All Begin?
The evening we met, we spent all evening walking the campus of Elon College, North Carolina — under the arches, past the gazebo, around the lake — until we settled to one of the benches by the water. David spotted a shooting star. Back of his mind, he was already thinking, “This could be the one,” and the romantic image of making a wish wasn’t lost on him.
After that evening we weren’t apart once — not a day, until Dawn left for a semester in London. By that time David had graduated, and the months apart were difficult for both.
We kept in touch through letters, packages, and phone calls, but even when Dawn returned she had another two years of school, and David was a state away in Virginia. We cherished each all-too-seldom visit, and when it came time to pop the question, David wanted to do it right.
In secret he began to make inquiries into the possibility of obtaining a meteorite specimen (an actual fallen shooting star). He began with the local Gem & Mineral Society, but the president warned him that meteorites are by and far iron- and rock-based, looking much like melted nails or small stones. Only seldom do they crystallize, and even then, the crystals tend to shatter on impact and would probably be much too brittle to facet.
Undaunted, David contacted rock hounds from as far as California and Alaska. The Alaskan dealer, after weeks of David’s pestering, offered the address of his dealer in Arizona, the esteemed renegade “Meteorite Man,” Robert Haag. Haag had a hand-sized specimen (above) that had been discovered in 1957 in Argentina. He had been able to facet from it a number of structurally sound gems, of which David bought two. The result: an engagement ring like no other.
On August 26, 1997, David snuck Dawn into a “normal rehearsal” of the Virginia Coast Chorus of the national barbershop singing group Sweet Adelines (his mother is a member and pulled a surprise of her own, as you’ll see). They serenaded Dawn to a private performance of “You Are My Sunshine” (a pun on her name), then David presented the ring. Dawn said yes. Immediately following, at a signal from David’s mother, one of the Sweet Adelines quartets stepped forward to sing us an original arrangement of “Catch a Falling Star (And Put It in Your Pocket)”. David’s mother had written to the arranger in person for an unpublished manuscript.