This small series
will be a break from my normal travel writing and blogging. It will attempt to document to the best of my
memory and limited writing skills the run-up to Colleen and I's recent
engagement. I apologize in advance if I
get a little sappy at times. Brent.
As previously mentioned, this summer marked Colleen and I's
two year anniversary (don' t ask me the exact date, because I am a human
travesty when it comes to remembering anniversaries, birthdays, etc) and I was
starting to feel like it was time to propose. Well that, and the fact that Colleen
threatened to castrate my nuts if I didn't make an honest woman out of her
before the end of the year.
Colleen has always been one of those girls who ever since
she was probably old enough to process thoughts had dreams of getting
married. I on the other hand am scared
shitless about the idea of getting married.
I am not really sure why this concept scares me, but I do know that it
does. I am pretty sure that a week after
we started dating, Colleen started planning our wedding and picking out clothes
for BJ (not blowjob, that's Brent Junior!) and CJ (Colleen Junior). On second thought we might have to work on
the boy's name...
As further evidence of the above mentioned fact, while we
were on a cruise about a year ago, Colleen actually thought I was going to
propose to her. In all honesty, the idea
had never even crossed my mind. One
night on the ship we went out for dinner at a super swanky restaurant, but
unfortunately the waters were rather choppy that evening to say the least. I was unable to stomach any of my food and at
one point I had to leave the table to go back to our room and get some motion
sickness tablets. A couple of months
after this incident, Colleen told me that she thought I had left the table to
get a ring and was going to ask her to marry me! Nope,
sorry Honey, I was actually on the brink of death.
 |
| Definitely DID NOT get engaged this night. Almost died actually. |
Since there was no ring to be found on the waters of the
Atlantic Ocean for Miss McParland, I started to think about possibly asking the
big question while we were travelling through Asia in the early part of 2013. In the end, I decided not to make any decisions
in haste and that my money at the time would be better spent on Thai beer and
cramped bus rides with non-English speaking folks.
 |
| No ring honey, sorry too busy barfing. |
Having said all that, by the summer of 2013 I could see that
Colleen was itching for some overpriced jewelry. Maybe it was the way she kept rubbing her
ring finger constantly or the fact that she developed a sudden love of
"ring pops". In all
seriousness though, you have to see this girl's Pinterest account. Anytime she left it open on the computer I
damn near had a heart attack. I have seen
more pictures of shit to do with rings, wedding dresses, bridesmaid ideas, and
related things than any straight man should.
 |
| I believe I have seven imaginary children. |
It became quite clear: The time was now.
In October, Colleen and I were scheduled to take
holidays. I was going to be returning to
Ontario for few weeks as two of my best friends (Derek Simpson and Jon Muzychka)
were getting married. Not to each other
mind you, although I must admit that that would have been more convenient and
saved me some money on wedding gifts and tuxedo rentals. Colleen was going to be visiting her family
in British Columbia and was scheduled to come to Ontario for a few days for Jon
and Gianina's wedding. While she was in
Ontario we were going to take a mini-romantic vacation before Jon's wedding and
I could tell that Colleen thought something was up. I had to let her down gently and tell her
well in advance that there was no way I was going to ask her to marry me a few
days before my best friend's wedding.
That would be the biggest dick move in the history of dick moves. It takes a dick to know a dick move.
Why I mention that is because before we left for vacation
Colleen was fairly certain that I would be ring shopping while in Ontario as
such things are hard to do in Inuvik. This
was true and not really a secret. After
many discussions and some not some so gentle hinting from my now fiancée she
knew that it was highly likely that I would ask her to marry me before the end
of the year and this trip seemed like as good a time as any. It was our last trip out of Inuvik for the
year and she was very adamant that I didn't propose to her in our "circa
1976 low level drug dealer chic apartment".
Somehow I had to figure out how to surprise the least
surprisable person in the world while not upstaging my friends' weddings.
So I enlisted the help of my sister Natalie (ring picker-outer
assistant) and Colleen's friend Stephanie (my partner in crime) to aide
me. We would surprise her come hell or
high water because as every wise man knows, HAPPY WIFE = HAPPY LIFE.  |
| Sums it up. |
It was time to make Colleen's Pinterest board a reality.
~Brentski~
Next time: Fastest
ring shopper ever and the surprise that almost wasn't!
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