Since people have been asking...

A lot...and I mean a LOT of people have been shocked, stunned, and surprised by recent events. I think the most common question has been "How do you go from not even seeing anyone nor wanting to see anyone romantically to planning a wedding in less than a week?"
Seems like a fair question. Particularly considering my mindset over the past...oh, I don't know, 2-1/2 to 3 years?And since the story tends to be a bit long, emotionally intensive (for me) and not easy to say in an orderly, concise fashion, I have decided to post it up here and let you all (who want to) read it.
I wrote about what Greg meant to me (here; http://darthweasel.blogspot.com/2006/04/greg-fischer-462005.html )
and then about how it affected my thinking (http://darthweasel.blogspot.com/2006/04/how-is-this-for-change.html)
In fact, thoughts revolving around his life and passing have pretty much dominated my thinking for a few weeks. With the exception of the Dark Mistress crapfest (http://darthweasel.blogspot.com/2006/04/oh-dark-mistress-how-I-adore-thee.html) I have not written anything even attempting to be funny for several weeks now.
Well, other thoughts entered my head, too. It was lonely for them. They echoed a lot, so I heard each thought a multitude of times. Sometimes they would think in rounds. Kind of like "Row, row, row your boat"" except without talent or rhythm.
Some of those thoughts had to do with family. It was really cool that the twins (and Deb's husband, my loved and respected cunado Gabe) were able to come up for the funeral. All the kids sans Sue hung out together several times. And Emily was invited to virtually every function. Not only is she friends with Stanica, but Deb likes her a lot. Even Dad...he once shocked me by saying, "Where is Emily? Haven't seen her around lately . I really like her." He has never expressed that sort of sentiment before.
So several family members have commented on how much they like my friend. In an emotionally difficult time, it was natural to ask her on family outings. We have been friends for...Well, for about three years.
So it all started there, with the change in thinking I wrote about in the "change" blog and thinking about issues surrounding Greg's passing. Second, the naturalness of her inclusion in family outings. She fits in well. She "gets" our family humor, does not get annoyed at the constant wisecracking, but actually chips in and goes along with it and contributes.
We have so many other mutual interests. Our love of movies and quirky interactions therein just work. The whole running commitment thing has been an inspiration to me, also. She has long shown an interest to both take part in my interests and to share hers. My family loves her...and about that moment I realized I did too. That I have been being a fool to push her away when she is so good for me. Now the main worry becomes...can I be that good for her?
So we started talking a little bit about how things stood in our respective lives...and pretty quick it just clicked. It just is right in so many ways. I have met her family (last year's marathon), she has spent a good deal of time with my family, including being one of Stanica's closest friends, and we have very similar ideas about so many key issues...how to deal with disagreements, the need for time apart as well as time together, what we want from the future, where we stand on wanting kids, how to deal with money matters, etc.
So from a sterile, clinical standpoint, we agree on most of the mechanics of a successful marriage. And we have a pretty good platform for dealing with the areas where we don't.
And from the standpoint of just pure emotion...I have never been particularly good at that end of it, but wanting to make her happy makes me want to work on that, and I find I have been very, very expressive to and about her, at least by my standards. And the desire to make her as happy as she makes me is very strong.
So there you have it. A great man dies, I start thinking, the family opens my eyes, I figure some stuff out, realize I want to share the rest of my life with someone after all, as long as that person is the right person, I figure out I have been friends with the right person for quite some time and the only thing standing in the way of us as a couple has been my stupidity, we talk, and now there is something I am very excited for and about. A long winded way of answering the question of how I go from planning to die a single, bitter old lonely man to being unofficially engaged in 5 days or less; I stopped being an idiot.