What are you looking at?

Oh Yeah, I Had a Honeymoon

I'm sorry, Internet. Here I've been blathering over superficial matters like the salvation of my soul when I promised to enlighten you about the fabulous trip that was Luke's and my honeymoon.

And I would, if that new husband of mine hadn't beaten me to it.

His write-up is a pretty good one, so just go and read that. However, I will say I learned more about my shortcomings in those four days than during the course of my twenty-six years of life. Like:

I am no good at driving. Frema's a very lucky girl in that, for the most part, Luke does all the driving. In this case, there were nine hours of quality car time to endure--five and a half from northern Indiana to Michigan, where we spent the night in a hotel where the idea of a continental breakfast consisted of a Frosted Flakes dispenser and a box of Hostess Donuts, and three and a half hours to Canada. The day before, halfway to said hotel, I offered to take over and unwittingly proceeded to steer us forty-five minutes in the completely opposite direction. So, not only did I tack on an extra hour and a half to the trip, it was raining on and off ALL DAY, meaning a journey that should've taken fewer than six hours ended up equaling almost the entire length of the trip. Next morning I was eager to prove to Luke I could get behind the wheel without repeating imbecile behavior like confusing I-69 with I-96. This leads directly into my next item.

I am no good at customs. Because I was driving, our safe passage through Candian customs solely depended on my ability to utilize common sense. Apparently, though, such positions of power render me unable to take advantage of my brain bank, because when asked about our citizenship, I answered Illinois, even though it's been four years since I owned a Windy City driver's license and, you know, IT'S NOT A COUNTRY, and when questioned about the possession of firearms and/or other defensive weapons, and I actually paused to stare at Luke in wonder, like, I don't know, honey, DID we pack our nine-millimeter automatic?

Luke was not pleased.

"For future reference, we are from the United States," he said, once we (surprisingly) crossed the border. "Also, if someone asks you about weapons, just say no."

I am no good at gambling. That first night in Canada, we had a nice dinner and decided to treat ourselves to an evening of fun and potential profit at Casino Niagara. It was my first time participating in gaming activity, and I didn't expect to feel so intimidated by the hoards of men and women who probably TiVo shows like The History of Poker and rip the pants off their grandmas in no-mercy marathons of Texas Hold'em. I'd been so excited at the thought of sitting in front of the dealer, maliciously stroking my piles of winning chips, slapping the palm of my hand on that luscious green table cover until I remembered professional dealers aren't as willing to answer your questions during a hand, even the most thought-probing ones, like "How much is the ace is worth again?" and "When is it MY turn?" This meant Luke represented the Frema-Useless Clutter household by default, and he actually won thirty bucks at Black Jack, but I was so, "Do it again!" "Again!" "Yeah, baby, AGAIN!" that we walked away with nothing. I then proceeded to whittle away another six dollars at the slots because I liked pulling the silver lever.

In my defense, I am VERY good at finishing off a quarter pound of cookies'n cream fudge, falling asleep in the car, and pouting over the the rain we experienced at some point EVERY. SINGLE. DAY. of our honeymoon. Luke is already counting his blessings.

* I had pictures to share with you, but Blogger is being a stupidhead, so I'll have to try again tomorrow. In the meantime, will wedding proofs do? Find 'em by visiting this Web site, clicking "Online Proofing," and finding our last names. Enjoy.

I Can't Watch That Clip of Our Vows Without Crying A River.

Well, maybe not a river. But definitely a respectable puddle.

So, I'm back. And married! It only took twenty-six years.

As you can tell from the blogs of my nearest and dearest, the wedding day, it saw rain. Luke and I knew it was coming; at the rehearsal we were huddled together under the shelter of the gazebo, shivering, attempting to stay dry, giving up all hope that the sun would deem our firstborn child a worthy sacrifice for twelve minutes of cooperation. However, our wedding party was fantastic and agreed to proceed through the park as planned, so everyone could ooh and aah over their spiffy tuxes and dresses and I could savor the moment of walking down the aisle with my father. Equally fantastic was our paparazzi, who came armed with color-coordinated umbrellas for the ladies and a white sleeveless parka vest for me, the latter probably unintentional but they deserve the credit nonetheless. Mandy Meyers, if you haven't booked a photographer for your gig yet, call the Bellas. Really. Do it now. Just don't tell them Frema sent you, because they don't know who she is.

Seconds before this shot was taken, I was hissing in my father's ear, "They forgot to set up the chairs!" I'm currently torn over whether or not to call the park and complain. On one hand, since it was wet outside, I doubt our guests were expecting chairs, and even if they were set out, who would've wanted to sit in them? On the other hand, we paid two hundred and fifty-six dollars to rent the space, so dammit, gimme my effen chairs.

