It was one year ago today that Eric asked me to marry him. When I think about it I still get butterflies in my tummy! Valentines day is tomorrow and that he asked me so close to Valentines day really had nothing to do with Valentines day at all. I found out later on that night when we talked about it that he was planning on asking me the week before he ended up proposing.
He was supposed to come with me to a conference I had in Las Vegas and had planned on asking me to marry him then (he went to high school in Las Vegas so the area has meaning to him) but he ended up having to work and couldn't go. So we had planned a weekend away together as soon as I got back, but I ended up stuck in Las Vegas for two extra nights because we had a snow storm in Atlanta/Raleigh and all the flights were canceled (see that, everyone thinks that this year's weather in the southeast is so uniquely bad but we had the same level of storms almost to the exact day as last year. People just don't remember!). So when I made it back to NC he was finally able to propose. Poor guy! All his big plans kept getting spoiled!
Spending my deployment down-time thinking about the wedding really brightens my day. June is really right around the corner. I can't help but feel that a line from "When Harry Met Sally" is appropriate here: "When you realize that you want to spend the rest of your life with someone, you want the rest of your life to start as soon as possible."
Saturday, February 12, 2011
Sunday, February 6, 2011
The power of money
I love the show Say Yes To The Dress. I loved it before I got engaged and love it even more now that I am getting married. Since my deployment I have been relegated to watching episodes that cost me $2.00 a piece, take a full 5 hours to download, and I watch them on my borrowed-from-Eric iphone's 2x3 inch screen. Don't care. Grateful to see it. Even if it is in miniature.
Tonight's show featured a bride-to-be who came in with her mom to shop for her dress. The bride-to-be had a set budget of $5,000. She was paying for her own dress. Props! Now, in what was a very generous gesture, her mother comes in to the dressing room with a gift box. Inside the gift box is literally a blank check. Her mother decided she wanted her daughter to have an unlimited budget and as a gift, decided to pay for her daughters dress.
She had already tried on a couple of dresses (prior to the blank check gift) and the dresses the bride liked weren't necessarily the ones her mom liked. And vice versa. Cut to one of the knowledgeable consultants, who have been doing this for years, and they say that it changes the playing field when mom (or anyone else) is paying for the dress. Suddenly, they have a say in what dress you ultimately chose. *Queue sound of needle scratching across record here!* EXCUSE ME?
I have gotten some fantastic one-liner money advice in my lifetime. Here are two examples: "Never invest anything that you are not willing to lose" (Thanks uncle Dan!)and "Always view money you give to family, friends, co-workers or anyone, as a gift that you will never see again." (Thanks dad!) Don't get me wrong, if you give money to someone and they come to you the next day to pay it back, don't turn it down. By all means accept it. But never EXPECT to see it again. I have seen first hand how money has come between friends, family, and others and ruin relationships. SO not worth it.
Over the years I have developed my own views about the giving of money. When you make a decision to give money away, be it to family, friends, or whomever, you also need to be willing to give up ANY say in how they spend it. If a family member comes to you and says, I need $50 to pay my electric bill or they are going to shut off my lights and you give them $50 and they turn around and spend it on beer and cigarettes, so be it. You can always decide to never give them money again. You are not their boss, you are not a bank, you are not their mother (ok, maybe you are their mother, but this is not applicable to a parent who is trying to TEACH fiscal responsibility to an 8 year old). Money should NEVER come with strings attached.
Watching this particular episode, I have no doubt that this mom REALLY just wanted to give her daughter a very generous gift. It made her feel good. But perhaps, in her mind, she thought that her opinion should count for something since she was now paying for the dress. THIS, I have a real problem with. If you were with me when I was shopping for my wedding dress and you generously offered to make my budget unlimited, but there was a stipulation that YOU had to be happy with the dress as well, I would thank you profusely and then graciously return your check.
Tonight's show featured a bride-to-be who came in with her mom to shop for her dress. The bride-to-be had a set budget of $5,000. She was paying for her own dress. Props! Now, in what was a very generous gesture, her mother comes in to the dressing room with a gift box. Inside the gift box is literally a blank check. Her mother decided she wanted her daughter to have an unlimited budget and as a gift, decided to pay for her daughters dress.
