I feel like our generation has realized that getting married is an extremely important decision. We've seen divorce all over. Most of the people around now grew up in a time where divorce was no longer taboo and although it may not be easy, it's easier now than it was 50 years ago... unless you're Catholic and need the Pope's permission, then you're screwed. The point is that now we know that marriage isn't just about being in love. Marriage is a legal contract between two people. Marriage is sharing everything and splitting your assets if it doesn't work out. Marriage is a really big decision.
That being said, I don't believe that it's necessary to get married. Marriage has its benefits: lower insurance rates, it makes it easier to buy a home, awesome wedding shower gifts. It also makes sense if you're planning on having a child, adopting a child, or if you're concerned about your rights if your spouse needs serious medical care, but you don't need to do it anymore -- it's not the 1950s.
Since I was 19, I've had 3 serious relationships -- two of them lasting over 3 years, the third relationship being the one I'm in now. With the first relationship, we both lived with our parents and although I wanted to get married to him when we first started dating, eventually I just wanted to live with him and have dogs instead of kids. As for relationship #2, we lived together with dogs and I was getting older and thinking about marriage and children more and more, but he wasn't the marrying type and eventually it ended. Now I'm in a relationship where we're both on the same page. Marriage, house, children -- it all makes sense to both of us.
My boyfriend and I have been planning to get married for a little bit now. In order to relieve a little bit on tension about getting older and not having our lives completely together, we made a 5 Year Plan and marriage was in it. My boyfriend moved into my rented hours and when he moved in, the basement was a disaster. It was filled with old junk and water-damaged carpet. We made a deal that when the basement was redone, I would get a ring. The basement was done in May, but then there came the added bonus of saving the money to buy this ring.
I shopped around on jewelry websites looking for styles I like and price ranges. It made more sense to me to buy the set outright rather than have to go back and buy a wedding band. I found a few styles I likes and pinned them to my secret Pinterest board. I'm not a person of expensive tastes. I don't want a big ring -- I want something sparkly that won't be cumbersome and I don't think that a ring needs to be excessive amounts of money. I don't need something that says "I love you this many dollars worth" -- no one is going to know how much you spent on the ring unless you tell them. You could get cubic zirconia and sterling silver -- no one is going to be examining your ring that closely. Seriously. The rings that I liked were around $800-$1000 and that was fine with me.
In order to save money, I took over my boyfriends finances; I made him spend less money on cigarettes, whiskey and going out to eat and put more money in his savings. It took a few months, but we were able to save enough money. Personally, I just wanted to go to the store and find out what size I was and then order the ring online, but my boyfriend insisted that we shop in store because jewelry looks different in person. I think that I have a pretty good eye for buying jewelry online, but he's the one buying this thing so it's his choice.
The plan was to go look at the rings on the Saturday after the 4th of July, but on the 4th, we woke up early and had no idea what to do with ourselves on this bonus day off. We had a barbecue in the afternoon, but what were we supposed to do all morning? There is a mall a quarter mile away from our house so we decided to go ring shopping that day instead. It's an outlet mall so there aren't as many jewelry stores as other malls. The rings I really liked were from Zales and there was a Zales outlet so it was perfect.
The first jewelry store we happened to pass by was Kay. I had looked at their stuff online and wasn't very impressed by it, but it was right in front of us so we might as well check it out. Three different people helped us including the store manager -- they weren't pushy. They were very polite, but they never asked us our price range and were showing us $6000 rings -- those were a little out of our price range. Of course, they kept offering us a line of credit, but we aren't trying to get ourselves into any more debt than we're already in. I found a ring I liked but it definitely wasn't my favorite and it was on sale for $3000. We politely told them that we were going to look around some more and come back.
The mall is set up like a race track which forces you to walk by every single store with an exception of two short cuts. We kept walking until we found the Zales Outlet. One of the woman's first questions was "What is your budget?" and when we told her, she directed us right to the section where we could look. I found one of the rings I had likes online and it was exactly how I pictured it. It was also under our $1000 budget so it was perfect. My boyfriend and I have an extensive collection of Chuck Taylors and there is also a Converse Outlet in the mall so we were able to each get a pair of Chucks and go out to dinner on the money we have saved.
Now we have to keep saving to pay for a wedding...
On the 4th, my boyfriend tried to get my dad alone so that he could ask for my hand in marriage because "it's the right thing to do." The whole ordeal made him extremely nervous and he never even had a chance to ask. I'm not interested in giant proposals with all of my friends and family there -- I just want something quiet and chill. I keep giving him ridiculous ideas like putting the ring in a pizza box or around the straw of a Slurpee. The ring will take 1-2 weeks to get sized. Then I'll be really nervous.
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