The Story of Us

A lot of folks have asked about how we met, and many more want to know about the wedding since they couldn't be there - so here it is.... I apologize in advance for the likely length of this post, but I hope you enjoy it! :) It was a Sunday afternoon in mid-September, 2012. I had just gotten back from working the Castleton (opera) Festival and a massive cross-country drive. I thought I was leaving in 2 weeks to join the national tour of "A Chorus Line", and had bought a bright pink suitcase for the tour. I stopped off at the local grocery to pick up a few things, including some salmon, to make dinner for my bestie and myself. I was having an amazing day - the weather was beautiful, interesting work to look forward to, and a lovely day with my friend. I got into the fish department, and was immediately greeted by the fellow working the counter. I thought he was cute with his big brown eyes and beautiful smile, then he spoke - and I heard that Aussie accent. We ended up talking for over 20 minutes, and I gave him the tour of the pins I had tacked on my hat from my travels that summer, told him about the woman who gave me "jazz hands" when I borrowed her husband to help me get the suitcase down and told her I was going on tour, and about this blog in hopes that he might want my contact information. Now keep in mind, I had given up on ever meeting anyone - that's why I had decided to tour for the next indefinite period of time. It had been ages since I'd really been flirted with, and cute guys definitely never hit on me. But it didn't mean I didn't see him, and well, a girl can dream.... So he said he'd love to follow the blog, and I gave him my card. By the third day after not hearing anything, I began to think I really had imagined that he was flirting with me. I'm not sure what possessed me, but I decided to go see - and invite him to hear a friend's band play the following Saturday. I went in on Wednesday evening, and he wasn't there. I decided to give up, then figured "What the heck?" and went in on Thursday. He was working, and immediately apologized and said he'd lost my card and could he please please please have another one? I gave it to him, and before I got to my car, he'd texted to say my number was installed in his phone. He had his son that weekend and couldn't go to the show, but we did end up skyping - for about 3 1/2 hours. We decided to set a coffee date at Starbuck's for Monday morning at 11. By the end of the conversation, we moved it up to 9am because we were excited. We both arrived for our first date a little early. We got out of our cars to greet each other, and immediately went in for a hug. He actually kissed me, and it felt completely natural. We went in to get coffee, and there was a fellow sitting and waiting for his friend. He said hello and "how are you", and I replied, "It's a beautiful day, we're having good coffee, and I've got a cute guy - life is good!" We started the first of many "bubbles" - we find that when we focus on each other, we have no consciousness of anyone around us. As the fellow who said hello was leaving, he came by and said "I hope someday I find someone and can be as happy as you two." Needless to say, he nearly fell over when we told him it was our first date! Then there was the woman who kept staring and grinning at us - and neither of us knew who she was. Finally we gave up and went back to where I was staying and sat and talked for ages - our first date lasted for 7 1/2 hours. I've never enjoyed just being with someone so much.

We'd been together just over 5 1/2 months when I left to work for Princess Cruises. It was supposed to be a 6-month contract, and ended up being just under 8 months. All I can say is: thank goodness for Skype. I was coming off 6 months of unemployment, so I refused to pay for shipboard internet - this meant we could talk on the phone occasionally, and skype once in a while if I could find a decent enough connection while in port. It was hard, to say the least. Given Paul's nightmare situation (see most recent post previous to this one for that background), it was really rough on him. I was lucky - I was out doing cool things and seeing the world - he was stuck, but we did have each other. We knew that when I got home (we thought in August) that we'd want to get engaged. Then in April, we decided we just wanted to be married. So we got engaged. We realized that November 16th was a Saturday, it was a weekend Paul was scheduled to have his son with him, and it was exactly 14 months to the day from when we met - so a wedding we planned! He drove me nuts with details, but I have to say, it was beautiful having a man so excited to get married.

What seemed to take forever was suddenly over, and I was back in his arms. We spent my first two nights home in a motel, just relishing being together. The first morning, we went out to breakfast at Denny's (I'd been craving it for months) and back to "our" Starbucks for coffee. While we were there, at the same table where we had our first date, Paul got down on one knee and proposed. I had no idea he had planned that, and was totally taken off guard. I jumped up and hugged him, then yelled to the place "I'M GETTING MARRIED!!!!!" Everyone applauded, and a couple women asked to see the ring.

While I was on board the ship, I started looking into dresses. I found one I liked on a website, and ordered it. It was a cool little medieval-looking thing, and was supposed to be in silver.

