The Tough Choices

Turns out, tough choices surrounding weddings don’t let up once you get married. Who knew?

Sure, the tough choices we had to make about our own wedding are well and truly behind us, but we still have to make choices when it comes to the weddings of our loved ones, and I’m facing one down right now.

Here’s the back story:

A very good friend of mine – one of my kinda-sorta-not really bridesmaids – got engaged about 6 months before Eric and I. She and her fiance promptly decided to postpone wedding planning for at least year. They knew they wanted to go back to Tahiti (where they got engaged), but also knew they couldn’t afford it anytime soon, and decided to focus on saving rather than planning. As is often the case when folks want to have a destination wedding, things didn’t really pan out as they’d hoped. Between the unfavorable exchange rates, rising cost of gas, and general economic uncertainty of the past year, travel to Tahiti has become prohibitively expensive, particularly for their parents. So they floundered around for a couple of months, considering other options – none of which really appealed to them. Like me, my friend is not much of a planner (probably even less so, actually), and finally she decided that after nearly 18 months of being engaged, she simply wanted to be married.

So, about a week ago they decided to get married in their home state of California in a very small ceremony of only immediate family. Then they decided maybe the wanted to have one friend each at the wedding – a Maid of Honor and a Best Man. And she asked me! Very exciting, right? I mean, I’ve been a bridesmaid more times than I care to count, but I’ve never been the Maid of Honor! (As an aside, I told a friend about this and she pointed out that I’d actually be a Matron of Honor now that I’m married. Duh! I promptly decided I’d rather be a maid – as in cleaning houses for a living – than be called a “matron”. Really. What an awful word. It just sounds so…matronly. )

Oh, and did I mention that the wedding is on New Years Eve? As in 5 weeks from now?

Yeah. That’s where the tough decision comes in.

If you’ll recall, I was laid off in March and remained woefully underemployed for a good 7 months after that. I’m doing some full-time contract work at the moment, but how long they’ll need me is impossible to predict. It looks like they won’t for the final 2 weeks of this year which sounds great on one hand (vacation!), but less than ideal on the other (unpaid!).

Do you see where I’m going with this?

Money is funny.

Given the unstable nature of my income at the moment, wouldn’t it be financially irresponsible to jet off to California at a cost of at least $1000 ($1200-1400 is probably more accurate)? Then again, given the nature of my friendship with the bride, wouldn’t it be personally irresponsible not to? You tell me.  Technically, we could afford it. I mean, we have that money in the bank (although it is earmarked for something else – the down payment on our first home, emergencies and taxes, to be specific).

Five years ago, I would have thrown caution to the wind, withdrawn the funds, and boogied on over the California to celebrate with my friend. Hell, two years ago, for that matter. But…times have changed. Money isn’t just about me anymore, and it isn’t just about instant gratification. My friend’s wedding is indeed incredibly important to me – she is a true kindred spirit and the idea of not celebrating with her feels awful. But Eric and I’s financial future is more important to me right now, and the idea of not making that a priority feels even more awful.

I have chosen friends over finances at almost every juncture in my life to date, but doing so in this instance feels like a really, really bad idea.

But not doing so makes me feel like a really, really bad friend.

Things that worked: Music

As I’ve mentioned previously, we opted out of having a DJ for our wedding, and instead played the part ourselves, via our iPod and a rented sound system. This has become an increasingly popular option over the past few years, to the dismay of DJs everywhere. But have you checked out prices for the pros lately? They’re kind of bonkers! At the one and only “bridal show” I attended, I met a DJ who told me he offered the best prices in town. Sweet! I love the best price. However, the “best price” in town turned out to be $1600 for 8 hours. Dude gets paid $200 an hour to play some songs? Homie say what?

Granted, a DJ typically has great equipment and lighting schemes and that sort of thing, but still. $200 an hour is a lot of money. Even my most successful lawyer friends don’t make $200 an hour. I barely make $200 in an entire day.

To be fair, I did not seek out any other DJs so for all I know, this fellow could have been blowing smoke up my ass with his so-called “best price in town.” Could be that $800 or $500 or some such other number is closer to the norm.  In any case, it just wasn’t an expense we wanted or needed to incur.

So, we put together a sweeeeeeet playlist, rented a sound system, and went to town. And you know what? Everything worked perfectly.

A friend took care of starting and stopping the music for the processional, as well as queuing up the music for the song he sang in the middle of the ceremony. Afterwards, we simply pushed play and let technology do the work and there wasn’t a single snag.

