Diamonds.

I am seeing Someone New.

Last night, Someone New and I were hanging out at the house; I just moved in yesterday. I have my two kitties back and my allergies are just started to get used to cats again. So I took a Benadryl and then we settled in to watch Bill and Ted's Bogus Journey. But before the bogus journey commenced, we happened to catch the end of a diamond commercial. Which clearly meant that it was time for me to launch into my anti-engagement ring rant once again.

"Engagement rings are stupid," I said. Yeah. Not a good beginning for a rant. Be kind; I was all woozy from the Benadryl and not as sharp as I usually am. I continued, "If I ever get married, I don't want a diamond ring."

Someone New has not yet learned to ignore me when I start in on meaningless tangents. And so he took the bait. "Why not?"

"Small children get their hands cut off for diamonds," I answered.

"That's what I thought you'd say," he said.

I let a few seconds go by. He likely thought I was done. But I wasn't. "Plus there's the whole symbolic thing."

"Which is?"

"Oh, you know. 'I own you. Now I shall tag you with this shiny ring to display my ownership.' I used to tell people that if I ever got engaged, I wanted a red velvet engagement sofa. Nothing says commitment like expensive furniture." He didn't laugh at the punchline. He just gave me a skeptical sidelong glance. So I refrained from the next part of the now-nearly-scripted monologue, in which I state that men don't give women diamond rings because they want to; men give women diamond rings because they have to.

I've always assumed that if I ever got married, I'd be the one proposing. I don't have the patience to sit around and wait for someone else to do the asking. And who needs romance anyway? But after viewing that diamond commercial with Someone New, I got to thinking.

Just once, I wanna be all girly. If I'm going to eventually succumb to marriage, I want someone to plan something stupid-romantic. I don't want a diamond ring, I don't want to fling my left hand under my girlfriends' noses so they can survey and assess it. I'll take an engagement sofa. Hell, I'll take an engagement very-high-thread-count set of crimson colored sheets. But I'm tired of being the anti-romantic. I want the fairy tale, dammit. Sans diamond.