Despite all that, though, the ceremony was perfect; I felt it would be the minute my dad pulled into the parking lot. When I took my place on the bricks and spotted Luke for the first time, I knew with every fiber of my being that saying "yes" to this man was the best thing I'd ever done. And when I looked into his eyes as we exchanged our vows, I saw five years' worth of love fill his pupils and spill down his cheeks. He never looked more handsome.

Praying to God we make it past the first year.

There's nothing really poetic to say about the picture we took with our pastor; its primary purpose is to serve as a public service announcement to future brides who might assume stashing lip treatments in your dainty little bridal purse and leaving said purse in the back seat of your father's truck is sufficient, because when you're ushered from the ceremony straight into pictures with no lag time in between, you will think about your lipstick but ultimately be too chicken to put a halt to the festivities for five minutes to ask your dad to fetch it for you, as you can't stop imagining your guests tapping their feet and drumming their fingers in anticipation of your arrival with only a coffee bar to keep them company. Thus, you'll resort to coating your lips with the natural moisture of your tongue and hoping the photographer can Photoshop lip gloss. My recommendation? Chapstick in your bra, if not fastened to your wrist like a sassy charm bracelet. I guarantee you'll thank me.

Anyway.... The reception went just as well, even though the cake had pistachio icing instead of buttercream and people were too interested in the open bar to notice the pretty champagne fountain set up next to the entrance. Luke and I danced our first dance to "Someone Like You" by Van Morrisson, which I first fell in love with when I heard it in Prelude to a Kiss in the scene where Alec Baldwin is lamenting the sudden drastic change in his new wife and befriends a strange old man who strangely enough made a brief appearance at their wedding and also strangely enough knows the color of the undies Meg Ryan was wearing the night she left for a summerlong trip to Europe, or something, and Alec realizes that Meg is trapped in the decrepit body of one Archie Bunker. Those less cultured in Meg Ryan cinema may recognize it from the better-known Bridget Jones's Diary, when Mark Darcy tells Bridget he likes her just the way she is.

My father and I danced to "What a Wonderful World," during which he told me how beautiful I looked and what a great family I married into. Then he said it really was a wonderful world, held me tight, and started to cry. At the end he held up my hands and shouted, tears still streaming down his face, "This is my daughter!" It was the most magical moment I've ever had with my dad.

And now I'm verklempt. More to come later.

P.S. Thanks so much for all the lovely comments and e-mails this last week. If it weren't illegal, I'd marry each and every one of you.

Series Premiere

We're back...

...from the hair appointment. There is a veil on my head, and the strands are secured with much, much hairspray. Kasia dared the rain to do its worst. Samantha also dared oncoming traffic to avoid hitting her 1991 Buick Park Avenue. Twice.

It's eleven-thirty now, and there's still an hour and a half before it's time to go. All I have to do is throw on my make-up and slip on my dress, so I'm not sure what to do next.

At the hair salon, there was much talk about the procession, and whether or not we would have one. It's a little wet now, but not bad, so I asked the girls to go for it. If there's hard rain, that's one thing. But I want to do everything in my power to see that I walk down that aisle with my father. If there's one thing I want to be Bridezilla about, it is this. I hope everyone understands.

Also, I figured out the whole AMC thing.

I'm taping episodes for today, Monday, and Wednesday so I can get the gist of the storyline without eating up the whole tape. How smart am I?

Need to shower now. Hair appointment's at nine. Must step away from computer.

AHHH!

Holy Shit.

I'm getting married today!

Random Photos, Take Three: Leaves (Also, This Whole Tree Analogy Is Starting To Wear Thin)

P.S. Jason Chambers won't be at the wedding. He landed a cohosting gig for some martial arts show on The History Channel and is doing voiceover work today in Tennessee. Honestly, the priorities of some people. :)

It rained today.

And I don't just mean today, but ALL FREAKIN' DAY. It rained during my drive to Rensselaer, where I spent two hours receiving a heavenly French manicure and trampy-red polish on my toes. It rained when Luke and I went to the hall to set up, only to find there were too many chairs at the head table, no centerpieces, no dishware--in short, a whole lotta nothin' going on. Did my best to not freak out, but the tears, they weren't above punching the shit out of my eyelids.

It rained at the rehearsal. And I don't mean an "oh, isn't that adorable" little sprinkle. I mean RAIN, with umbrellas and chattered teeth and frizzified hair--the whole nine yards. We decided that if it rains like this tomorrow, we won't do a procession to the gazebo but instead just gather inside and take it from there. The rain is also forcing us to kabosh our plan for live music and surrender to the glory of the disc player, which saves us from damaging the church's keyboard and also electrocuting our musician, who was kind enough to run to the store between the rehearsal and dinner to purchase CDs we could play before and after the ceremony.

