the whirlwind named engagement

It has been an incredibly long time since I last posted. I think it's safe to say that the more eventful my life is the less I post, so yes, the months from November-February have been very eventful!

I November I was working hard at school and really feeling the weight of the marriage decision. How can we be prepared to make such a huge decision? It was exciting for sure, and yet scary because the next 75+ years hold so much uncertainty. And yet I felt (and do feel) ready for that amazing partnership called marriage. And it is so comforting to know that whatever storms come, we will be facing them together. And on the sunny days (like today in Nottingham) we can just enjoy each other and this beautiful world God has made.

I had a lovely break at home during Christmas. On Christmas Eve Stephen proposed (and what a ring!) and we reveled in our engagement bliss for a few days before setting down to business. The need to get to work right away felt unfortunate but necessary since I don't live in CT anymore and it's hard to do a lot of things from a distance. We weighed the options on when- before or after I finished my second year in England- and decided we wanted to start our life together right away rather than deal with a whole extra unnecessary year of long-distance engagement. So the current plan is, summer wedding and Stephen moves to London with me!

January was probably one of the toughest months I've ever been through, which seems ridiculous considering there was no real tragedy that occurred, but my emotions had been at a feverpitch since November at this point, and 12 hour days at the library and 3 very important exams and 1 project and planning a wedding in the back of my mind left me exhausted. Knowing I would get to marry Stephen in the summer did so much to get me through! Months like January make me wonder if a Ph.D. is really the right plan for me, at least in the immediate future.

February was filled with its own stress- wedding stress. This was surely better than January's academic stress, though it was an emotional roller coaster all its own. Everyday I found a venue I liked or a dress, only to find the next day that it was too expensive, unavailable, or the posted information had been a mistake. It was literally happening every day- it's actually comical. And yet February was a pretty great month. I enjoyed going to afternoon tea with the ladies in my church small group, stayed at The Burn (an old scottish mansion) for a weekend with some fellow marshall scholars and did lots of great hiking & walking, and discovered that I'm really interested in the newest theories in International Trade Economics.

I thought that class might be boring because I took Trade at UConn, but the material is drastically different and very current. For example one of the topics we studied was how productivity differences between firms may be responsible for their internal decisions to export to foreign countries or establish affiliates there whom can serve that market directly. This has big implications for globalization and perhaps explains why multinational corporations are so much more productive than firms that just serve their domestic markets. Another closely related topic is firm organization: do firms want to vertically integrate (i.e. do everything 'in house') or outsource? And will they outsource or integrate within developed countries like the US or UK, or will they outsource or integrate in the developing world? The Trade literature suggests that these decisions are the result of productivity differences as well. I'm planning to do my masters dissertation on something in this field.

This brings us to March, the present. I can't believe it's already March! My first year in England has gone by so fast (and I know the countdown to the wedding will too). After lots of drama about when we can get married (since getting my visa for next year has become complicated) we finally found a place and a caterer this week. I have never been so excited to hear from a caterer in my life (perhaps not surprising). We haven't signed contracts yet so I'm not going to mention specifics since I have too many times seen promising things fall through, but suffice it to say I am pleased and excited. If our current arrangement works out, I'll be Mrs. Michelle Parlos in 143 days.

And now I will confess, my amazing power of concentration which has served me so well in all the years of my education, my super ability to focus and block out distractions for long hours on end, is now failing me miserably. It has become such a struggle to focus on economics for more than 45 minutes at a time. I'm hoping this was temporary and now that we've found a place and date things should get back to normal. But I still need to find a dress (and they're too expensive over here with the exchange rate), a photographer, bridesmaid dresses, florist & centerpieces, favors, ahhh the list goes on and on! I'm going to need to be more disciplined going forward.

One area of my life that has improved dramatically in the last few weeks is my health & fitness. I've been on a fresh fruit & veggie spree for about 2 weeks now and exercising multiple times a week for more than the last 3 (this is a huge improvement over the previous situation). I have to say, I feel pretty good (though much hungrier!) One drawback to the wedding anxiety was that it was really cutting into my sleep, though this week has been better. Stephen and I are excited to get fit for starting our lives together, sort of as a commitment that we will not 'let ourselves go' now that we're "stuck" with each other forever :) I'm excited about us both being healthy and it's fun cooking with fresh foods. There is one main issue when it comes to my cooking : sauces. I don't really like the store-bought sauces I've tried but I just don't know how to make good sauce myself. I have learned recently how to make risotto, which is pretty easy and always provides me with several meals. I'm trying to stick to a plant-based diet as much as possible (less meat, more fruit & veg) because I've heard this is much healthier and certainly couldn't hurt.

I can see why it helps to have a long engagement (so much to do!) but I'm very thankful we're getting married this summer. Days like today when it's so sunny I can actually close my eyes and feel the sun's warmth on my face, I get to reflecting on how everyone is so wrapped up in their own life story (for example, hearing if a caterer has my day open means soo much more to me than basically anyone else) and we're all walking around, hopefully interacting a bit, but our lives can be so different. Through it all, God's story is the meta-narrative. Perspective, that valuable mind-state, is so crucial to keeping our priorities in line- this is definitely one of the lessons I've learned in the past 4 months. I am looking forward to the upcoming day when we two will become one, and our life stories will be so completely intertwined. I am by nature a very independent person who is not afraid of spending time alone, and I think God has used this in the past. Yet the companionship of marriage (which seems so completely different from a long distance relationship) looks so sweet. I cannot wait for it to begin & grow.

(Hanging out at The Burn in Scotland)