AA and I are going to question and examine every step of the way.
First up - THE RING. There were some surprising initial reactions to hearing that I was proposed to with not a ring but a necklace. It was almost enough for me to NOT want a ring. AA has since said that the thought of finding the perfect ring for me on his own was beyond him, which I completely understand because it was beyond me too! I don't usually wear rings and I had no idea what it was that I wanted. I'm not the type of girl whose sat around dreaming about her wedding since I was a kid. That's just not me.
In the end though, the decision was somewhat made for us. Embarrassingly, I'm kinda allergic to my necklace! Stupid sensitive skin. During the time in which this became evident, I started warming to the idea of an engagement ring but we had to process it all before we got there.
Firstly... why is it just the bride to be that gets the engagement ring? I had planned to get AA a vintage watch and have it engraved, to give to him when he proposed but... he beat me to it. And he has difficulties reading analogue time. Then we discussed us BOTH getting engagement rings but in the end AA decided he'd prefer to not wear a ring until our wedding day.
Then there's the tradition of getting a fancy schmancy engagement ring and only simple plain wedding bands. What is that all about? What's with the symbolism in that? AND what's with the symbolism of presenting a lady with a giant glittering rock - is that to lure a lady into marriage with the promise of jewels? It all seems a bit wrong. I'm glad we got engaged without a ring and then went to choose one together. For a while we toyed with the idea of getting a simple engagement ring and getting more decorative wedding bands. We might still do that I suppose. Afterall - why all the glitz and glamour for your engagement and then boring and plain once your married? That's not right!
Also... while starting to have a look on line at rings to see what we
liked we started seeing references to 'conflict free jewellery' and I started reading about the damage 'new' gold mining causes the planet. Alex was already well aware of this, but this was a real eye opener to me. There is as much gold being mined as there is gold in unwanted jewellery already above ground, available to be melted down to make new pieces. It just seems crazy we are continuing to mine gold and diamonds. I found this very disturbing and we decided we wanted to either buy estate pieces or at least conflict free jewellery using melted down gold refashioned into new pieces.
I wish we had a family heirloom piece, but it's ok - after looking in many shops - antique stores, jewellery stores, collectors markets, you name it we finally found THE RING at an estate jewellery store in our home town of Adelaide. How fitting.
At first the diamond on it looked so big to me I was almost embarrassed to look at it on my finger. I can't explain it but... I guess I felt I wasn't worth having such huge glittery thing on my hand. I felt silly and girly! Interestingly it was kind of how I felt when I got proposed to. I was kind of embarrassed by how giddy it all made me, it wasn't the reaction I expected to have, being an independent modern gal and all. Shows how much I know. I love the ring so much, I couldn't stop looking at it all the time for the first fortnight and constantly feeling that it was still on my finger, and having minor panic attacks if I was walking around and couldn't just FEEL it sitting there without checking. I'm getting more used to it now. I'm paranoid I will take it off and lose it somehow, but I am getting more used to it now.
Any other modern brides to be out there with bouts of embarrassment? I was so relieved to hear my dear friend say she too was embarrassed when she got proposed to (tho, she was proposed to with a SWORD). I think I was the most anxious when AA called his parents to tell them the news, I seriously felt I was going to faint or throw up I was so nervous!
