feelingofgaze

1. me: I’m the worst.    B: no, we’re The Worsts.

2. PEP TALK FOR MYSELF: I approach wedding planning like I do everything else in my life,

procrastinating for two seemingly contradictory reasons: 1. I fear success and achievement and half-ass things so if people hate it, I can just be all like, “I wasn’t even trying and don’t give a shit;” 2. everything will be fine and get done because it always does. it’s like when I write my final papers every semester. it will be half-assed but chock full of goofy jokes & brilliant insights & packaged so smoothly you won’t even realize it slipped in under the wire. plus you’ll be drunk!

self-affirmation is important!

3. plus, okay, granted, I am not an expert, but I have been to more weddings than most people since my dad is a pastor and my mom is an organist. there are only two things that have made me ever judge a wedding super harshly: reinscription of oppressive antiquated gender politics and lack of (free) booze. I can’t imagine either of those things being a problem at my wedding.

4. not to be a dick about it, but it kind of hurts my feelings when people ask if I’m going to change my name.

5. I think that, in the future, even though this is the season of my wedding, I will think of Summer 2012 as that summer I smoked a lot of weed and did a lot of yoga and practiced keyboard a lot and made breakfast sandwiches every day (mayo + bacon = bride diet of champions) and spent like 20 hours a day with my dog. I’m kind of OK with that. after an intense semester—an intense year—an intense two years—I need a few months of just spending a lot of time being a body. plus I’ve been having weird wedding feelings this whole time that I’m just now sorting out.

6. not weird marriage feelings—I mean, I feel weird about the institution of marriage, but I don’t feel weird about being married to this particular person since we’ve been basically living as married people since college. I don’t believe in soul mates, and I believe a lot of people could have been / are / will be right, but he makes the most sense at this point in my life. and I love him & junk. but I feel weird about other people’s expectations & assumptions about what this wedding is supposed to be like and what it’s supposed to mean and how we’re supposed to feel.

7. the other night I was sitting in the backyard at 3 AM reading old love letters by candlelight (yeah) and I realized what was getting to me wasn’t “am I marrying the right person?” but the fact that we’re partially doing this so that we can be married before our ten-year anniversary: and where have ten years gone? and am I a good person? have I been good to the people in my life? am I where I want to be, not romantically but just as me? can I sail through the changing ocean tides? can I handle the seasons of my life? hm hm, I don’t know.