2004-08-04

The picture of calm.

With less than two months to go until the wedding, I appear to be the very picture of calm. Of course I don't sleep at night, I've gained five pounds from stress eating, and my fingernails are bitten to bloody nubs.... But I do look very collected.

Don't misunderstand. I am completely happy and excited to be marrying Ken. I have no doubt at all that he is going to be my main man forever. It's just the wedding itself and all the stuff that surrounds it. Especially my family stuff. Planning things with my family has always been a little sticky. My family has never been big on participating in anything, really. I've found myself worrying too much about what my family can and can't or will and won't do. Will my mother be able to make it to the rehearsal dinner? "We'll see" she tells me. Should I send my brother Joseph an invite to the shower, when I know that he is so bad off financially that he had to borrow money from his church to pay his rent? (I just told him that he is welcome to come gift-free) Will my father stand up and yell "Blasphemer!" in the middle of our ceremony? (He came over last week to tell Ken and I that even though the fact that we are having a non-christian wedding ceremony "hurt him to the bone", he will participate and "not consciously do anything to ruin the ceremony". Then he gave us a bible.)

I do love my family. We have our annoyances and mis-matches, but they are still my family. My family rarely gets together for anything. I've never been happy with this. My oldest brother Scott claims that our family used to have regular holiday gatherings, birthday get togethers, etc. before our parents got divorced. Guess being the youngest made me miss out on that kind of stuff. It's very sad, especially when my mom forgets my birthday every so often. But I accept it. I do know that it will be interesting to see my family's dynamic at the wedding. Everybody together in one room! Crazy!

Eh. Why worry about the family aspect of the wedding when I have many more important things to obsess over? Such as:

Will I be able to fade my farmer tan enough to look right in my gown? Will I start my period the day of the wedding? Will I get stage fright and throw up in the middle of the ceremony? Will the candles set the building on fire? Will anybody have fun? Oh dear. I'm glad that Ken loves me, because I can be a real train wreck sometimes.

On a lighter note, we got back our engagement pictures that we had taken this past December. My friend Malia shot 'em. Here you go: