After he told me he loved me at the fountain, it was like we couldn't stop saying it. He whispered it to me in church the next day. We said it at the end of every phone call (I was actually beginning to look forward to the end of the conversation so I could hear him tell me he loved me!!!) We were two crazy kids in love who couldn't stop talking about how much we loved each other. I thought it was great, my roommates thought it was gross! hahaha... I would write "Joseph loves Tara" and "T hearts J" all over the white boards in the apartment. I was head over heels crazy in love with this boy, and I had never been happier in my whole life.
Now it was conference weekend. My secret hope going into this weekend is that there would be LOTS of talks about marriage which would springboard us into a great conversation. The first session I watched on my own because he had to work, and I felt like ALL of those talks were about marriage and having babies. Man how I wished he was listening to this! I drove to Lehi and watched the second session with him there. And then helped him with homework until he had to go to Priesthood session.
The next day he came to my apartment and we watched the first session together, had Easter lunch at my aunts house, and then went to his place for the last session with his family. The whole Van Zant crew was getting together for Easter. His sister was so adorable and made little easter baskets for all the nieces and nephews with little $5.00 bill rings. She folded the bill so it made a ring and put it inside a plastic egg. My mom had teased with me just the day before that he might have a ring in an egg to give to me. He actually did open one of the eggs and handed me the ring and said, "Don't say I never got you a ring!" That was such a surprise, because at this point we hadn't talked about marriage at all, and now he's teasing me about a ring. I laughed and said I didn't want that ring. Later his sister folded her 50 dollar bill into a ring, and he tried to give that one to me too! I liked that it was 10 times better than the last ring he gave me, but still I wasn't interested.
His family is nice and big, and every year they draw names to see who buys who a birthday present. His little sister is dating someone seriously, and she was writing the names to draw. She said, "Oh awkward, do we include these people?" She pointed at her boyfriend and at me. We laughed and Joseph's brother in law said, "Well it depends on how serious you guys are!" This brother in law has teased us since day one about when we were getting married, so this wasn't something out of the ordinary. But it did leave for an awkward giggle.
While we were in the car driving back from Lehi to Salt Lake I told him how much I loved his family. They are seriously one of the greatest groups of people there is, and I have loved every encounter I have had with them. I joked about how I even liked the brother in law who likes to tease us... somehow that lead Joseph to ask me... "So... how serious are we?" I was super taken aback by this question. Leading up to this he had said a lot of times how he wants to date for a year before he gets married. So I didn't think we'd be having serious conversations like this for a while. He asked how serious we were and I said, I mean... I kinda love you! He said, "kinda?" and I said I really loved him. Then he said, "I really love you too... and I would love to marry you."
My heart dropped. I know this wasn't an engagement by any means, but we were talking marriage, and I had wanted to talk about this since our third date when I started planning which pictures we would hang in our home. I asked him, "would you get me a better ring than the one oh just tried to give me?" When he said yes I was sold! He started to ask me what I wanted out of marriage, we talked about children, we talked about where we want to live, we talked about everything I could think of talking about. I have never had so much fun with one conversation in my whole life.
That night after he dropped me off it hit me. He wants to marry me. This boy is choosing to live with me forever. He wants to be with me through all my ups and all my downs. He loves me enough to want me to be his eternal companion! And I could not want anything more than to be his wife!
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