But there’s more. Something unexpected that makes me thank my lucky stars that we went this route:

That sweeeeeet playlist we put together? It still lives on my iPod. And I still listen to it. And while I often hear those same songs in other contexts, there’s something about listening to them in the same order that they played on our wedding day that just takes me back and allows me to relive tiny moments over and over.

For example, the incredible heart-swell I felt during the first few notes of #34 by Dave Matthews Band, and the accompanying waterworks as I looked out and saw the faces of our guests, and of Eric, who was gazing at me with as much love in his eyes as I felt in my heart. Or that private moment we shared smack dab in the middle of the ceremony, while our rings were being passed from guest to guest for their well-wishes, and we were serenaded by a friend singing our sing: Let’s Stay Together, by Al Green. Or dancing with my dad and talking about my mom and what things would be like if she were there to Daughter, by Loudon Wainwright III. Or dancing wildly, encircled by my girlfriends, singing at the top of our lungs to Cecilia, by Paul Simon (by far the most popular song of the night). Or having one final dance with Eric at the end of the night to Someone Like You, by Van Morrison.

And speaking of reliving our wedding: Every single time I’m at our friends’ house – the ones who so graciously offered up their home to us, I’m bombarded with mini-memories, which I don’t think would be the case if we’d gotten married in a wedding-specific location that we never set foot inside of again.

Bonus!

Whoopsy Daisy!

About two hours before the ceremony was set to begin, my phone rang. It was Eric.

My heart filled with joy in anticipation of what was to come, and love for the man I was going to share it with.

He asked me a question (I can’t remember what).

Ten minutes later, the phone rang again.

More joy. More love. Another question that I can’t remember.

Ten minutes later, another call.

This time I rolled my eyes. It was more of a ‘God love him!’ moment than an ‘I love him’ moment.

This time, I remember the question.

He was calling to ask me if I thought we had enough ice. We had like 100lbs. I assured him it was more than enough, even though I had no idea whether or not that was true.

Ten minutes later, another call.

Instead of ‘hello,’ I said ‘what now?’

What now turned out to be the fact that his key to our house broke off in the lock.

With him outside, and his suit inside.

We live on the second floor of a house, so climbing in a window was not an option.

I wished that calling me hadn’t been one either.

At this point, one of my lady friends took my phone, said ‘I’ll handle this,’ and disappeared.

I have no idea what she did, but an hour and a half later, when I laid eyes on my husband-to-be, he was wearing that suit, and did not appear to have scaled any walls.

And that, my friends, is how I almost got married to a man wearing cargo shorts and a t-shirt.

Things that worked

In the most general sense, our wedding – that inexpensive, fuss-free, friend-centered backyard BBQ we threw last summer – worked. It worked in the regard that it was in line with our values, our personalities, and our budget (which was itself in line with our income, networth and longer-term financial goals).

Broken down into specific pieces-parts though, there were some things that worked better than others, and some things that didn’t work at all, which is the point of this post and those that follow.

Up first? Something that did work: Our last-minute DIY

The bulk of our DIY projects were things that most couples choose to outsource for the simple fact that they’re time sensitive; they’re the sorts of things that have to be done the day-of or the day before: food, flowers and beauty. That alone ups the ante on their stress potential, but we were not to be deterred and decided to do them anyway.

Beauty was a piece of cake. My hair and make up turned out exactly as I’d hoped they would, despite the fact that I never got around to practicing (you know, beyond the practice I do every day). In the end, I pulled off a look that was special and a departure from the everyday, but not to the extent that I looked and felt like someone else. Which is perfection, as far as I’m concerned.

There’s not much else to say about the flowers, other than that I am so, so glad I went with my gut on that one. Smooth sailing all the way.

As for the food…

We didn’t self-cater the entire wedding (although I have no doubt that we could have if we really wanted to, and in retrospect I think we would if we were to do it all over again), but we did handle a few things ourselves. Namely, all of the booze/beverages, one side, and dessert. With Eric having a second job at a liquor store, it just didn’t make sense to not DIY the drinks. We served a wide variety of local microbrews, a delicious (yet potent) peach sangria, one great red, and one great white (which, I might add, were left untouched at the end of the night – something I knew would happen, but kept my mouth shut about because Eric insisted that we serve wine). Izze and Mexican Coke rounded out the drink options for those who didn’t want to partake of the hard-stuff (which was precisely no one).

