That Wedding Thing

So we did it.  I have never had more fun at short notice than this.  We had a lovely gathering.  First, my sister, my brother and my niece arrived, late on Friday night. Then, my friends showed up, including Carol, my best friend in the whole world (starting when I was 15), and her husband Bruce who drove my mother down from Ottawa.  (She got my mother to go on a road trip!) My other best friend Siobhan and my great friend Mark (who married Siobhan just a few years ago) drove from Toronto.   Our wonderful friends Peter and Dana from Essex Junction where we have the sweat built came, our awesome friends Kitty and Gary from Rhode Island, our amazing friend Gina from NYC, who knew we were in love almost before we did, our great friend Magili from Maine and her husband Ted and our favorite person-under-three, Marisol.  Finally, Lewis’s long time friend Peter, friend through thick and thin, co-teacher, who fortunately was ordained, was able to come to perform the ceremony. We live in Brattleboro, VT., in a small place with no guest room. Down the road from us, right by the frog pond, is the Meadowlark Inn (meadowlarkinnvt.com).    We turned our house over to friends, and moved into the bed and breakfast.

I had a dress.  Well, I had four.  I have fortunately discovered the thrift store in Keene, Sal’s Thrift Avenue, and had picked up a frock or two there for Christmas and New Year’s.  Plus Brattleboro has really good thrift and antique stores, and I happened to find a black and red number that worked well.  I like to get advice on things like this, so I recruited my own personal What Not to Wear group who could advise me. At the last minute, I went to our outlet mall by the highway ramp and found a nice short one-shoulder white dress and a pair of matching shoes.  On Friday night, we had those who had arrived over for a dinner of pulled pork and greens from our local co-op, and then Saturday morning, while I vacuumed and did laundry (why?  I don’t know, just because when the going gets tough the tough do laundry), I also had my sister and niece over to pick the dress.  Excellent advice later, we went with the white.  They helped out extraordinarily, running errands.  I had ordered a chocolate cake from our local bakery, gluten free, and had got little packages of wine and local products (cheese and chocolate) for those who were making the trek, so we put those in the rooms (along with the moose slippers we found for Marisol). A week isn’t long enough for monogrammed balloons or engraved invitations!  Lewis had apparently invited some people for a ‘Christmas Party’ planning to surprise them in case I said yes. Everyone else began arriving on Saturday afternoon, and we all gathered at the bed and breakfast and headed into town for dinner at the Fireworks restaurant.  As we had only made our reservation on Tuesday, they had kindly accommodated us but had only a table for 12, so we squished in the other 4 and had a merry time. Then home to bed early.

On Sunday, we got up early to do more errands, and sent Kitty and Gary and Gina scurrying back and forth to get things we forgot – they were awesome and had an incredible sense of humour.  Thank you guys.  We had come up with a ceremony and we ran it by Peter. We decided to make a bundle and had emailed people on Wednesday to invite them to contribute words or little things. We had also emailed Peter, our friend from Essex Junction, who had once spontaneously played Lewis and I a love song over breakfast  It’s a beautiful song with words from Rumi, and he wonderfully agreed to play it during the ceremony.  Incredibly and again wonderfully Peter Blum, who plays the singing bowls, offered to bring his, so we said yes and thank you.  After cramming my hair into an up-do, dimming with foundation the bags under my eyes and squeezing into the spanx, I threw on my dress and my lovely mother gave me away (or, rather, brought and presented me – we didn’t like the implications that I could be given away).  The ceremony was wonderful, with music and gathering the bundle and prayers and singing and lovely words.  And, when it was over, we all went down to Gillies fish market restaurant at the bottom of the hill.  My sister had prepared a powerpoint presentation with pictures and stories from when we were young, and it made me cry. She was very kind. When we came back, the lovely women who own the B and B had tidied everything up, so we took up a collection to put in the housekeeping envelope at the end of our stay.

The next morning, Lewis had to go back to work!  I spent some time with my mother and brother, my sister and niece went straight back, and gradually we were left gently alone, feeling sweetly sad to say so many goodbyes.

So, we are married.  I am licensed to wife!  We are very happy, though the implications for immigration are dawning on us, and I might not be going to Australia this year.  But that’s for a different story. Meanwhile, we are so very happy, and feel so very loved. Thank you all so much.