Rules of Engagement #2

Rule Three (as dictated by Herself and Himself): No one is allowed to call us engaged.

Rules of engagement.

Step One: Come to an agreement on marriage.

Step Two: Decide on the rules of engagement (no pun intended).

Mostly the rules as discussed to this point are about the wedding.

Rule One (as dictated by Him): No poofy white dress.

Rule Two (as dictated by Her): No sneakers with suits.

There are more. Most of his revolve around the idea that this wedding needs as little fuss as possible, and that I'm not allowed to turn into a Bridezilla. Most of mine revolve around the idea that he has to get over his 'wacky' tendancies (see Rule Two) and have an 'adult' experience. We haven't come to massive blows yet, but I think if he continues talking about kilts and getting an uncle/cousin/friend to take a course and become a celebrant to marry us it may be just around the corner... and once he realises I'm already 'researching' options on how/when/where it's a certainty.

Spreading the news

Why is it that deciding to get married is treated like the most amazing piece of news people could ever receive? If I told people 'hey, I really love this guy and I don't think we're going to break up', I can't see them caring much. People don't care about the state of each other's relationships (beyond gossip), so yesterday seemed slightly surreal for me.

After deciding to get married, Himself and I weren't really sure what to do or how to approach the actual practicalities of the rest of the journey. How should we tell our parents and families? Given that we had the rare occassion where both sets were going to be in the same place at the same time, that question was made a little easier. In a week Himself was finally graduating from uni, and we were having an early dinner at our fave cafe, Devour, with his mum, grandma, brother and my parents afterwards to celebrate. So yesterday I watched Himself get a certificate, then sat with butterflies in my stomach over a dinner, unsure of exactly how we were going to bring this up. I had been uncertain, right up to that night, of whether we would really do this. Saying you're going to get married is pretty easy, telling anyone besides yourselves is making it real.

When, mid meal, Himself said "So we're glad you're here together for another reason, too... Herself and I are thinking we should get married." I thought I would throw up. I'm not sure why I'd been so nervous about telling our families. There was no reason to think that anyone in our family would be upset - I get along great with Himself's family and sometimes I'm convinced my parents love him more than they love me. Even given that, I guess there was a part of me that was worried either of our families would think we were rushing into something, or that given we're so financially (and generally) irresponsible, that we weren't ready. If I'm going to be honest, there was also a part of me that was secretly worried that the look on Himself's family member's faces would show me that I was wrong and they weren't really that 'ok' with me, they were just putting up with their son/brother/grandson's partner. Even more honestly, after having gone through the experience once of telling my parents life-changing news they didn't react well to, I was terrified to tell them something they might not like again. The only thing worse than the disappointment on my parent's face when I told them I was pregnant at age 19 was losing the baby to a miscarriage.

This time my news was received a lot better: Himself's mum nearly spoke over the top of his little speech with "Good. When?" and Himself's brother was genuinely delighted, telling us both how great he thought it was. My parents were a little more of a puzzle. As I looked down the table towards them, my nerves were clanging and the butterflies had turned to nausea. It wasn't really helped by the look of surprise and trepedation on my Dad's face, or the shock on my Mum's. My Mum was the first to say anything, with a quick "Really?", and I'm not sure, but I think Dad asked "Are you serious?". When Himself and I kept nodding to confirm we weren't joking Mum looked at Dad and said "He's still waiting for the punch-line". I finally spoke and said "There's no punchline... we're serious". Mum came over to kiss and hug, and Dad leant over to kiss us. At that stage I was pretty scared that we hadn't just surprised them, but that they weren't happy. It didn't take long for Dad to get up and buy a bottle of champagne for us to share, and for me to see that Mum was happy, but I was still uneasy over their reaction.

While Himself left the table to call his Dad, who is living in the Middle East for work, I sat trying to be happy about the idea that this was now real. For the most part, I was still feeling like the whole day was unreal. This probably hadn't been helped by the fact that I didn't sleep the night before, but I think my own emotions over our own private agreement with each other being out in the open was starting to take over. Himself's sister-in-law soon arrived to join in our celebration, and after a drink with everyone and a few standard questions like when, where etc, everyone started to clear out to go back to work, baby bed-times, vet pick-ups and so on.

