Dodging the Engagement Ring Bullet
Tuesday, September 22nd, 2009I found out the other day from the mutual friend who introduced us that North Shore, the guy I dated for a few months last summer, is engaged. To the girl he dated mere weeks after me. I believe this makes seven- seven guys who have proposed once removed. Anyone trying to get engaged? Apparently, I can be quite deft at helping!
In all honesty though, of all the less than stellar choices I’ve made in the past few years where relationships are concerned, here now is a solidly good one. My instincts told me at the time that he was “the marrying guy” and sure enough….
I am grateful today to have avoided his misplaced and clear interest in “locking it down.” I wasn’t ready for something like that, am still not, and the idea of a long-term anything with him felt so…pedestrian, “figured out,” anxiety-producing. I could literally see how “it” would all play out.
I could see the dating and trips and other people’s weddings. The suggestion of living together, the combining of furniture, the dinner/ring one-two punch engagement. The living in the city for two years, then the move to his native north shore, the babies that would come next. AND the depression, resentment, disappointment, and regret that would follow. The whole thing turned my stomach. It was just wrong…for me. I had this unbearable sense of being hemmed in.
So even though he treated me well and we got along, I broke it off. I chose not to waste his or my time with something that would result in my inner panic and his disappointment. I felt bad, but I also felt it was right, and now I feel reaffirmed. He’s found someone else to lock into marriage. Mazel tov.
North Shore seems to have found exactly what he wanted- a girl to solve his concerns about being the utter last one of his large group of friends to get married. A nice, agreeable-if mousy- school teacher with his preferred large chest, who I met at “my” birthday baby shower actually. I can see them very happy together in their complicity.
Maybe I’m wrong about all of it though. Maybe no matter how long it carried on, he wouldn’t have chosen me. Maybe I really was just a brief stop-over to his wedded bliss. A last hurrah before his dating candle went out. No matter what it would have been, I am absolutely certain I avoided a mistake.
Three of my past boyfriends have since proposed to their new girlfriends, but I literally dodged an engagement once when I opened my then boyfriend’s glove compartment, found a Kay Jeweler’s credit applciation and said “No, no, no, no, no” as if in a trance for a minute straight. I thought I was uncomfortable with the idea of getting married period, but with my current BF I actually welcome the idea. Funny how that goes.
Oh I’ve been here too and often wondered about my role in their eventual bliss. But you know that staying with him would have been a mistake and that’s all that matters. You are going to find someone better just for you.
I think that’s probably true…the whole “when you’re with the ‘right one,’ it won’t seem so scary/anxiety-producing, etc. That said, I still think you can be with the prototypical “keeper” and still not be ready for “it.” At least, that’s how I feel.