Vancouver, blocks from the proposal (before the question was popped)
My seat from the Denali Lodge offers views of sun-drenched mountaintops brushed with fall colors and raw sedimentary rock. You can tell by the layers of millions of years of earth-work. The Grizzlies and Moose, Caribou and Dall Sheep have chosen a beautiful home here.
Since this vacation began almost two weeks ago in Vancouver, many glorious moments have transpired. The intertubes, at a cost of $30 an hour on the ship, have prohibited my use of this blog as a means of travelogue-ing, and I can’t say that I would have been able to squeeze a post in now and again, anyhow.
But now, just beyond this window, sits six-million acres of Denali National Park, in all of her rugged and natural beauty. Upon my return, I will look out my home’s window and daydream of these mountains and this land and form romantic notions of scrapping it all for a Dodge Sprinter that runs on Straight Vegetable Oil (SVO). And maybe a year from now, that will be precisely what I do, with my now fiancee, David. In the midst of the bear and cubs, beluga and humpback whales, moose and bald eagles, dall porposie and dall sheep, caribou, lunar eclipses, and UFO’s, me man popped the question. We are engaged to be married. And even though I already felt married and couldn’t be more committed, it seems he wants to make this love official, and for that, I will celebrate. I am a lucky woman, for he is a great man.
I have found, weaved between my natural tendencies as a rebel and knee-jerk reaction to the conventional, a sweet spot. Placing herself ever so delicately within the idea declaring a life-long love, this sweet spot is overwhelmed with the beautiful emotion of knowing that the one I love and admire does so back; enough to marry me up and make an honest woman outa me.