The Story of a Lifetime - Engagement and Wedding Story

Shelley and I are writing another installment in our The Story of a Lifetime series.

This one is what was our Engagement and Wedding like?

We got engaged September 19, 1998 and I have to be honest I don't remember a lot of the details leading up to it or about the evening. I was extremely nervous and was a little unsure about my decision.

I had only been divorced for about 18 months and was really concerned that I was making a poor decision. Shelley was the only person I had dated since my divorce and now I was going to ask her to marry me, I just knew this was not a wise decision. But, I also knew I loved her incredibly and really couldn't see spending my life without her.

Shelley and I had talked about marriage but we had not set any time tables so this was going to be somewhat of a surprise so I was also a little unsure what her response would be. Plus, I didn't even have a ring to give her because I had made a decision to let her pick out her own ring. This turned out to be a good thing because I would never had bought the ring she picked out but that is another post for another time.

I made reservations at a restaurant called Barclays (it is now out of business) and explained to them that I was going to ask my girlfriend to marry me. Well, it was run by a bunch of women and they were really disappointed that I didn't have a ring or really any solid plans on how I wanted to pull this off. I just planned on asking her without any drama like the waiter delivering a glass of champagne with a ring in the bottom in it.

I picked Shelley up and like I said, I have no idea what she was wearing or what I was wearing. We went to the restaurant and had a nice dinner and during the dinner I kept trying to determine how I was going to do this. I kept having the thought "I should have planned this better" running through my head because I didn't even have a speech or script planned. So I had something real poetic like "I want to spend the rest of my life with you" and I assume she said yes since we have two children now but I don't remember her response.

We set our marriage date for June 12, 1999 and decided we would get married on a beach in Destin, Florida. I highly recommend the beach wedding to anyone.

The entire event was very simple. There were just a few guests and they were just our immediate family and we all stayed in a Bed and Breakfast right on the beach. The ceremony was scheduled to start at 7 pm and just hours before we were all playing in the ocean.

Shelley wore a dress her mom had made and no shoes and I wore a suit with shoes. In fact, none of Shelley's side of the family wore shoes and my entire family did. This was definitely an indicator of some of our differences. We were married by a notary because notarys can marry people in Florida. The ceremony was short and simple and some people who were taking a walk on the beach decided to stop and watch so we did have a few extra guests.

After the ceremony ended we had some time to kill because our reservations at a local restaurant weren't until 8:30 PM so we sat and watched game 6 of the Stanley Cup playoffs between the Dallas Stars and Buffalo Sabres.

How is that for a wedding day? Play in the ocean, get married, watch hockey and then go to dinner. It really turned out to be a perfect day.