She had already tried on a couple of dresses (prior to the blank check gift) and the dresses the bride liked weren't necessarily the ones her mom liked. And vice versa. Cut to one of the knowledgeable consultants, who have been doing this for years, and they say that it changes the playing field when mom (or anyone else) is paying for the dress. Suddenly, they have a say in what dress you ultimately chose. *Queue sound of needle scratching across record here!* EXCUSE ME?
I have gotten some fantastic one-liner money advice in my lifetime. Here are two examples: "Never invest anything that you are not willing to lose" (Thanks uncle Dan!)and "Always view money you give to family, friends, co-workers or anyone, as a gift that you will never see again." (Thanks dad!) Don't get me wrong, if you give money to someone and they come to you the next day to pay it back, don't turn it down. By all means accept it. But never EXPECT to see it again. I have seen first hand how money has come between friends, family, and others and ruin relationships. SO not worth it.
Over the years I have developed my own views about the giving of money. When you make a decision to give money away, be it to family, friends, or whomever, you also need to be willing to give up ANY say in how they spend it. If a family member comes to you and says, I need $50 to pay my electric bill or they are going to shut off my lights and you give them $50 and they turn around and spend it on beer and cigarettes, so be it. You can always decide to never give them money again. You are not their boss, you are not a bank, you are not their mother (ok, maybe you are their mother, but this is not applicable to a parent who is trying to TEACH fiscal responsibility to an 8 year old). Money should NEVER come with strings attached.
Watching this particular episode, I have no doubt that this mom REALLY just wanted to give her daughter a very generous gift. It made her feel good. But perhaps, in her mind, she thought that her opinion should count for something since she was now paying for the dress. THIS, I have a real problem with. If you were with me when I was shopping for my wedding dress and you generously offered to make my budget unlimited, but there was a stipulation that YOU had to be happy with the dress as well, I would thank you profusely and then graciously return your check.
Thursday, February 3, 2011
The weeks are fast, but time is slow?
I find it very odd how my concept of the passing time can differ so greatly. On the one hand, I really feel as if the WEEKS are going by quickly. Monday-Sunday seems to fly right by. But when I look at the calender, the total time spent here seems to stand still.
As I sit here tonight, listening to gunfire and eating a brownie I wonder if this is what it feels like to live in East L.A.? I hate the gunfire. I haven't gotten used to it. It makes me jump. I can tell it is not intended for us (right now), but I never know when that might change. It takes a toll to be stressed this regularly. I can feel it.
I am sure that my stress is no worse than anyone else's stress. The world today is a stressful place. You never know if you are going to lose your job (and subsequently your income/livelihood), and that is EXTREMELY stressful. Especially if you have a family. People have lost their life savings in the market during this recession and THAT is stressful too. What if they are 60 years old and lost it all? Not like they can go back to work and start over for the next 40 years to make up for it. Those are life-affecting stresses too.
I guess what I am trying to say is that although stress comes in different forms, when you feel it day after day it takes a toll no matter what kind of stress it is. I am looking forward to going home and transitioning from this environment back to my not-so-stressful one. I am also hoping that the time spent here as a whole catches up to the quick pace of the time spent week-to-week.
As I sit here tonight, listening to gunfire and eating a brownie I wonder if this is what it feels like to live in East L.A.? I hate the gunfire. I haven't gotten used to it. It makes me jump. I can tell it is not intended for us (right now), but I never know when that might change. It takes a toll to be stressed this regularly. I can feel it.
I am sure that my stress is no worse than anyone else's stress. The world today is a stressful place. You never know if you are going to lose your job (and subsequently your income/livelihood), and that is EXTREMELY stressful. Especially if you have a family. People have lost their life savings in the market during this recession and THAT is stressful too. What if they are 60 years old and lost it all? Not like they can go back to work and start over for the next 40 years to make up for it. Those are life-affecting stresses too.
I guess what I am trying to say is that although stress comes in different forms, when you feel it day after day it takes a toll no matter what kind of stress it is. I am looking forward to going home and transitioning from this environment back to my not-so-stressful one. I am also hoping that the time spent here as a whole catches up to the quick pace of the time spent week-to-week.
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