so i asked the fair ephelba to marry me saturday night. i was so conflicted as to how to go about it. i had this plan. i wanted to ask her on the day of the winter solstice. i like things astrological, and as i told ephelba, it would give us the longest night of the year to celebrate. but i was too impatient. anyway, the whole solstice plan was based on the fact that ephelba had said she did not want to get engaged to me until we had known each other six months.

this seemed reasonable at the time, but that meant asking her in december, at the earliest. but since then we have grown so close, and gotten to know each other so well that the six month thing became irrelevant. and then there is the ring. i had been spending some time at a local jeweler’s shop playing around with different designs. so once you come up with a design you like, you find a stone that you like [and can afford, jeez!] they make your ring and you pick it up, really, you can’t wait.

and poor ephelba, she knew that i had the ring, and she was so dying to see it. she didn't know what it would look like at all. it was taking all her restraint not to pounce at once. so i couldn’t see waiting until the solstice. but then what? its not like you can just ask someone to marry you just out of the blue, during a commercial break in “ER” or something. there needs to be a plan, a setting, some intimacy, some drama, even. which i so did not have. at the jeweler’s, all the folks there were asking me how did i plan to propose to her. i did not know. i have this ring in my hot little hand, and i want to give it to ephelba. i want to see her face light up, and see her smile, and maybe even cry. i want to be engaged to her. i want to marry her. but i just can’t hand it to her.

i had these fantasies of a long walk on a moonlit beach, a beautiful warm summer evening with the waves washing up on shore, and no disgusting dead fish smell. or in some fancy high class restaurant, with table cloths on the tables, and a waiter with a white towel folded over one arm. i would have it a set up with the waitstaff ahead of time. when you see her cry, i’d say, bring over the champagne. but there are no beaches where we live, and if i couldn’t wait until december, there’s no way i’m waiting for warm weather, and ephelba isn’t really into fancy restaurants.

ephelba is showering as i think all this, me sitting on our bed, holding her ring in my hand, seeing how far down it fits over my pinky [not very]. she comes in our room all undressed, and i stuff the ring under my pillow. she undresses me, and wants to leave the light on for a while. she doesn’t see well at all without her glasses, and usually when we are naked together, she doesn’t have them on. tonight she says she wants to have a good long look at me. so i lie back and let her. she tells me how she likes what she sees, which makes me grin like a maniac.

then, after we turn off the light, we talk for a while. i tell her how much i love her, and how i want to be with her for the rest of my life. and i tell her that i have this ring. of course she knows. but she waits for me to finish. i have this ring, and i don’t know how to give it to her, that it should be special, somehow. ephelba says she’s heard of people putting proposals up on those stadium scoreboards, and how the women always act so surprised, but that they must have known something was up. i told ephelba all the different thoughts i had about how i would ask her. she said she would be thrilled with anything i came up with. and i said that i had been thinking about spending our lives together, and how hard it would be, and how it seems so few people succeed at it.

then ephelba shares a truly brilliant insight about how when we think of how hard it will be to make our relationship work at times, we almost automatically think that the alternative of being single would be easier. but that isn’t true. there really is no easy life, each is hard in its own way, and you get to choose the kind of hardness you want to have, and that each comes with its own happiness, too. and so you can choose the kind of happiness you want. and that made so much sense to me. i knew the kind of happiness i wanted, and it is with ephelba.

so naked and lying in bed together, i asked her to marry me. when she said yes, we kissed for a long time, and then i pulled the ring out from under the pillow and put it on her finger. it fit perfectly well, since i had taken one of her other rings down to the shop for sizing. on come the lights again, and ephelba’s glasses. she looks down at her hand to see what i’ve put there. she squeals delightfully, and we kiss a lot, and look at her hand, and kiss, and talk about how wonderful our life together will be. [it will be so cool]

in the morning, as if on cue, boi jumps into bed with us. boi went with me to get the ring, and so he’d seen it already. he loved it, and asked did it cost a million dollars? [not quite] but he was not really aware of the significance of the ring. this morning we told him that it means we are getting married. this seems ok with him. then i made us pancakes for breakfast, which pleased him more. but as we were lying in bed, and i am attempting to kiss ephelba, while our cats scream at each other [this part of our mixed family is not mixing well] and boi is practicing his explosions in the living room, i wonder aloud to ehpelba just what have i let myself in for. chaos, she says, snuggling in closer. and plenty of it, says i.