Through a communication issue, the payment didn't go through immediately, and I wasn't able to get it because they couldn't guarantee I would have it in time. Yes, it's my fault for not checking to see if PayPal needed another step, but you would think that if they hadn't gotten payment confirmation within 24 hours, knowing it was for a wedding dress, that they would have checked in with me and not waited a week?? Anyway, I started shopping. I found a few things, but nothing that really made my heart sing.

And then I found this:

It wasn't traditional, but I sure did love it (and figured it would be perfect for when we have the ceremony on the beach in Australia for all of his folks), and I bought it (the price was amazing). I didn't want to risk bad luck by having the groom see the dress before the wedding, but I had to get his okay on it since it was so radically non-traditional. He took one look at the picture of me in it and said, "You obviously love it, so I love it. Go for it - it's our day, who cares what anyone else says?" And that was that. Then I was in Savers looking for bridesmaid dresses, and found this dress for $59.99. I figured I should try it on - because it is strapless, I needed help, so I asked a woman near the dressing room to help me. She zipped me up and gasped, "Wow! It looks like it was made for you! You HAVE to buy it!" And I agreed - it did look like it was made for me.

While I was waiting to check out, holding the armful of dress, the same woman came by and chatted with me as I waited. As I was checking out, she gave me a 30% off coupon - I got the dress for $42!!!! With all the beadwork and detachable train, it had to have originally been at least $1000. I couldn't believe it!! I decided to let Paul think we were still non-traditional, and conspired with my friend Allison to keep it from him. We had organized for a friend who is a professional photographer to do the pictures for us, but as things ran over budget and I lost some work, we just couldn't afford it. The person who was supposed to make our cake totally forgot about it, and was now unavailable. Fortunately, I remembered my friend Madison's fiancee is a baker, and she was fortunately willing to make the cake to have as portfolio work, as she is looking to expand her work. I called the Hallmark Institute of Photography to see if there was a student who was looking for portfolio work (hoping against hope), and we found Helena - who just that morning was wondering where she would find a wedding to use for an end-of-semester project! The cake ended up being one of the most amazing, delicious things ever (the ducks we found and thought they were cute - no real story behind them).

And we honestly cannot say enough good things about the photos - Helena is an incredibly talented photographer, and was a delight to work with.

The ceremony itself was fairly non-traditional, but we like to think it reflected our personalities and incorporated our spiritual paths. Our celebrant is a friend of mine, who is in the process of becoming ordained. We were her first wedding, which made it that much more special for all of us. There were a few glitches (like Sulis not understanding my direction about letting the music finish then centering the congregation then cueing the entrance music so that was a bit awkward - and we all forgot the sand for the sand ceremony, but between Sulis and Brenda, it came off great), but overall it was just memorable. Paul's mom and my dad have passed away, and my mom wasn't able to be with us (combination of health, finances, and I don't have a place for her to stay with me at the moment), so I asked Brenda to stand in for my folks and give me away. It meant so much to me to have her stand with me. Jen, my maid of honor, was amazing. She stepped up and helped organize where we had holes in the planning, and performed amazing poetry during the ceremony. I am so deeply grateful to have these two incredible women in my life.

The reception was amazing. I have never felt so incredibly loved and supported as when we were introduced and everyone applauded - and kept going! They wouldn't stop!!! Everyone was so happy for us, and I loved watching my friends fall in love with my husband. It was truly amazing. We had decided to do a potluck reception because we just didn't have the funds to do anything else. We were nervous, because we thought people might thing it was tacky - but the main comment I got was that folks loved it because it let them feel like they were a part of everything. And the food was out of this world! We got to dance a bit ("our" song is "Forever" by KISS) - and our bubble is still in place - every time we danced, we couldn't have told you if there was another person in the room.

It was a perfect day. We spent our wedding night in a bed and breakfast in South Hadley, MA - it was beautiful, and the hostess was delighted we chose to spend it with them.

On our way to the B&B, we realized we were both starving. So we stopped off at a gas station in Holyoke to buy Subway, and loved the reactions we got from the folks who worked there! :)

Our good friends Mindi and Dan Fried were unbelieveably kind and generous, and treated us to a second night at the B&B, and it was the perfect way to start our married life together.

That first day coming back to the "real" world, we stopped off to Savers - and I re-donated my dress. I had thought about consigning it (heaven knows we could have used the money), but decided to pay it forward. I am grateful to whomever donated it in the first place so that I could have something so beautiful for my big day - I hope someone else has the same joy I did. It's been an amazing journey coming to this point. Ten days after we got married, I dropped Paul of at Boston's Logan Airport to head out to Australia to lay the groundwork for our life together there. We are back to Skyping, and it will be at least a year before we hold each other again. And I wouldn't trade him for anything.