Being engaged is a weird place to be sometimes.
I am decidedly not married. I slipped and referred to Scruffy as my Husband and got an well-intended earful. I can't file taxes as married. I have no legal say in anything Scruffy does, and no rights to his property. And while we are *planning* to make a life-long commitment to each other, it has not yet been made.
It's weird, when you're looking for someone, dating someone, or committed to someone, you think of getting engaged as having a certain finality. Not so, I am discovering from many a married friend. I've gotten lots of Free Advice over the past months about what it's like to be married, what I should do at the wedding, and of course, horror stories about marriages and engagements gone wrong. But the upshot is that being engaged and being married are very different.
No, I am not married. Not until I walk down the aisle and say, "I do." Presumably Scruffy will say the same. Otherwise I'ma look really dumb.
But I'm also decidedly not single. This was driven home at a wedding I attended recently. When the bride went to throw the bouquet, I caught myself starting to shuffle to the clump of single women. I realized I had already achieved the "goal" of that little exercise: I was engaged to be married. It was an odd feeling, sitting with my married friends, watching a ritual of which I was no longer a part, not really being a part of either group.
But the weirdest thing for me is day-to-day stuff. Saying, "my fiance," which sounds pretentious to me, but saying anything else is inaccurate. Realizing Girls Night will now actually mean a night out with the girls, instead of an attempt to find a man. Coming home to kids that are not legally my step kids, and certainly not my genetic issue*, but still look to me for guidance and tutelage.
There's good stuff, too. Planning the wedding with my Mom has been an excuse for us to talk on the phone every day, and its brought us so much closer. Planning things with Scruffy is awesome too, because every time we think about it, we get happy. And stressed. But mostly happy.
This is a transitional period, and I suppose its meant to be. It's just weird sometimes.
*I use this term here it's archaic sense, meaning "to issue forth". They aren't issues. They're adorable.
