4th of July and Our Engagement Story

Happy 4th of July, everyone!

Happy Engagement Anniversary to us!

2 years ago, Justin's family was planning a reunion over the 4th of July weekend in Dallas.  As Justin's best friend and old roommate Isaac, lived in Dallas, Justin decided we just HAD to go.  I was not at all surprised that he wanted to go see Isaac but the excitement over the family reunion surprised me.  What 26-yr-old guy gets excited about a family reunion???

As the reunion drew closer, Justin decided we had to take HIS car to Texas.  To say the least, I was not thrilled at the idea as my Altima gets close to 35mpg on the highway but if he was willing to drive the boat in Dallas traffic, it was all on him.  Part of me was also convinced that he just wanted to show off the stupid car to all his cousins.  *Sigh...*

Justin's 1980 Cadillac Sedan DeVille that he restored

We woke up bright and early the morning of July 3rd to roll out of town.  Justin went to move his truck into the driveway and we noticed someone had totally hit the rear fender--it was bad enough that it was going to need the auto body shop.  We called the police to come do a Hit-&-Run report, but Justin got impatient and headed to the store in his car and left me standing in the driveway...the officer shows up, is slightly confused as to why the vehicle's owner left (as was I) and realized the dent was not fresh.  It'd been there a while.  Great, Justin--you're just now noticing something this obvious?!

Grrrrrr....I loaded up on coffee in hopes it would improve my mood and we hit the road.  It was a beautiful morning and I have to admit, the Caddy just glided down interstate.

We stopped for lunch in Only-God-Knows-Where, Oklahoma...we hopped back in the car, got back on interstate and within minutes, the Air Conditioning went out.

Seriously?!  It was already blazing hot (and humid) and now we have no cold air?!  All I could think was "I told ya we should have taken my car!"

We eventually pulled into Dallas later that day with all four windows down and my hair resembling a birds nest.  Isaac's apartment felt so refreshing!!!!

The next day was the family reunion on the other side of the metro.  We headed out without any directions as Justin was confident we could find the place--after all, Isaac knew how to find the suburb and we'd just call for directions when we got closer.  Well, we found the suburb without a problem but no one was answering their phone...so we drove around for another good hour or so in the sweltering heat with no AC until his cousin finally picked up and gave us the much-needed directions.

A bbq'd lunch came and went and I was just baffled by how weird Justin was acting around his family.  He wouldn't sit down and frankly, was just plain driving me nuts.

When he and Isaac told me they were headed into town to pick up more ice with the suggestion that I stay back to socialize with everyone, I wasn't surprised.  My immediate thought was, "Yeah, drive me ALL the way down here in this horrible heat and ditch me at your own family reunion!  Oh, boy, you got it coming to you when we get back to Kansas!"

Well, the ice "run" took a good hour-and-a-half.  When the boys got back, I was livid...LIVID.  My clothes and hair were soaking wet with sweat and I had just spent all that time making small talk...while they were out goofing off. 

As soon as Justin got out of the car, I gave him "The Look."   The look must have killed because he went inside the house and didn't come back out for another 15 minutes or so.  He finally came out to where I was sitting and attempted to be nice.  By that point, nice wasn't good enough.  I just wanted to go back to Isaac's to shower and call it a day.

All of a sudden, Justin raised his voice to get everyone's attention and started introducing me to his family.  All I could think was, "Hello, you idiot.  I've been sitting here by myself for the past 90 minutes and I already made sure to introduce myself and get everyone's names."  Why was he doing this?!

As all the family was right there, I decided to play nice and actually listen to him--even though I really, really wanted to tune him out by this point.

Good thing I decided to pay attention--after just a few more seconds of senseless rambling, Justin pulled a ring box out of his pocket and asked me to marry him!

I have to admit--I was not expecting it AT ALL.  Especially considering I wanted to strangle him just moments before he proposed...but obviously I said yes!

In hindsight, everything makes sense now.

To Justin, what better than showing off your new fiance and your restored car to all your family???  That definately explains his excitement for a family reunion.  Luckily, Justin has matured some and now cares less about showing off that stupid car :-)

Now I get why Justin (and even Isaac, to an extent) was acting so neurotic.  The ring was in the glove box during the trip down to Dallas and Justin was incredibly worried that I would stumble across it.  Isaac was the only other person who knew that Justin was planning to propose and almost let it slip out a few times...or so he claims--I didn't notice at all!

The ice run--Justin didn't want to leave the ring in the car once we got to Dallas.  It had accidentally been left behind at Isaac's when we headed out for the reunion so they had to drive CLEAR ACROSS the metro to go back and get it.  Hence the 90 minutes it took them to pick up "the ice."

Once everything clicked, my annoyance slowly dissipated.  We were getting ready to start a new phase of life together and why ruin it by dwelling on what went wrong?  I think it also helped that on our way back to Kansas, there was a significant temperature drop and it was actually fun to cruise down interstate with the windows down!

Whenever 4th of July rolls around, I always think about our "engagement story" and laugh about how the trip started off so rocky but in the end, it ended up being something to celebrate. 

A lot has changed since then...

There's now 2 rings, instead of just 1!

And some things still remain the same--there are days where Justin still manages to drive me up the wall...and I still think we should have taken my car ;-)