When I woke up this morning and saw the rain, I was all, Well, fuck. Say good-bye to dry clothes, in-tact updos, and those sexy stilettos I wanted to wear down the aisle. Tonight, though, I'm almost glad, because now we don't have to wonder when the first ball will drop; it already has. And even if there are ten million more, we'll still be married, and our loved ones will still be with us, and in the end, that's what's important.

Well, that and the open bar. Mentally, I've already downed my first daquiri.

Random Photos, Take Two: Branches

The Night Before The Night Before

Today was another big day, a day that began with fewer than five hours of sleep but ended pretty well. There were account withdrawals, oil changes, trips to the Salvation Army, and the printing of many, many Mapquest directions. Right now we're in Merrillville, printing out place cards and filling out our marriage certificate. Tomorrow I'll go to Rensselaer for a top-rate manicure and pedicure (forty-five minutes away, yes, but you're talking to a woman who travels three hours for a decent hair cut, so who's really surprised?), and then it's off to the hall. The rehearsal starts at 4:30, rain or shine. After dinner, I'll head to Chicago with my parents and siblings, who'll take me back to the park on Friday.

One of our first errands when we got into town was to grab Luke's tux, which meant there was a lot of waiting around while he dealt with too-short shirt sleeves and other related issues. When he walked out of the dressing room, though, fully clad in the clothing that'll bind him to me for eternity, I felt a little preview of the emotion I imagine he'll get when he catches his first glimpse of me down the aisle. He looked so handsome, and for the first time, I couldn't wait to take his name.

I wish there were more earth-shattering revelations to share with you all. Would a picture of tomorrow's pedicure help? Cuz my toes are gonna look FABulous. Also, on a scale of one to ten, how wrong is it for a bride to sport red polish?

Random Photos, Take One: Roots

Guess what time it is.

If you thought I wasn't stupid enough to stay awake past 1:00 tonight (yesterday?), you would be wrong, Internet friend, very wrong. It is 1:25. In my defense, I'm newly showered and lotioned up, and my kitchen floor was reintroduced to soap and water for the first time since Christmas, so progress, it has been made.

In addition to chatting with my bridesmaids and securing my Blogger videographer (bloggeragrapher?), I've spent a great deal of time opening up gifts from our wedding shower, washing glasses and plates and flatware, attempting to find storage space for all the new things Luke and I have acquired to jumpstart our new life together. Part of that has involved making decisions about our current individual possessions and which ones will be lucky enough to take the ride with us. During the three years I manned PR for Saint Joe, I became the lucky recipient of at least ten pint glasses featuring logos for Homecoming, the senior class dinner, and so on. In the spirit of compromise, I designated at least half of them to the Goodwill pile that has slowly overtaken the surface of our table. I said good-bye to cups and bowls I purchased at the dollar store my freshman year, and damn if those cheap little dishes haven't fared better than some of our best pieces, assuming you don't mind burn marks from heating up cans of Chef Boyardi. All the plates I inherited from my mother when I moved into my first non-dorm/non-parental living space, gone.

When Luke moved in last September we went through a similar process, and by "we" I mean "me," because even though I was lonely and heartsick and missing him more than my luggage (random quote alert! Did anyone get it?), I had become quite accustomed to having my way when it came to where I put those dollar-store finds, how many to hang on to, and which to throw in the trash. Now, though, as the two of us prepare to join more than our housewares, it's suddenly easier to let the old things go, because I don't have to worry about filling the voids I create. Life will do it for me.

Continuing With The Idiocy

1:46 a.m. That's what time I went to bed last night. When my alarm went off at 6:45, I laughed and reset it for 7:15, like thirty minutes of sleep can magically make up for an extra four hours. I stumbled into work an hour later, sans shower, make-up, and any resemblance to a well-rested human being. By 10:00, I was devouring my turkey sandwich with the passion of Augustus in Willy Wonka's chocolate river and trying to tame wild hairs with my index fingers and the moisture of my own spit. By noon, I was bidding a heartfelt farewell to the two women who give two figs about my misadventures and headed home.

So. Am home now, where I plan on loading the dishwasher, finally unboxing our wedding shower gifts, and watching AMC live. Since I'll be out of Internet commission for several days after the wedding, I figure I better blog while I can; hence, you'll see a number of scatterbrained sentences and random photos disguised as entries before Friday, as well as a live update from Lost A Sock the day of, as she'll be dropping off her precious boys before hitting the reception and has promised to post an update on this little site, as I have Delusions of Grandeur and want to believe the twenty people who read this site who won't be attending Our Big Day will have their fingers poised to reload.