This element of the wedding was not only DIY for us, but also our guests, as everything was self-serve (via a large, galvanized metal tub filled with ice). We toyed with the idea of hiring a bartender for legal reasons, but ultimately decided not to. Our rationale was that there’s not a single other type of party that we’d hire a bartender for, so why would we for our wedding?

Funny story: About a week before the wedding, Eric and I were discussing some of the nitty-gritty logistics, such as how to make ice available to those who were drinking the sangria. Eric suggested we simply fill a cooler with ice and put it under the table where the jar of sangria was being served. I was convinced this would look terrible and tacky and refused to do it. I mean, I put my foot down and said absolutely not, insisting we come up with a better solution. Plastic coolers full of ice sitting on the ground? At a wedding? No. Way.

Midway through this argument, I had a moment of clarity and realized how ridiculous I sounded. I apologized immediately, resolved to let it go, and am happy to report that today, I have no idea what we did with the ice. I assume Eric did exactly what he said he would, but on the day of, did I notice? Of course not.

Then there’s the potato salad – remember what I said about that? That I’m massively picky and only like my recipe? Right, that was my reason for wanting to DIY it. I figured doing so would prove to be one of the easiest, most forgettable parts of pulling off our wedding. Potato salad for fifty? No problem. I’ve done it before and could surely do it again even in the midst of wedding madness.

I was half-right.

It was indeed one of the easiest tasks I undertook, but it was anything but forgettable. In fact, making that potato salad was one of the most memorable experiences of the entire weekend.

Here’s why:

The day before the wedding, I came home from my air-brush tan appointment (an entry on the ‘things that didn’t work’ list) and found an apartment that was gloriously empty, save for two of my kinda-sorta-not-really bridesmaids. These are two of my absolute favorite women in the world – who know me better than almost anyone else (maybe even Eric). And for the next three hours, we basked in the sun on our patio, drank wine, reminisced, pondered marriage, laughed, cried, and re-connected in a way that you can only do with people you’re incredibly close to emotionally, yet incredibly far from geographically.

Oh yeah, and we made some potato salad.

It was the calm before the storm, so to speak, and I would not have been nearly as grounded the next day without that experience and without those ladies. I just love them so.

And finally, the dessert. You may recall that our original plan was to serve cupcakes and mini-cheesecakes from Whole Foods. Well, we scrapped that plan at the last minute and decided to serve strawberry shortcake instead. It made sense for a couple of reasons. First, it’s a favorite for both Eric and I. Second, our wedding was two days after my birthday, and growing up, I never, ever had birthday cake. Instead, I always had strawberry shortcake. Third, it seemed to fit the overall down-home, southern-grub tone of our wedding better. And finally, it was cheaper. Like, a lot cheaper. Maybe 20% of the cost of the Whole Foods option.

So my step-mom and I made strawberry shortcake.

It was DE-licious.

Unfortunately, very few people ate it.

By the time it was served, most everyone was stuffed to the gills with ribs and bobs and sweet potato soufflé and my infamous potato salad. Either that, or they were too busy pouring Fat Tire and peach sangria down their throats and cutting a rug on the dance floor to be bothered with dessert.

No biggie. The next day, we took all of the leftovers from the wedding to Urban Peak, a local shelter for homeless youth, and I have no doubt they enjoyed eating that strawberry shortcake every bit as much as my step-mom and I enjoyed making it.

Up next? How I almost married a dude wearing cargo shorts and a t-shirt.

 

The one where I let you down

Promises, Promises.

On Friday, I promised to share my half-baked theory on why some couples experience a palpable shift in their relationship (and/or their feelings about their relationship) after marriage, while some don’t.

But then I had all weekend to keep thinking about it.

And the more I thought about it, the more I realized my half-baked theory truly was half-baked and really didn’t make much sense at all.

Oops.

I think the bottom line is that there’s just no rhyme or reason to it.

Each individual (and couple) experiences marriage in their own way; for some it feels distinctly different from non-married coupledom, and for others, it feels remarkably similar.

Ain’t nothin’ wrong with that!

Four months in now, and I’m beginning to see some of the small ways in which marriage might be different from non-marriage for some people.

The ever-insightful Meg over at A Practical Wedding recently talked about the sense of partnership that comes with marriage. An almost conspiratorial, mildly-exclusive, ‘we’re in this together’ sentiment that comes with having willingly bound yourself to another for all the days of your lives.

Then again, maybe it’s the other way around? In having developed that sense of partnership, that ‘me and you against the world’ mentality toward and about your beloved, perhaps marriage becomes sort of a foregone conclusion?