After everyone left Himself and I were alone, staring at each other accross an empty table. Himself seemed more excited by the whole affair than I was, and we took the quiet minute to call his sister, who had missed dinner as she was working. Her reaction was as expected, happy surprise, and with that all the obligatory family announcements had been made. While all of this had taken only an hour or so, it felt like a huge ordeal and part of me was still tied up in trying to decipher my parent's reactions. Wanting to put my own mind at ease, I decided to call them so I could get on with the rest of my night. I picked up the phone, and when Mum answered I asked "So have you recovered from your surprise yet?" We had a brief chat where I teased them about their reaction and Mum reiterated that they were just taken aback; they really hadn't seen it coming. While Mum repeated on "Dad says he's not sure if he managed to tell you properly, but he's really happy and passes on his congratulations", I started to ease my own mind. After hanging up I was reassured and felt ready to get on with what was due to be a long night.

When we collected our thoughts and ourselves, we went on to the next point for the night. Meeting up with the friend who introduced us (a happy co-incidence that we were set to see him again after his long absence in Sydney) at our fave local hangout in Northcote, Terra Firma. A quick drink with him where we shared our good news went as expected - he didn't really care and said the perfunctory congrats - then we moved on to the last stop of the night. The IsNot Magazine launch for their latest edition. By this stage, I think I was just operating on auto-pilot.

It took about two seconds after we arrived before Himself told our very good friends Jane, Tim and Richard. Given that I had convinced Tim that he couldn't go home after work, he had to come out that night as I had good news for him, they had been speculating before we got there as to what the news was. When we asked well, what do you think, Jane responded "Tim thinks you've changed the name of our company, or you're getting married." We looked at each other, laughed, and confirmed that we were getting married. Both Tim and Jane seemed shocked, but happy. Richard gave the very apt response "Well congratulations on being able to do something I can't!" (the proud gay lad he is). It took me about two seconds to apologise and tell him I didn't have the strength to follow in Brad and Ange's footsteps and refuse to get married until all people had the right to do so. Within about two seconds of that we had managed to tell the ever wonderful Penny, Tash and Mel from IsNot, which earned us some free champagne (thanks Tash!) and about five seconds later (or so it felt) the whole room knew.

While Himself took to the attention like a duck to water, I suddenly found myself overwhelmed and unable to respond to people's reactions. It took a lot for me to convince people that while we were going to get married it wasn't the big spectacular deal that it sounded. Friends and people we didn't really know that well had suddenly turned the spotlight on our relationship. Maybe it's because we are so different in public to the way we are privately, which is a product of the fact that our relationship (particularly around other people) is a combination of work and personal, or maybe we just hide how serious we are about each other, but it felt as if people were quite shocked.

On top of that, it wasn't something I was used to when Himself and I are so rarely a 'couple' in public - we're Him and Her from the magazine or the conference. I was also pretty overwhelmed by the assumptions that come with telling people you are going to Get Married. For us, it's a natural progression of where we are and what we want from our future, it's going to be a chance to have a very informal, personal gathering of the people who matter to us to make a committment to each other. Suddenly all those conversations between Himself and I where he told me he didn't see the point of everyone else being involved in what was, essentially, a very private committment between ourselves, made much more sense. I understood his feelings that our choice to get married really didn't require an audience. Unfortunately, it was a little late to come to that understanding in the middle of a room of people.

So now we're gradually getting around to telling the rest of our friends and family... A few of my oldest friends were away, so in this modern age it's email notification (which is better as people can't over-react). As for the rest of it, I'm not enjoying the 'announcement'...

The non-proposal.

Himself and I have been talking about marriage for a while now. A long time ago, when we first knew each other as friends rather than partners, I used to hear how Himself felt about marriage as absolute. No. Never. Not happening. It didn't worry me - mostly because I didn't think of him as someone I wanted to marry, even when we had started dating. I've always felt like I wanted to get married, but never had that desperate desire, the perfect picture in your mind of a wedding day and perfect husband. Even once we started to become more involved, if the topic were raised I expressed my real feelings; marriage was an option for my life, kids were a deal breaker. No kids, a relationship wouldn't work, no marriage, I couldn't see that it would be the end of a relationship.

