So Holly and Dhia decided to legally tie the knot. The wedding blew up (as in wind blowing, not explosives) in about 2 weeks. They wanted a small informal affair. Supposedly a quiet, family only party. Cake and champaigne, over in two hours. Not even letting dad travel up from Florida for the occasion.
No one was going to let that happen. What is it about weddings anyway? First, John and Jeanie immediately and enthusiastically declared they would come up if Holly would just tell them when to come (this is Holly's dad, my father-in-law) then her grandparents said of course they wanted to come. Somehow uncles and cousins got invited. And that's just Holly's side of it. Dhia is Iraqui, and apparently, the Middle Eastern way of handling a wedding is that you simply tell the entire village when it's going to be and everyone shows up bringing food and music. When they tried to cast this as a small, private affair, I think his friends and brother were realy hurt. The two of them shrugged and gave up and I hope they had a good time letting their friends celebrate. Everyone pitched in and we shared the logistics among ourselves.
So two weeks flat got us a 60 or 70 person gathering (I might be exaggerating) that was half prepared by Holly's family (mostly James and Jan, but Reed and I helped) and half brought by Dhia's community all over to James and Jan's house which was wonderful since they've been prepping their house for their own wedding in October and this was a pretty excellent dry run for their own numbers. (Since it's their own wedding, they are wisely hiring a caterer, though.)
I was surprised and pleased to hear them use a very slight modification on the vows Reed and I went to so much trouble over 4 years ago. They modified some words I'm not sure Dhia's english extends to, but it was our service alright, kidnapped from the man who'd married us 4 years ago without our knowledge. Anyhow, I was tickled. And it sounds like James and Jan are going to use that service too. I guess Reed and I managed to say something right acording to someone besides ourselves. Yay, us.
But enough about the wedding in general. You know, of course, that I can't possibly manage to comment on a large gathering of people I know and don't see terribly often without a big fat eye-roll over my "condition", followed up by more info than you ever wanted about what it's like to be preggers. If you're bored by this habit of mine. Leave immediately. This post isn't going to contain anything else from here on out.
First, there's how I felt: For the first time ever, I had a logistical maternity problem that could NOT be ignored. Sometime over the last 4 days of eating complete crap while Reed was in Carmel, NY, I blew my body chemistry out of whack, and by dinner time Friday my feet were blistered from my usually perfectly comfortable shoes and so swollen I couldn't put them in any shoes I own except sneakers. This just as I'm supposed to dress up and STAND for HOURS because were were a bit short of seating.
Add to this, embarassing toenails that looked like they had a good case of mange because I had been painting them and you really shouldn't use Acetone on yourself when you're preggers so when I quit painting them, they just got all chipped and nasty looking.. Add to this, the one maternity dress I have been lent does NOT fit, so I went to the wedding in casual slacks. Now throw in the inquisitive well meaning relatives asking the same birth related questions over and over and stir.
I had some wonderful conversations with Reed's cousins, whom I have always really liked and never see enough of, but between being in a moderate amount of pain, feeling inappropriately dressed, having mangey swollen feet and being a bit immobile, I was crabby. I hope I wasn't rude. It seemed like a lovely party if you could stand up and enjoy it. Holden and Elizabeth rescued me and took me home to a quiet, properly airconditioned house (mine) where I could put my feet up. And then looked at me bewildered as I perked up and suddenly wanted to sit up until 4 am talking. It was quiet. It was comfortable. My feet were elevated and no one was going to ask me my due date, my diet, my workplans or anything else undecided and overpersonal or judgeable and micromanageable again that evening. Mercy. I no longer felt an overwhelming need to hide in the bathroom or James and Jan's bedroom.
Anyhow, betterplans will be laid for the remaining 5 weddings. Correct clothing, better diet management to prevent swelling (Since luckily, it DOES seem to be food related for me) and correct SHOES will manage a lot of it. There's no one left who needs putting in the know about when I'm due, what drugs I'm planning on taking or my philosophy about early childrearing, and total strangers are unikely to be offended by my changing the subject.
A word about the foot swelling thing, to the ladies -- this is NO JOKE. If you want to be a virtual cripple for months on end while pregnant, eat a high salt, high fat diet and you stand a reasonablechange of being unable to do anything but sit on your ass for the entire pregnancy. I ate badly for about 8 meals straight and paid for it with 2 days of the freakiest most unnatural feet I have ever seen bar none. At no time previously in this pregnancy have I slowed down for anything as most of you have heard. I thought I was going to have to spend the next 2 months in bunny slippers before it became clear it was diet related and I could do something about it. For the record, as shoes go all I ever usually wear are Clarks and other really foot healthy things so it's not like I was asking my feet to do anything special.Just HOLD ME UP. I gather some women cant help this symptom at all and for othres it can also be weight dependent. Anyhow, watch yourselves. Yuck.
So, anyhow, Holly and Dhia's wedding was lovely if you weren't me -- and it wasn't bad if you were me apart from being unhealthy. One wedding down, 5 to go. Eep.
Posted by karen at August 17, 2002 12:00 AM