Our Story Begins...

My boyfriend had champagne on the beach at sunset; still, I had no idea he was about to propose.

It's a strange thing, getting engaged. One day you're going about your everyday business, finally (well, mostly) past the point of constantly dishing about your mate's latest screw-ups with your friends, settling into a good rhythm of fight-avoidance and tentative mutual life planning, when your significant other throws you a curveball in the form of a proposal and a piece of metal that's hopefully something you like well enough to wear every day of your life for the foreseeable future. It's an emotional sucker punch. (And if it isn't, you really might want to give extra-special consideration to your response on that fateful day.)

For me, it came while I was on vacation with a big group of old friends on our annual summer outing to a rustic lodge on a remote corner of Martha's Vineyard. I'd been dating my boyfriend, John, for about three years, and we'd been living together for two. We'd just arrived at the house, and he'd been bugging me to hike down to the house's remote private beach at sunset, despite my protestations that the whole gang had just arrived, there were margaritas to be drunk, we had a whole week ahead of us for romantic excursions, etc. After what should have seemed like a suspicious amount of prodding at the hands of my in-the-know friends, I finally acquiesced and we set off for the beach. The expensive bottle of champagne and picnic blanket my boyfriend was toting should have been dead giveaways as well, but what can I say? He's cheesy like that.

We sat on the aforementioned blanket with our little cups of champagne, and John launched into a nervous speech about our relationship and how well things had been going, and yet somehow I remained blissfully unaware as to what was going on. It wasn't until he took out that little telltale black box and popped it open that I knew. My first thought? Yes, of course, definitely, yes! My second: Dear God, are all of our friends going to be waiting at the house to gush all over us the second we emerge from the woods? (A less than romantic response, I know.) And awaiting our return they were, with huge expectant smiles on their faces and a giant magnum of champagne they'd somehow managed to smuggle into the trunk of our rental car without my noticing a thing. The heartfelt celebration that ensued was awkward and amazing in just the right proportions, though my utter cluelessness about all the prep work that had gone into it made me suspect that my observational skills could use a little work. I couldn't have asked for a more perfect proposal. John said he'd decided to pop the question on Martha's Vineyard because he thought the location made me happier than anywhere else in the world, and he was absolutely right.

Regarding the ring? I don't know or care how much he spent on it, but I'm no J. Lo (and he, thankfully, no Marc Anthony), so suffice it to say that it won't be adorning the style pages of a celebrity weekly anytime soon. It's an intricate, understated, 100-year-old antique that John found after tirelessly searching our neighborhood's antique-jewelry shops, and I absolutely love it. Which reminds me--I've been wearing it all over town, but like an idiot, have failed to get it insured. And I definitely know better: I had a long stint helping to edit New York magazine's special wedding-themed issues, and I wrote countless stories on everything from shoe-dyeing to invitation etiquette to the contractual ins and outs of making sure you're not getting screwed out of money--which includes instantly insuring a purchase that for many people is the most expensive item they'll ever own, aside from, say, a car or a house.

With that in mind, I'm adding "Engagement ring insurance!" to my weekly to-do list as we speak. Hopefully, the added public scrutiny that comes with writing this blog will shame me into submission. Till next time!