Guitar Center

I went to Guitar Center with my fiancé today to hear him play the drums on one of the little (electronic) drum sets they have set up for people to test out.  Even though our relationship began jamming out with each other on our acoustic guitars, he's always told me he feels more passionate about the drums.  In the many bands he's been in and collaborations he's been a part of, he was frequently the drummer.

I heard him play the drums for the first time today.  And he was amazing.  And very passionate.  And the whole thing was just...incredibly hot.

I don't know what it is about music, what it is about the creative process, what it is about collaborating together musically or just observing someone display a musical talent where they are wholly in their element, that is just super intimate.  There's something intangible, something spellbinding about it.

I told him I wouldn't be able to marry him unless I heard him play the drums.  And now that I've heard him...it's definitely on.

Since when did my wedding become "Treat yo' self"?

There is a legendary episode of Parks and Recreation where Tom and Donna have "treat yo' self" day.  It is hilarious and I love it.  Watch the "treat yo' self" segment here.

However, when did May 16, 2015 become treat yo' self for folks?

Like, I'm talking about folks inviting themselves to the wedding without shame.  I'm talking about folks messaging me talking about some "I wasn't invited" and not kidding.  I'm talking about folks proffering their congratulations on my engagement followed by their mailing address as if to say "I know I'm invited so lemme go 'head and give you my address so you can send me an invitation."

Like, what the heck?  When did this become a thing? I would NEVER invite myself to someone's wedding.  Like, I would never even kid around talking about some "I wasn't invited."

How about I just institute a policy saying feel free to invite yourself if you're willing to pay for yourself?  Ugh.  What an (outside) wedding boils down to is renting enough chairs for butts to sit in during the ceremony and purchasing enough food for all the mouths waiting to be fed during the reception.

The side of me that fantasizes about going down to the courthouse and being done with it is starting to sound more and more reasonable.  I wouldn't do that, though.  My fiancé doesn't want that.  And I think it'll be nice.  I know I'll be glad we had a ceremony and had an occasion where our families and friends could celebrate with us.  It'll be worth it.  But I seriously think I will go Bridezilla on somebody if one more person boggles my mind with their presumptuousness.

If you weren't invited it's because a. Maybe I like you and consider you a friend but maybe we haven't been in touch in a while, b. We ain't cool like that, c. You're an ex (more or less), d. We're poor and didn't consider you important enough to put money on the line for your butt to sit and your mouth to eat, and/or e. You got to draw the line somewhere.

I have a shower coming up in my hometown in a little over a week.  I know my dear mom really wants it to be nice and I'm looking forward to it.  Some of my fiancé's family are coming and they will meet my family for the first time.  It will go fine.  I'm not worried about that.  But I do have a sinking feeling that what I may have to deal with is somebody saying something crazy to me at the shower.  And I'm to the point where if anyone has the audacity to say something crazy, I will have to let some of the Bridezilla out.  Seriously.  My wedding is not treat yo' self, and you can't say ridiculous stuff to me and expect to not get called on it.

I have come to the conclusion that there are two things that bring out the crazy in people, and they are 1. weddings and 2. babies.  And even though #2 isn't happening for at least a year after we're married, can you believe that people are ALREADY asking us about kids?  Seriously.  Can we first let the ink dry on the freaking marriage license before you start getting all up in my grill about the state of my uterus?

A blog quite befits passive-aggression, does it not?

There he is.

We're planning on finally mailing out our invitations tomorrow.  So, we spent Friday night and a few hours on Saturday addressing them and stuffing them.  I bought a purple calligraphy pen so that I could make them look cute. We totally did not spend a lot of money on the invitations at all.  The invitations themselves look classy, but none of this double envelope stuff, no bells or whistles.  We did get address labels for our return address.  Let's face it, although some sentimental fools might save the invitations (to be thrown in with their ever-growing piles of sentimental junk), the majority of human beings who receive one will do what the majority of human beings do with paper things that are likely to be left laying around—throw them away.  Why spend extra money on uber-nice invitations when they're going to end up getting tossed?

Friday night we were sitting at my (soon to be "our") table, me using my purple calligraphy pen, him applying return address labels and stuffing them with invitations and our Bed Bath & Beyond registry cards, both of us listening to some background music, when it hit me: We are addressing our invitations.  Our ceremony has been planned and is going to happen at a specific date and time very soon. We are getting married.  There was something about sitting there addressing the invitations at that moment that brought tears to my eyes.  A question came to mind: Did you ever think you would be sitting here at this table addressing wedding invitations with your future husband?  Suddenly, the mundane became surreal.

I'm a crybaby.  Thankfully, my fiancé has gotten used to it and is no longer alarmed whenever tears unwittingly spring to my eyes.  He just smiled and held me while I whimpered, "I just can't believe it."

I always wondered what my husband was going to look like, what kind of man he was going to be.  And while my fiancé held me and stroked my hair, I felt like someone was telling me, "See?  There he is.  This is what he looks like.  This is the kind of man he is."

