Married Twice...Proposed to? Never! Part 1

Depending upon how you view this, I have had either the luck or misfortune of being married twice. 

This was not part of my life's vision. I fully expected to be happily married for many, many, many years, following in the footsteps of my parents and maternal grandparents, who made being married look so flawlessly simple.  But, hey, life doesn't always unfold the way we expect.

I met my first husband in my last year of university. He won my heart by taking my hand and kissing it, telling me he thought I needed that. That was all it took, an innocent gesture that I thought showcased his true self.

The courting ritual was pretty standard; meals out, a movie here and there, the occassional flowers sent, a gift for this or that, meeting friends and being introduced to family. Normal stuff.

He was a bit of a rebel and his sense of adventure drew me in. It was exciting and titilating! A couple of years older than me, he had his own place that he shared with two female roommates (think Jack Tripper a la Three's Company) and worked full time. Very different from the university boys I had been dating. Things were going well and he began to talk about travelling the world. I was TOTALLY on board with this! So, off we went to Australia!

I thought he was my prince charming! Whisking me off to a foreign place, half way around the world!  I won't go into details of how blind I was to the reality of our relationship (saving that for another day and another post) but I did move in with him.

As a young girl, I can remember dreaming about the day the man of my dreams would propose.  In my mind, there were rose petals scattered along a path in the park next to where I lived.  Candles would light up a spot under a beautiful weeping willow, where the man in front of me would be down on bended knee, proclaiming how I was his world and professing his undying love for me.  There would be tears in his eyes as he takes out a little blue box and says, "Audrey...you complete me.  I can't imagine my life without you, will you marry me?" 

I remember that day like it happened only yesterday but there were no rose petals, no billowing trees, no vanilla scented candles, no man on bended knee with a little box and no "I love you more that the sun, the moon and the universe".

Wanna know what I got? Well, I'm gonna tell you...

It was early evening and we were sitting on our futon, eating noodles from the local Thai place.  We had just gone for a roller blade in the park (yes, so close to my dream but yet so far away!) and were famished.  As we stuffed our faces, he looked over to me and said, so matter of factly, "I guess the next step would be marriage, right?" 

Looking up from my plate of noodles, I replied, "I suppose", wondering why he would ask such a random question, out of the blue.

Taking another bite of his dinner, he continued, "Ok, how does March work?"

"For what?" I asked, completely confused.

"To get married. This way you can take March Break off?"

"Sounds ok," I muttered, completely horrified and disappointed that I had just experienced and witnessed the most pathetic marriage proposal of all time.  That is, until husband number two...