“Will You Marry Me?”: MusiQ to My Ears

Quiana and I love listening to Musiq Soulchild together. It’s a bonus that there’s a “Q” in his stage name! 🙂

However, this particular song is etched into the history of us #ForeverAndADay.

In this song, he basically says that he’s said, #ILoveYou so many times, that he has to say it numerically: 1-4-3.

We’re both engineers by degree, so we love numbers. In fact, one of the many times I realized she was special was when she called my from the University of Pittsburgh while I was at the University of Delaware. I was frustrated by my #DifferentialEquations homework, but instead of telling me to forget it so we could talk (like other girls might do), she walked me through the problem and helped me solve it! 🤯

SO… when it came time to propose to her, I decided to take a page from this song and program a lock that would uncover her engagement ring with 4-3-5-2 for #WilllYouMarryMe? God, in His infinite knowledge and humor, had decided to commemorate moment in time because the numbers coincided with the date I proposed as an anagram of the numbers themselves: 4/25/03. I love them both very much (God and Quiana, just to be clear)! 🔐🗝️ #20YearsLater

Here’s the poem. Quick backstory. I told Quiana I loved her early in the relationship. It’s been the pattern for us from the beginning: I feel a thing strongly and act on it, but it kind of positions her to balance us out to make sure we aren’t rushing into a thing. I’d been engaged before, so that may have played into it, as well (I’d wanted to get married and have a family since the fourth grade). As such, when I realized I might have concerned her, I decided to make and laminate a small heart which I cut into four pieces. Over the course of our courtship, I gave her a “quarter of my heart” with a poem to match it. She’d know I was pacing myself when I gave her each quarter over time. At the same time, she’d know we’d be at the next level of our relationship when I gave her that final fourth:

“Four-Piece Combo”
a.k.a.
“The Final Fourth”

4/22/03

Remember my vow to place you Under Lock and Kee?
Better yet, remember how MusiQ expressed love numerically?
Combining this logic unlocks a promise that I now believe is the time to make good.
My heart’s been full now for awhile.
It just took a minute for me to lock the meaning back down…
As I was demeaning vows for the better of worst trials that I’ve withstood.

I’ve been on shaky and humble ground, but I’ve remained calm, though.
Thanks to the graceful key of peace unlocked in our combo.
There have been hard blows to my esteem at times, but with you at my side, I’m making it through.
You’re the rib that’s closest to my heart.
You hold together the pieces that can never again be torn apart…
So with this last piece set in place, there’s no more time to waste – A Decent Proposal is due.

Knowing what this final fourth represents,
My heart mustn’t skip a beat in hesitance.
We should take our time and cherish this moment that God has given us.
Thought it took a while for this moment to come,
It was only because I misled myself waiting for an unnecessary component to come…
As love is all we’ve had and will ever need to complete the task that’s driven us.

 – “143” for eternity –

A Decent Proposal
a.k.a.
An Engaging Conversation

4/21/03

Having had one engagement already of recent disposal,
I’m better prepared for the true coming of a decent proposal.
What was once overcompensated for now rests comfortably in my presence.
But even though I readily realize this,
My pride hasn’t let me materialize it –
Too concerned with what’s been predetermined,
my pride for my wife seems worthless without a job present.

I know that I was displaced from my home to be at her side.
But since that move, I’ve been consumed with being redeemed within her strides.
As my progress retards, her prowess embarks to higher pay grades and marks.
I didn’t move here to get a job, though.
I moved here to let the will of God grow…
A seed that’s been planted and is best managed in the soil of a humble start.

And though I know that she’s my treasure to be Under Lock and Kee,
I’ve become oblivious to what’s been blocking me.
My industrious pride has hindered the illustrious bride that God’s intended her to become.
Despite trying to keep my Blackmail Ego from becoming my prized authority,
The majority of my time has been spent making my job search the prime priority…
But doing things in orderly tradition doesn’t match God’s ordered mission that’ I’ve begun.

God often uses unorthodox methods
to magnify the glory of His paradox message –
In His time and mercy, He begins working things out that are beyond our comprehension.
Although we can do whatever we put our minds to,
True miracles at work He often makes our third eye blind to…
So by concealing His imperceivable prominence,
when He starts revealing His inconceivable dominance it’s hard to miss it.

Just to show He’s in control,
He’s placed my life almost completely on hold.
So stubborn was I that I tried even harder to free it.
The ordered steps that I felt my life should behave in
Were rearranged in a day when He provided my Stairway to Haven…
And I’ve only just now come to understand the honor of His genius.

He has bestowed upon me
A life worth the price of my dreams…
He’s stripped me of my ability to make my trials a true testimony.
Though a job normally comes first,
God’s given me a new place to live in reverse…
So now I must engage in this trade off of securing a job for securing matrimony.

It seemed to me that a job would bring my engagement into alignment.
But my thesis on how to place these pieces is not my assignment.
The issue of my unemployment is of unimportance against His issued graces.
My blind destination was never up to my zeal,
It has been kindly placed in the order of His Will…
All I have to do is replace my pride with faith that’s blind
and claim my bride with an engaging bracelet.

Proposing will be a key freeing agent
In exposing the secret ingredient of my redeeming patience.
In God’s grand theme, things don’t happen how we deem –
what may seem strange is really a set stage for a life-changing event.
Without struggle, there is no honest progress.
Without a tussle, we all must make way for God’s oddest promises…
For in His quirks, the true power of His works becomes more plainly evident.
*RGL*
‘I came to you in weakness and fear and much trembling, and my message and my proclamation were not with persuasive [words of] wisdom but with a demonstration of spirit and power, so that your faith might rest not on human wisdom but on the power of God.  Yet we do speak a wisdom to those who are mature, but not a wisdom of this age, nor the rulers of this age who are passing away.  Rather we speak God’s wisdom, mysterious, hidden, which God predetermined before the ages for our glory… But as it is written:  “What eye has not seen, and ear has not heard, and what has not entered the human heart, what God has prepared for those who love Him…”
– 1 Corinthians 2:3-7,9
**