Exceedingly, Abundantly Above

I got a phone call yesterday that tearfully overwhelmed me.  My friend is having a baby.

We don't talk often.  Once every few months.  When we do, we just pick up from where we left off.  The last time we talked, I was giving her wedding updates and I asked if she and her husband were still thinking about children.  She'd had a miscarriage a couple of years ago and though they wanted children, it had been a while since then and still...nothing.  She's entering her late 30s and was unsure if it would ever happen for them.  She said if it happened, it would be wonderful, but if it didn't, that would be okay, too.  She said they might consider adoption.

But she called me yesterday and told me she's having a baby.  She's far enough along that she felt comfortable sharing the news.  I was overjoyed.  But what really gave me this overwhelming feeling of wonder was that the last time we'd talked, she was already pregnant, but just didn't know it yet.  While she was telling me she didn't know whether it would ever happen and if it never did, that would be okay, it had already happened.  There was something holy and wonderful about that thought.

It made me cry because I was overjoyed for her. It made me cry because it made me reflect on my own "unexpected" experience of crossing paths with my future husband.  It made me cry because it gave me hope.

I see now more clearly than I ever have that things are never "settled."  Finding a life partner is a milestone for sure, but each stage of life brings a new set of questions and a new set of uncertainties.  My friend's news somehow reassured me that God knows where we are, what we desire and what we need at every stage of life.  Her news reminded me that not only does God provide, He goes beyond what we could have ever imagined or thought possible for ourselves.

Ranty. Composition purgatory. Can I just get married already?

I cannot express how much I loathe grading Spanish compositions.   To be fair, so far, my students have done pretty well.  But they just take forever to grade and it sucks me dry of all motivation to do anything.  I absolutely have to finish them.  This is so ridiculous.  They're just stupid compositions.  Why am I being so whiny and lazy about these dumb things?

Every single time I have to say goodnight to my fiancé, I just feel like ugh.  I just feel like crying.  Even though I know I'm going to see the guy again the next day.  I hate saying goodbye to him.  I hate seeing him leave.  I hate not being with him.  I'm scaring myself with how attached I've become to him.  How I can't imagine life without him.  These don't even sound like words that I'd ever type or think that I'd ever use to express how I feel about another human.  Me?  "I can't imagine life without him"?  It sounds like something I would have made fun of at one time because it's just so cliche and overblown and dramatic.  Fresh out of a sappy chick flick.  Verbatim from a poorly-written romance novel.  But here we are.  There are those laid-bare little vulnerable feelings, quivering and teary-eyed and exposed and in awe of what it means to completely hand over your heart for life.

This man.  Him.  He's gentle.  He has handled my heart with such painstaking care.  In the same tender way he holds my hand.  Then presses it to his chest.  Then kisses it.  With those shy lashes and green brown eyes looking right at me.

There's a mental block holding up my brain called "I'm getting married."  When I sit down to grade compositions.  When I think about how I'm going to structure my next chapter.  When I think about the possibility of expanding a paper for submission.  Anything work-related gets sideswiped by "I'm getting married."  I feel like if I can just get married, just become his wife, just get all the wedding jitters and planning and speculation and expectation over with and out of my system, I can settle down into this new stage of life and regain my focus.  Because right now, I'm a barely-tethered helium balloon being battered about by hordes of giddy fluttery butterflies.

Here's something I realized: Last Valentine's Day was the first Valentine's Day I'd ever spent with a sweetheart.  This Valentine's Day will be my first Valentine's Day as an engaged woman.  Next Valentine's Day will be my first Valentine's Day as a married woman.  A series of Valentine's Day firsts.  Well, whaddya know.

More Yay!

At one of me and my guy's favorite little coffee spots.  He is sitting beside me looking super hot.  He has this look of determination on his face while he's engrossed in his work that I find highly attractive.  I can't lie and say his spectacles don't have anything to do with it.  Sometimes I miss him without his glasses, though.  When we first met, he always wore contacts.  But once I hinted that I was rather taken with bespectacled guys, he ditched the contacts.  Once he knew that I preferred the bespectacled look, he was relieved because he didn't particularly enjoy bothering with them.

Anyway, a few more spots of sunshine to testify about:

1. I FINALLY submitted the first draft of my first dissertation chapter.  Yes, it's just a draft (subject to rigorous critique and revision) and I definitely still have my work cut out for me.  This is just chapter 1 of 5. But it's good to be able to get something complete off my hands.  Onward!

2.  An abstract that I submitted to a conference got accepted!  It's going to be a presentation on a section of the chapter I just submitted.  The best thing is that it's right here in my little Georgian home away from home.

3. We received a TOTALLY unexpected, VERY generous wedding gift in the mail.  Well, praise the Lord.  For real.

Here's me super happy while we were eating wedding cake sample cupcakes.  Yes, that's a sunflower.  Yes, sunflowers (even fake, sugar ones) make me muy feliz.