Distracting Myself with Joy

Enough whining.  Enough whingeing.  Enough pouting.

It is what it is.  Appointments have been made.  Exercises have been undertaken.  Massage is at hand.  All that can be done has been done.  It's time to smile and move on.

Luckily for everyone concerned, there is something equally potent on my plate right now.  It's a major undertaking. It involves multiple venues and vendors and dollars.  There are almost-but-not-quite too many cooks tending the broth and thus far none of us has spoiled it for the others.

We're planning a wedding.

January 6, 2009.... from my backyard

SIR and Little Cuter have gone through several of these United States in their wedding-brains before settling on the desert Southwest and our brilliant Tucson sunsets.

Our house will be a refuge on the wedding day and a venue before and after.  The actual event is being left to professionals. Thus, a venue must be secured.

Apparently, many other brides and grooms have had the identical idea and they have gone ahead and planned while we were debating the appropriateness of the Carolina coast.  Available dates are in short supply.... except at the place we want the most... the one that's closest and classiest... the one that has the best air conditioning.... the one that's set up in case of an unexpected downpour...the one that's just a little bit too expensive... the one that has the date they'd hope to use.

TBG and I are going to look at it this afternoon.  Our job is to make no commitments, no promises, no decisions.  We are to gather facts, ask many questions, be critical and nit-picky and take lots of photographs which are different from those shown on the website.   We are not to fall in love with it until the kids come and choose it.

None of us like this
Hey... at least we agree on something!

I've already run afoul of that last instruction.  The first venue I visited was, except for the carpet,  absolutely perfect.  I liked the guy who showed me around, I liked the all-inclusiveness of the price, I liked the view and the indoor/outdoor possibilities.

I was filled with enthusiasm when I called Little Cuter to share the joy.  After 5 seconds of chatter I fell silent... for a second.  Was I too excited?  Was I too pushy?  Was I just finished with thinking about this and wanting a decision, any decision, to be made?

The fact that I was having those thoughts at all was enough to rein me in.  And that's when I realized that this is not my headache.  I don't have to make the decisions.  I am, for the first time in my life, not in charge of a major event in which I am a player.

It's enough to cause a lesser woman to stop in her tracks.

Not I, denizens.  No, indeed, not I.  I took a breath and said that I'd send her the photos I'd taken with my taped together Nikon and she told me to relax and go to the other two places on the list... the ones that she  had chosen,,,, the ones in which she was truly interested....and then she hung up because she was on the bus and who talks to her mother about this stuff while crammed in next to a 60-something who's bopping along to her admittedly too loud ipod.

Sometimes it's good to be reminded of your place in the overall scheme of things.