About a year ago, I asked my mother for my grandmother’s diamonds. She died in 2001, soon after Erin and I started dating. They aren’t large, but they are meaningful; her engagement stone has been in another setting for twenty-odd years (my grandfather died in 1972), and has been worn by both mom and my late grandmother.

About six months ago, she brought them to me in Houston.

About three weeks ago, I took them to a local jeweler, who agreed to create a ring around them.

About noon today, I picked up a new ring made of Mimi’s stones plus one new one. It is beautiful.

Until about three today, I’d planned to use this ring on Sunday night, the third anniversary (“Sunday after Thanksgiving”) of our first date, a U2 concert in Dallas in 2001.

At about 3:05 today, I realized waiting until Sunday was no longer a possibility.

At 3:10 today, I rejected the plan offered by Certain Longtime Heathen Readers to wait until the security checkpoint at IAH on Friday (basically, insist that the metal detector’s buzz is “because of this pesky thing in my pocket; honey, come here and see if it buzzes if you carry it,” and pull a bit of a Jumbotron trick in front of the TSA goons).

At 6:00 today, I picked up The Girl. At this point, I was still a bit woozy from the whole prospect.

At 6:05 today, she said, when asked, that we should go to Tafia for cocktail food.

At 6:06 today, I hatched a pseudoplan.

At 6:30 today, she obligingly complained that she’d not gotten a manicure ahead of our aforementioned trip this weekend, and that therefore her nails didn’t look as good as she’d like.

At 6:31 today, I took her left hand, still profferred for examination in re: nail care, and kneeled in the middle of the Tafia lounge. “I have something that may fix the nail problem.”

At 6:31:05 today, we became engaged.

Goddamn, we’re happy.