It all feels a little ‘chicken or the egg’ to me, but if I had to sum up my own experience, I’d say it’s closer to the latter. Eric and I got married because we were already partners, not because we wanted to become partners.

It fascinates me that marriage feels so profoundly different for some, but so profoundly similar for others, and it’s something I’d love to get to the root of. It’d be impossible to do so, however, as each couple’s experience is uniquely their own.

I do have a theory though.

And I’m going to share it with you on Monday.

The Proposal – Part Two

So, when we left off, Eric and I were on our way out of town for a weekend getaway that was supposedly about taking in the gorgeous fall foliage in the high country, but that I suspected (read: knew) was really about him proposing.

We spent Friday evening and Saturday afternoon tooling around the Rockies, awestruck by how beatiful the aspens are, especially when a soft breeze blows and their golden leaves shimmer in the sunlight. We explored ghost towns and took about a gazillion photos from about a gazillion scenic overlooks. We spent Friday night with a friend on the western slope, but had “other plans” for Saturday night. Plans he wouldn’t tell me about.

Coming down the mountain toward Carbondale, there is a teeny-tiny town called Redstone, which is one of my favorite places in all of Colorado. It’s a place where earlier in the summer, we’d sat on a slab of marble next to the Crystal River, had a picnic, and talked about our plans for the future – which were very much up in the air at the time because he’d be laid off only two days earlier. As we approached the turn off for Redstone, I thought to myself ‘if he’s going to propose, he’s going to do it here’, and held my breath in anticipation. But he kept on driving – right past the turnoff – and I exhaled, thinking ‘ok, maybe I’m totally off base and he’s not planning to propose this weekend at all.’

A few minutes later, we arrived at a bed and breakfast in Carbondale – a big, beautiful Victorian mansion with four-poster beds and clawfoot tubs and the best homefries I’ve ever tasted. As soon as we arrived, I laid down on the bed to rest (because, you know, I was exhausted from spending a day and a half sitting on my ass in the car), and Eric joined me.

And now is probably the right time to tell you that Eric’s name is really Jon, because now is the time when that fact matters, and now is the time when things are about to get really funny.

So we’re laying on the bed, and he says “ouch, there’s something poking me in the leg.” I thought he meant there was a bedspring sticking out of the mattress, so I started patting it down, and he says “no, I think it’s something in my pocket.” Subtle. But I’m totally clueless, and reach into his pocket where I feel something hard and round and…ring shaped. Before I pull it out, I ask “is this what I think it is?” and he screams…

“WHO WANTS TO MARRY JONNY!!?!??!?!?!”

Seriously. That was the proposal. Who wants to marry Jonny.

I like to say it was my first “I DO.”

I later found out that he’d been planning to propose at the top of Independence Pass the next afternoon. A friend had told him about a lovely stroll that takes you through an arch of aspens to a scenic overlook. He’d written a poem and planned on getting down on one knee and proposing in the usual fashion.

But he couldn’t wait. When we arrived at the bed and breakfast, he got excited, said fuck it, and hence…”who wants to marry Jonny?”

And you know what? It was perfect. In fact, a friend later reminded me of a conversation we’d once had wherein I said “I want to be proposed to in bed.” Why? Because I really, really, really love to sleep. Like a lot. And bed truly is one of my favorite places in the world. Like I said. Perfect.

That night, while we were celebrating, Eric/Jon told me he almost pulled into the turnoff for Redstone so as to propose on the slab of marble next to the river, but he didn’t because he thought it’d be too obvious. And he was right. And a stroll through a grove of aspens at the top of Independence Pass? Probably also would have been to obvious. In bed after a long day of driving? Not obvious.

So yes, I knew it was coming. But at that exact moment, it was pure shock and awe.

The Proposal

So before our big, fat “second honeymoon” (which was incredible, by the way. So very, very), I alluded to the fact that Eric and I got engaged exactly one year earlier in a place not too far away. So, since I don’t have much left to say about our wedding, I figured I’d back that ass up and talk about the proposal!

But first, a confession: My name isn’t really Michele, and Eric’s name isn’t really Eric. Those are our middle names. Given the surprise nature of our wedding, I chose to use fakey-fakes when I started this blog, just in case. Plus, the internet never forgets so I decided to err on the side of anonymity.

I’m only telling you this now because it’s an important piece of the story I’m about to tell.

