So About The Wedding

Hello All,

It is sooooo warm today. It's 71 DEGREES. It's so nice out. I just got back from a walk. I'm so glad I'm not working today.

A couple of you have asked how preperations for the big day are going. My answer is that I believe they are going well...

So ya know... if you could see me writing this blog in real time, you would have just watched 5 minutes pass while nothing about this page changed. I'm still trying to figure out what it is I want to write about these things. I guess all I can do is be honest. Boy, this whole wedding thing seems way over my head. If nothing else, let me just say that if you come to our wedding and you have a great time, the person that you should walk up to at the reception and say thank you to is Kristine. As it stands now, I have supplied some input into what I like and what I'm not really into, but outside of my small insights, she's set everything up and I made sure to have the checkbook handy.

I must say, even the smallest of tasks seem rather daunting to me. Even just inviting people. It's because of the need to invite people that I've learned some weird stuff about myself. For instance, I have very little idea of who my family is. This is made ever more daunting by the fact that Kristine knows all of her family.

Now, I know family members. I've been to enough family picnics over the years to be familiar with my family and when I see family members at these gatherings, I'm always happy to do a few minutes of catching up with everyone. Also, having spent a few summers with my grandparents at their beach cottage as well as a couple of Xmas's with them in Florida, I would see countless family members when they were visiting my grandparents. Somehow though...maybe it's the fact that there weren't many Burghoff's or Dorsey's in my age range, and maybe that I never really developed good social skills until the end of my high school years...But I don't really have a connection or a bond with many of my family members. How weird is that?

And you know what? I'm going to give you the perfect example of this because I've never forgotten this moment. It was the Winter of '92. My Grandfather had recently passed away and my Grandmother was living by herself in Florida. Since I was going to school in Florida at the time, one day I drove to her place which was about an hour away so that we could go out for dinner.

Now the thing about all the time I had spent with my Grandparents in the past was that the house was always busy. There homes were like the family meeting place so I would end up chatting with whoever was most interesting and then move on to the next person when the conversation was over. In all this time spent in their homes, including all the times my Mom and I would just visit, I assumed that I was very close with my grandparents.

And yet, I remember to this very day, sitting in my Grandmother's Florida livingroom with her. And we're sitting there...and after our casual hellos, how are you doings...we ran out of conversation. I remember sitting there thinking, "Oh my god. I'm out of things to say." And as if reading my mind, she said to me something about that I didn't need to feel like I had to force a conversation. And I should also add that just before we ran out of things to say, something must come up about Grampa because she was also sniffling and wiping a few tears from her eyes.

I forget what I said next but the realization that I had was that the woman who sat in front of me was no longer my disciplinarian, nor the person that I had somehow come to expect to carry the conversations and quite frankly whatever else was going on around her. She was a person and a loved one and I was going to have to show up and not sit back lazily. It was like the slate had been wiped clean and although we had so many years of history together, we were new friends.

I think I told her something like I had just been distracted for a moment and that I wasn't trying to force a conversation. I did say though that we should probably get going to dinner and the two of us went to the Olive Garden. And while I can't recall what we talked about, I remember very vividly sitting in that restaurant, feeling like we had escaped a very tense moment and also that I was having one of the best conversations I've ever had with my new friend, Grandma.

Unfortunately, one of the few family members I've bonded, my Grandmother, is no longer around and will not be attending my wedding. Also, all of my family from my Father's side who I do have a sort of natural bond with...well, they all live out in Ohio so they won't be attending the wedding. Thankfully, though I have bonded with my Cool Ant Sara who is somewhat local and she will be attending. Ya know it's funny because the defining moment where I realize that I connected with her was while we were out to dinner. It was a place called Frankie's near Clinton Beach. Maybe I should just meet up with all of my family members and take them out to dinner.

After you consider your family for wedding invites, then you get into friends. Boy, that's a tough one. Because then you have to start rating your friends and decide whose more of friend and how long it's been since you've seen or talked to that friend. This is a problem for me because you're either cool or I don't like you. I have a few friends who I put up on a pedestal and after that, the rest are pretty even on the good people scale. So there's a number of people who I've been great friends with over the years but if we were good friends and haven't talked in a couple of years, that's why you didn't make the cut. Nothing personal I swear.

It's funny because as I sit here, I'm wondering where I was going with those thoughts. Alright. Just to catch me up...Kristine's done most of the wedding planning and inviting people to the wedding has weighed on me some. Also, I love and miss my Grandmother.

As for the actual marriage itself, all that I'm worried about is that I'm missing something now. By that, I mean that I already feel like I'm married. Kristine and I have been together on and off since 2000 and we've been living together since June of last year. We've certainly had to jump over some hurdles and we've made great strides in understanding one another. If there's something about marriage that will change about our relationship that blindsides me and kicks me in the ass... Whatever that is, it will catch me completely off guard and I will be screwed.

Kristine and I have grown to love each other and trust each other and we desire to grow old with each other. This might sound awful, but I see the wedding itself as a great party that will cause us some stress and once we get passed it, we can get on with our marital lives.

On that note, I must say goodbye as Kristine called during the writing of this entry to give me a few wedding related tasks to do for the wedding. Having realized a few things during this writing, I'm anxious to jump on them and help out.

I Hope You All Have A Great Weekend
Dave