Wedding Blog

I sort of knew the proposal was coming. The minute Mr. Robin told me that we would spend the rest of our lives together on the phone, I knew. We had been very careful to make no statements of commitment that we could not back up out of respect for each other. This is mostly because last February we took four months apart while Mr. Robin lived in Mexico to figure out our relationship, because after a year we had reached the point of either committing to marriage or not dating any longer. We were not together as a couple during these months (though after about a month we began talking over Skype at least once a week for several hours). Sometimes when I am feeling silly, and people ask “how long have you been dating?’ I answer: “Three months.”

So for him to say something about “forever” was Major (with a capital M)! And then he started saying things like “After we are married…” or “In a few years…” Ummm, did I miss the proposal? But no, little did I know that Mr. Robin had sneaked off to my parent’s house, in far away Sherwood, and asked their permission to marry me. However, the question plagued him about where to do the formal question popping.

Meanwhile, we had been planning a last minute trip to Mexico for a few weeks, to visit his good friends, and so we could attend la Feria in Zacatecas. He thought, well it has to be special because this moment only comes once, so why not wait until Mexico? THREE weeks away. I was dying of anticipation and my poor mother, who knew it was coming with certainty, was forced to tell one other person each day to keep her sanity. (Thanks all those people for keeping the secret!)

I, who was tingling with anticipation every day, was starting to get a bit irritated and scared after three and a half weeks of sans engagement by the time we reached Zacatecas. But the city is gorgeous. The most amazing colonial city tucked away in the mountains, with almost no American tourists. I had really wanted to eat at La Quinta Real, a former bullfighting ring turned luxury hotel, and so our second night in town Mr. Robin and I strolled beneath the colonial aqueduct, around fountains and over the cobblestones to La Quinta (everyone but me would realize where this was going) and ate a fabulous meal of sopa tortilla, steak and fine wine at their restaurant. This is the view from our table out into what used to be the floor of the bullring.

As we are walking back to the lobby through the glassed in walkway atop the bullring, Mr. Robin suddenly walks up to one of the doors out onto the former seats, and casually lifts the lever that locks the door and pulls on my hand. “Let’s go out here.” It is obvious that this is not a public area, as some seats are still crumbling and if there is something to know about Mr. Robin and I, it is that I am the rule follower, and he is the rule breaker. Which means that I immediately start babbling something like this, “I don’t think we can be out here… I mean, I don’t think that this is a public… They are going to kick us out…”

At this point Mr. Robin turns on the steps to look at me and says with a smile, “You think they will kick us out?” To which I nod vigorously. “Do you think they will kick us out soon?” More desperate nodding and a pull on his hand to get back to the safety of the hallway (I also have a thing with heights). “Well then I better do this quick” and with that he dropped to one knee, and I forgot about where we were, and the height, and everything. He began to say amazing things about thinking long and hard about this, about wanting me as his wife, about following God, and how I could and should take time and think about my answer.

It was at this point that I, crying, dropped to my knees and said “YES!” Though I said it into his shoulder because I was hugging him so hard, he had to peel me off and get me to say it again, intelligibly this time. And then we took this series of photos.

The Robins, newly engaged

The spot where it happened

After that we, grinning hugely, walked downstairs to the hotel bar. This bar is amazing, as it is where they used to keep the bulls before fights and so is warren of arches and private cubby holes. We took the most private cubby and ordered a fat Cuban cigar and Banderas to celebrate. A Bandera is a sipping drink that is composed of a shot glass of lime juice, a shot glass of tequila, and a shot glass of sangrita (a sweet, spicy tomato juice). And there we sat and discussed all manner of things for hours as dusk fell into night, the hotel lit up around us, and the cigar became just a stub.

In the end I am glad that Mr. Robin waited until we could have this amazing memory of getting engaged. Before I thought I was ready to throttle him because I didn’t know why he was determined to have it be a special moment, because that question will make any moment special. But we will forever have this magic night, and I am glad that he planned it out in detail.