engaged

Jill:
When Stuart and I got engaged, we knew what sort of a ring we wanted. We wanted one with three stones, Jesus in the middle, Stuart on side and me the other and that’s what we got.
I was an English major and I had all these romantic ideas of what my husband would say to me when he put that ring on my finger. And I thought it would be sorta of Wordsworthy or Shakespearian or, you know I had all these little dreams.
Well we got engaged in the middle of rush hour in Liverpool. It wasn’t a very romantic spot but it was how it had to be. We got the ring, rushed back over the street got in the car, and I waited for these wonderful poetic words. And my husband put, well he wasn’t my husband then, my fiancé put this on my finger and said, ‘Well Jill, That’s that.’
Well I thought we’ve got a whole lifetime, I’ll buy some poetry books and get going on this and see what we can do. And at the end of that, sort of a little bit in shock, he went back to inspecting banks and catching criminals and I went home. At the end of the day Stuart and I went to my mom, and she was on the phone with a friend of hers who had a jewelry store. And she had promised this woman, without telling me, that we’d get the ring from her. So its now very embarrassing, I’m flashing this ring in front of her – my mother throws the phone at me and says, ‘well you explain.’ And so I get on the phone and I say ‘oh Mrs Kennle I’m so sorry we’ve already got the ring but, maybe next time.’ And it was then that Stuart took the phone out of my hand put it down, took me in his arms and said ‘Jill, there won’t be a next time because remember; that’s that.’
And suddenly those two little words: ‘that’s that’ became the bedrock of our marriage.
And they kept me faithful and in faith through many a strain that came as we left the banking world went into missions were separated for months on end for about ten years. And sometimes very lonely I would sit in my little cottage and struggle and then I would remember ah! – that’s that. That’s that -for better for worse, for richer for poorer, in sickness and in health till death us do part.

Stuart:
Hearing that story again just makes me think, ‘boy is she lucky.’