I’ll be honest and say that I don’t really remember the exact moment when I realized or decided that Eric would one day be my husband. In fact, I’m not sure that I had one. I knew early on that Eric was different, and that our relationship was going to be Big. Important. Life changing. But there was no single “he’s the one!” moment. Instead, it was a process that happened gradually in such a way that somewhere around the nine month mark, we’d reached a common – but unspoken – understanding that we were going somewhere.

Our intentions remained unspoken for quite a while after that, but they were there in every little thing that we did, and we both knew it. We shacked up and started building a life together, but it wasn’t until about two years in that we started talking about marriage. And once we did, we couldn’t stop. Neither could anyone else, for that matter.

I think that’s pretty common (people talking about getting married before actually deciding to do so), and for that reason I’d venture a guess that very few women are truly surprised when their partner pops the question. Perhaps they’re surprised in the regard that they didn’t necessarily expect it to happen in the precise moment that it did, but not in a ‘it was totally out of the blue and I had no idea he wanted to marry me!’ kind of way. Maybe for some. But not most. I think.

So anyway, of course I knew it was coming. I knew it was coming when he took a solo trip to Portland to visit friends and family, and let it slip that he was going shopping with a girl friend who is an artist and jewelry maker. Then I knew it wasn’t coming when he got laid off a couple months later and I figured we had much bigger fish to fry than planning a wedding. Then I knew it was coming when I answered his phone one morning – literally the only time in our entire relationship that I have done so – and he snatched the phone from my hand when I asked “Aaron from where” in an attempt to let him know who was calling (my initial assumption when a strange dude calls on Saturday morning is telemarketer). And I really knew it was coming when he planned a weekend getaway for just us two and refused to let me in on any of the details.

That, my friends, was a dead giveaway.

So heading out of town on that beautiful Friday afternoon last fall, I knew a proposal was imminent….

Stay tuned for part two of this story, which involves the revelation of Eric’s real name, a kinda sorta not really proposal that actually really was a proposal, and the most beautiful, one of a kind ring designed my my man himself.

It’s Almost October…

And you know what that means…

HALLOWEEN!

A holiday that comes with no obligatory gift giving or expectations to spend time with family? Sign me up!

Despite my love of the dressing up and debauchery that comes with All Hallows’ Eve, I start dreading it around this time of year because I feel like time is running out. Because in my crowd? Costume is king. Seriously, my friends are some of the most creative, crafty folks when it comes to costumes, and I might have just a tiny complex about it since as we know, I’m neither of those things.

And renting or buying something ready-made? Never going to cut it.

So what’s a girl to do?

Many go with some variation of the dirty/sexy _______ , but that is so very, very not me. I do dirty/sexy in the privacy of my own home, thank you very much. Publicly, I err on the side of funny/ironic or pop-culture referencing. But the truth is that there’s just not that many funny/ironic pop-culture referencing options for women, and as a result, those that do exist are terribly overdone. Sarah Palin was huge last year, and this year I predict we’ll see dozens of Kate Gosselins and Octomoms. BO-RING! I also think Lady Ga-Ga will be a popular choice, but a pre-requisite for pulling that off is going without pants, and I’m just not going to do that.

Right now I’m leaning toward Rosie the Riveter, but I’m not sold because a girlfriend did the same thing about 5 years ago.

So tell me now, what are YOU going to be for Halloween? What’s the best funny/ironic or pop-culture referencing costume you’ve ever seen/heard of?

The Second Honeymoon

I know, I know, we’ve only been married 3 months and some change, so how can we already be going on a “second honeymoon?” And aren’t I vastly underemployed at the moment? So how can we afford to be going on a “second honeymoon?”

Well, the answer my friends is this: Eric is Awesome. Amazing. Absolutely the best, because he won us a trip to Vail (well, Bachelor Gulch, to be exact), where we will be staying at The Ritz Carlton for 4-days and 3-nights. And he didn’t win this trip by simply dropping his name in a bucket and getting lucky; he won it by being the best at his job and finally getting his just desserts.

So this weekend, we will quite literally be puttin’ on the ritz. I may even speak with a British accent all weekend, just because. Tea and crumpets, here we come. I just hope this experience doesn’t ruin me forever and make it impossible for me to stay in hotels that aren’t quite so…ritzy. Then again, I once slept on a bed of hay in Bulgaria (not even kidding), so I think I’ll be alright.

And the best part? This trip coincides with the one-year anniversary of Eric proposing to me (a hilarious story that I must share at some point), and with the prime weekend for partaking of the fall colors in the high country.

Second honeymoon, indeed.