Paper Presents

Yesterday was our first anniversary, and it was lovely and meaningful and I share a lot of things on this blog (like, a lot of things. Inappropriate things.) but I'm keeping that one to myself. I got him a role-playing book, cause he's a geek, he got me a lovely picture based on one of my favorite movies. Because the first anniversary is paper.

I had this heartfelt concept for this post but then I thought: "No. Let's not." So instead, I'd like to share with you our wedding vows. They were written the morning of the wedding, and I tweaked them until like an hour before the ceremony. Our friend who officiated read them aloud for the both of us. I paraphrased William Shakespeare and F. Scott Fitzgerald (cause I'm super pretentious.). I keep them in a folder on my laptop called Important Shit. And I think they're lovely.

I love you, and that is the beginning of everything.

I come here today to join my life with my best friend.

I pledge to be true to you, to respect you, and to grow with you through the years.

I will hold you above all others.

Wherever you will go, I will go.

Whatever you will face, I will face.

Through laughter or tears, through riches or poverty, I vow here that this love will be my only love.

My heart is ever at your service, and I will make my home in yours from this day forward.

So there ya go. A glimpse into our wedding, because we didn't film the ceremony and I keep forgetting to get pictures printed to keep with me at all times so I can whip out a photo album.

PS we forgot to eat the piece of wedding cake we've had in our freezer last night so we're eating it tonight. Extended anniversary!

Haven't Posted In Awhile, My Bad

Let's start with some good news: I am now 10 pounds away from my goal weight, and looking good. High five for me.  Other news, I still hate my job. But that's to be expected. I will never like a job until that job is getting paid to sit around day-drinking pretending I have writer's block but really just milking everyone's interest in my forth-coming novel. (Note to publishers, I'm ready to talk if you don't care about a 30-page proposal, or a finished piece of work. Let's do this.)

I'm watching the original Born Yesterday again, cause Jeremy's still sleeping. He's the kind of person that won't watch black and white movies, for inexplicable reasons. He can't say why, cause he doesn't honestly know, but they just seem weird to him. So I watch when he's not around.

It's still great, and I still hate Brock. With gusto.

I've included this lovely outtake from our wedding photos for your viewing entertainment. Look at my hair, that is excellent hair. All lank and lifeless. Those sweat-soaked bangs, my gut making itself known, the clearly-too-warm flush to my chubby upper-arms. Not to mention the god-awful posture. How could he possibly say no to that?

Money Money... Money!

So I recently checked my student loan progress (by which I mean, I checked to see how delinquent my payments are because everybody knows I'm not paying on that shit) and crunched some numbers and determined a way to pay them off in 8 years. It won't happen because it involves working a minimum of 15 hours a week, steady, which as we all are aware doesn't happen to me. Holidays are great and everything but they also suck cause I forget that the hours won't last once January rolls around. Stupid January.

Upon this discovery I told Jeremy we should play the lottery, because I was feeling both lucky and depressed.

He sent me a picture message in reply, with the letters 'omg.' It was a damn cookie order form for Girl Scout Cookies. What a jerk. Now all my monies are going to cookies, which I won't get for like two months. Actually I don't remember when they come in. It's been way too long since I was a Girl Scout to remember a timeline like that.

The other day I weighed myself (who am I kidding? I weigh myself everyday, because I have a terrible body image and hate myself) and I've gained 5 pounds on this diet and exercise regime I've been on. I have to keep reminding myself that if I'm working out, even if I'm dieting, I'm still building muscle mass. But come on body, 5 pounds of muscle? You show me where damn it, cause all I see are chubby thighs and squeaky biceps. ...You know what I mean when I say squeaky biceps, right? As in, I can flex and you can squeeze my bicep and make the squeaky noise like I'm a chump at the beach who gets sand kicked in her face?

That went sad quick.

Monday was our 6 month anniversary! Yay for making it to the halfway mark! Six more months and we'll have been married for one whole year. At which point I will expect paper stuff. One year is paper right? It's the Paper Anniversary? Anyone? No? That's cool, I'll just have to scour the internet now for the information. Oh no, how awful.

It's De-Lightful

So after all that bitching I did about how the yard would look all redneck-y and such, my brother and his wife came over to my parents the night before the wedding to hang out for a bit and Scotty saw the backyard and I guess felt that it wasn't good enough for his little sister to get married in as it was. So early Saturday morning, (I like to imagine they were sitting in the parking lot waiting for the manager to open the doors, like those crazy Black Friday shoppers... which they are) they went out to Hobby Lobby and rented some stuff to pretty up the place and they even borrowed chairs from his in-laws. Oh, and they bought us two big flower bouquets and vases that are sitting on top of my piano now. I'm sad that I didn't get to see until after the ceremony though cause I only had a short time to really appreciate it. I wasn't allowed out of the house until the walk "down the aisle." (There wasn't really an aisle.) Everyone else saw it though so that's good. But what I did see was beautiful. My sappy big brother...

I ended up going with my back-up dress. The intended dress was ready in time, but when I put it on it just didn't feel right. I pictured something so much different in my head and I really thought I had conveyed that properly but I guess not and now I just have a kinda fancy dress for if we ever go anywhere where I need a fancy dress. My brother's wife summed up perfectly how I felt when I was wearing the original dress when she said she almost wanted to cry seeing my face when I looked in the mirror. I was just disappointed. But the back-up, while probably not beautiful, made me feel how I imagine a bride is supposed to feel when she puts on her dream dress. It didn't look anything like what I imagined my wedding dress would look like, but then again I didn't start imaging a dress until we started planning a wedding. Which I think is backwards.

I only wish that we had chosen some music to be played while people were waiting, or at least while dad and I walked from the back door to the very back of the yard. Everything I had wanted though made me cry when I pictured it and I knew I would already be crying enough once I was up there with him, I didn't want to exacerbate that. So instead there was an awkward silence, well it was awkward for everyone else, dad and I just made jokes about how awkward it was and how I was going to cry like a little girl... so I wouldn't start crying. Jeremy's mum made a comment about the lack of music while I was making my way up, and then he told me about it later and for some reason I got all fired up about it. I know there should have been something but maybe you can wait until after the wedding to make your snide remarks. I'm the only one allowed to be snarky about my wedding during my wedding. Occasionally Jeremy can be, but only occasionally.

I wrote our vows that morning. Literally, that morning. Courtney and I were texting until about one in the morning trying to work some things out. We had a general idea but all of the vows seemed cliche, hollow, or contrite. So I ended up paraphrasing F. Scott Fitzgerald and Shakespeare, and taking a bit here and there from some of the vows she found online. We didn't read our own, or recite after her. Instead she introduced them as being written by us and then she read them. I liked it better that way, cause it felt more unified. Also, neither of us would have gotten through them. We're big babies.

I asked my dad to read a poem by Yeats, which he (my dad) made it through just fine, but I did not. I was fine as long as I kept looking at our hands. The moment I looked at Jeremy though I thought, 'thank god Courtney's reading the vows.' We also did a sand-ceremony-thing. Which is where we each have a container of colored sand and we pour the two colors together into one container. We went with light and dark blue cause it our favorite color and the jars are now sitting on top of the piano, between the two vases of lovely blue flowers from Scotty and Ashley.

I should've known it would be a perfect day, (except for my being sick and coughing until I vomited in the Olive Garden restroom and everyone thinking I was pregnant) despite everything that wasn't working out how I wanted it to. Our family does well in the clutch.

I'll tell you what I'm not excited about that though: mum invited Drunkle (our consistently drunk uncle) to the reception while I was on honeymoon. Yeah. That's happening.