Life Is a Mix CD, Part Seven

Dallas Mix (December 2004)

1. Zebrahead “Playmate of the Year”
2. Remy Zero “Fair”
3. Blink 182 “What's My Age Again”
4. Boxcar Racer “I Feel So”
5. Carole King “Will You Love Me Tomorrow?”
6. Chicago “You're the Inspiration”
7. Jimmy Eat World “Last Christmas”
8. Eisley “Treetops”
9. Elton John “Tiny Dancer”
10. Peter Gabriel “In Your Eyes”
11. Rilo Kiley “A Better Son/Daughter”
12. Simon and Garfunkel “The Sound of Silence”
13. Wheatus “Teenage Dirtbag”
14. The Killers “Mr. Brightside”
15. U2 “With or Without You”
16. Weezer “Say It Ain't So”

I have referenced High Fidelity a lot in this series of blogs, but I must again turn to the wisdom of Mr. John Cusack. These blogs are all about listening to music autobiographically, and High Fidelity is pretty much all about listening to music autobiographically. The last lines in High Fidelity are a John Cusack monologue: “I've started to make a tape, in my head, for Laura. Full of stuff she'd like. Full of stuff that'd make her happy. For the first time I can sorta see how that's done.” That is what this mix was for me. I was attempting to get out of myself and make a mix full of stuff Liz truly likes. Sure, our tastes had started to merge a little bit. We had been dating for over a year, after all. We had been living in the same city for four months. I hadn't grown tired of spending time with her. I still missed her when we were apart, and we were apart too much for my tastes. We were sleeping under our parents' roofs. I was also working a lot of hours between the three jobs I was holding to make ends meet, which kept me away from Liz some nights. There were some nights at the end of a 12 or 13 hour work day, that I would still go over and spend an hour or two with Liz after I got off. It was important in this mix to show her I could be unselfish, that I could cater to her needs. I also wanted the mix to show her I accepted her for who she was and not who I expected her to be. It was important because I was about to ask her to marry me.

Liz and I knew at this point we wanted to spend the rest of our lives with one another and had discussed getting married at length, but nothing official. We couldn't make our engagement official in Amarillo. Liz didn't want that, and I realize in retrospect that neither did I. I just had to figure out how and when to get out of town. Despite my three jobs, I didn't have much money at all. My pride would no longer allow me to work in food services, so I was working for beans at an elementary school as a technology assistant. I had to take a few supplementary part-time gigs assisting with a GED class and working as a cashier at Cracker Barrel (with the caveat that I was not going to handle any food). So in late November or early December, I went and bought the ring and began planning a trip out of town for New Year's 2006. Dallas was the best I could do because I knew we'd have a free place to stay and we could drive. I didn't have the money to fly and stay anywhere. I labored over this decision. I just didn't know if Dallas was romantic enough or far enough away. In the end, I didn't really have a choice, but if I were to do it all over again, I would end up doing it exactly how it ended up happening.

The mix has a lot of songs I knew Liz liked. I didn't even try and put things on there I thought she might like. These had to be songs that I knew she liked. That showed that I knew her. She introduced me to some of it, namely Rilo Kiley. Still, I put her favorite Rilo Kiley song on here. There are, of course, some great movie soundtrack songs on the compilation, including “In Your Eyes” from Say Anything (we both love John Cusack movies) , “Tiny Dancer” from Almost Famous (a movie moment we had both reflected on in conversation), “Fair” from Garden State (a movie we had seen together and thoroughly enjoyed after getting together, and “Teenage Dirtbag” from Loser (another movie we had watched many times). “Last Christmas” was thrown on because Christmas had just passed and Jimmy Eat World and Ben Folds is where we had found some common ground in music. These two are still our common ground base groups. It's what we default to when we can't agree on what to listen to. At this point, I guess I also have to out Liz as a Chicago fan. I have come to terms with her fan-dom. I still find their music incredibly corny, but I love that part of Liz, too. I even remember her reaction when we listened to this mix on the way to Dallas. She got pretty excited when “You're the Inspiration” came on.

So on December 30^th, we hopped in my truck, this mix in hand, bound for DFW. I know she sensed something was up from the beginning, but I masqueraded our trip to Dallas as an excuse to get out of town and see some friends. Face it, we both needed an excuse to get out—we had both been trapped in Amarillo since I had moved back and did desperately need to get out. We stayed with the Jacksons, who I considered my second family in college. I still consider them as close as family today. I called before coming to plan out the how and the where I would propose. I wanted the proposal itself to be private, just me and Liz. We had spent the previous New Year's Eve at a party at my friend Jason's apartment and some guy his girlfriend to marry him there. The thing is, I don't think he knew half of the people at the party. Liz and I discussed this proposal at length and both agreed that we would both enjoy something far more private.

We got up on New Year's Eve 2004, and I tried to play off that I was going to surprise her and take her somewhere. I drove her to the Dallas Arboretum, which is a beautiful place, even in the dead of winter there are still lots of plants in bloom and they have a lot of ornate fountains. We walked around hand-in-hand. Liz began to giggle. I knew she sensed what was coming, but I wanted to find the perfect, private place to ask her the big question. My palm was sweaty and I kept asking “What?” at all of her giggles. Trying to hide what was coming and doing a very poor job of it. I found this walled in garden with a bench in the middle of it and proposed that we sit down. Now at this point, I don't remember exactly what I said. I was as nervous as hell and was sweating despite the cool temperatures. It wouldn't have been a proposal from me without it being at least a little awkward. I got down on one knee with ring in hand and asked the question, “Will you marry me?” She immediately said yes and her giggles turned to tears of joy. Despite my trek for privacy, we had been overheard. Above us, after a kiss, came the sound of a few strangers clapping and wishing us congratulations. I love that part of the story actually. It made the moment a little more special, receiving immediate congratulations. It also seemed fitting that Liz, who thrives on the stage, to get a little applause at one of the biggest moments of both of our lives.

Here is the exact spot where I proposed on the exact day I proposed:

That night we spent celebrating and ringing in the new year with my friends the Jacksons and Liz's friend Lisa. My sister and her boyfriend (my now brother-in-law) also happened to be in Dallas visiting a friend and got to pop by to congratulate us. I remember by the end of the day, my face hurt a lot from smiling. I know at the beginning of the day, I felt she might be a little disappointed we couldn't go somewhere a little more extravagant or romantic to get engaged, but by the end of the day, we were both happy to be somewhere where we could celebrate with close friends.

The next six months were a blur of planning a wedding, Liz getting her teacher certification, Liz getting a job as a teacher, finding a house to live in in Pampa, and a lot of work on my part, including a stint of about 6 weeks where I was working 80 hours a week on Monday through Friday. It all came together in the end and we were married on July 30^th of 2005. We honeymooned in New York City, where we saw a few Broadway shows and a few of the sights, dined on great food every night, and quite frankly, spent a lot of time sleeping off the blur and exhaustion of the previous six months. And, as I am sure we will one day hear Bob Saget narrate on How I Met Your Mother, “And that, kids, is the story of how I met your mother.”