As things progressed it wasn't marriage that got discussed anyway, it was the 'deal breaker'... kids. At first, Himself was more anti-child than he was anti-marriage (if that's possible), but after Himself's brother had an adorable baby girl his feelings changed. I look at the way if changed him, his perspective on his own life, our relationship and his family and I thank lots of gods I don't believe in. Not just because it opened him up to the idea of having children, but because it made him more aware that how you feel about something within yourself is fluid. We don't make decisions about our life and stick to them, we discover what feels right as we go along. I saw that allow both him and I to alter ways we acted in lots of areas of our life and make choices about work, home, family and pretty much everything from a more creative place.

From a few months ago Himself and I had been talking about why we weren't in the right time and place to have kids. Mostly it was to remind me that we weren't ready. Our relationship was doing great, we both wanted to have kids (and conveniently, even with each other!), but there was that whole issue of having no financial security, living in a rented home, not being in the best mental and physical health, not having finished uni (for one of us) or wanting to make our own company work (for the other). Despite all that, I've been fighting a tide of hormones and my own desire. While we could come to terms with some of the issues, it was pretty simple to see that there was too much saying 'wait' and not enough saying 'now'.

So how did it move from 'now isn't the right time for kids' to 'let's get married'? It was a conversation where I pointed out that any kids we did have would have to have my name - I wasn't going to have a different name to my children. Himself didn't like that idea at all. I kept reiterating that if I had kids, the only person I could count on to be their family was me. While that sounds pretty offensive to someone that you are considering having children with, I didn't mean that I expected him to walk out, just that as a mother, you carry a child, put your career and life on hold to care for them and hold primary responsibility for them (even if only out of physical necessity) for the first few years of their life. If you do all that, why does a father get naming rights while you are treated like an incubator? They are your child and you are responsible for them - a father gets to chose how much they take on, you are given a whole set of duties and responsibilities you can't walk away from.

During the discussion it evolved that while we were talking about having children very soon, Himself didn't consider that he would be ready to marry anytime soon. I think that shocked me. How could you talk about having kids (which is far more of a commitment than a piece of paper), but not be ready to commit to the person you were talking about having them with? Himself seemed to think that there was no point. Perhaps if we were having a baby there would be a point, but why bother before that? It struck a pretty sore point for me. Our whole relationship has played out as just sort of... happening. We were friends who fell into being workmates, then fell into being housemates, then fell into being a couple. We've never really had to choose to be together, it's just evolved as time has gone on. In a way it's really natural, but sometimes I worry that Himself is just unwilling to change or choose anything in his life. That our relationship is something he has just let happen, rather than decided he wanted. It struck me that if we got married because we were having a baby it would be just one more thing that happened to us (or him). Himself would never, in our whole relationship, have chosen me.

After talking about it for a while, we both got pretty exhausted. Himself had agreed we should get married, I had insisted that he was just giving up, not making a choice, he had said he couldn't win, I had gotten frustrated. The conversation ended with us deciding to leave it for a while, drop the whole issue and try to just get on with living our lives. We had a really busy few months with work and bad health. I didn't forget about the conversation, but there really wasn't time to worry or wonder about it. When we returned from the event we had been working on I flew back home a day after Himself had come back. Finally at home and with no pressure, we both relaxed on the couch. We caught up, enjoyed nothing-ness and when I was at my most tired-yet-content, he turned and said "let's get married". I tried not to get over-excited. I questioned him: was he doing it because he felt like he should? That the issue wouldn't go away so he may as well do it? For two days we went backwards and forwards until last night, where Himself insisted I stop over-analysing what was going on and we agree to do what we both wanted. Get married.

The first people to be told were the guys at the University Hotel bottle shop. We went to buy a good bottle of champagne and a very expensive bottle of whisky to celebrate. The guy behind the counter wanted to know if it was a special occasion so we told him yeah, we decided to get married. That scored us a free gift-bag and a card of congratulations. We came home, lit our candle-filled balcony and enjoyed a drink or two in celebration out in the dark with the city sounds of Collingwood around us. It seems so much more natural to me that we would make the decision to get married together, rather than wait in gender-trapped silence for a man to 'ask'.

So there it is, the non-proposal.

I'm getting married.

Yes, me. Sceptic, (very)closeted-romantic, informal me.