Also, because Number Twelve's husband is unable to get out of work in time, and because Luke and I are redefining "progressive," Butterflygirl will be joining in the festivities as well! We'll be so happy to meet you, Butterfly! (I wonder how many brides and grooms say that to their wedding guests?)

Condensed

If you made it through my last entry, congratu-freakin'-lations! This post won't be as long-winded, partly because I'm getting married on Friday, and also because DID YOU HEAR WHAT I JUST SAID? I'M GETTING MARRIED ON FRIDAY. IT'S HAPPENING. YES.

Also, HOORAY FOR ALL CAPS.

Things are going well, I think, despite the fact that I haven't made it to bed any earlier than midnight for the last two weeks and my face is starting to resemble those red dots used to map out cities on a U.S. atlas. Remaining items from last Tuesday's list include wrapping the wedding party gifts, cleaning the apartment, packing, and convincing Luke that a good freak-out to the YMCA is nourishing for the soul, but since that won't happen, I really have only three things to do, and they'll be crossed off tomorrow, so it's all good. However, I still haven't received any volunteers to monitor my AMC recordings; if you're interested, speak up! My ability to witness the murder of Dr. Greg Madden and the life/death balance of Kendall and her unborn son, Spike, is in your hands. Why did I schedule a wedding during May sweeps?!

It's hard to believe I'll be a married woman in just five days. In five days, I'll have a new last name. In five days, it will no longer be appropriate to joke about putting Kiefer Sutherland at the forefront of my top five, and any babies delivered from my womb will officially be legitimate, unless Luke and I are overtaken with passion in the gazebo parking lot right before the ceremony and I become with child (and in that case, I'll be taking Pastor Tim's word we were already married in spirit). Sometimes those thoughts bring a Marmaduke-like grin to my face, and other times they're enough to inspire my insides to buy a one-way ticket straight to the soles of my toes. As much as I love Luke and know in my heart this is the best thing I could ever do, I'm still nervous enough to make myself sick. And realizing not everyone comes down with these pre-wedding jitters makes me even sicker.

So you can understand when the pastor told us on Sunday we were more than welcome to personalize our vows, I was like, thanks but no thanks, because my body is too tired and my stomach is too nauseous to be conjuring any deep insights about life and love.

However, we also took a few minutes to visit the park before heading home, and as we stood on the steps of the gazebo, I imagined myself looking into Luke's eyes and pledging myself to him for the rest of our lives, and I can't even think those words without welling up inside, so Matron of Honor, you better have Kleenex handy, is all I'm saying.

Now You Know Where My Witty Sense of Humor Comes From

OK, so it's been a few days since I've posted, but between deciding which table is worthy of getting Jason Chambers at the reception and going back and forth with Luke as to whether a wedding party dance is really necessary and explaining to my brother that "Blow Job Betty" is not so much an appropriate song choice, there's been NO. FREAKIN'. TIME. A fabulous entry is planned for tomorrow, an entry I've already started on, but in the meantime I leave you with a joke my mom told me last night and requested I share with all of you. ("You can put jokes on blogs, right?")

A lady goes to the doctor to get her annual mammogram, and when it's through, she comes home all excited. "Honey, honey, honey," she says to her husband, "The doctor checked me out and said everything's fine. I have the boobs of an eighteen-year-old."

And the husband says, "What did he say about your fifty-year-old ass?"

"Well," she replies, "We really didn't talk that much about you."

My mother, ladies and gentlemen.

Fifty Percent Married

I took off work today so that Luke and I could apply for our marriage license at the City-County Building downtown this morning and visit with our DJ in Valparaiso early this afternoon, all before we're due in Rensselaer so I can properly fulfill my volunteer duties for an end-of-the-year senior dinner at Saint Joe, a dinner I had to cover for the college's alumni magazine just last year. It's hard to believe I've been away that long. I wonder if there's a trace of me left.

Everything with the license went smoothly. I was even a little impressed with the thoroughness of the county's questions, which included:

- Are you now or have you ever been adjudged to be of unsound mind?
- Are you now under the influence of an alcoholic beverage?
- Are you now under the influence of a narcotic drug?

I didn't make it past the first question before I was digging in my purse for my notebook, so eager was I to share this information with you. What would happen if the answer to any of those questions was yes? Better yet, what if you said no but it was obvious to the whole world you'd enjoyed one Bloody Mary too many? Is the clerk authorized to make you stand on one foot or touch your finger to your nose? If so, how the hell did Ross and Rachel get married in Vegas on Friends?

They also worked in a special signature testifying to the fact that we both received our handy-dandy "Before You Marry: Information on Sexually Transmitted Disease and HIV" brochure, where they adamantly spell out your rights to privacy and even anonymynity. In other words, if Luke tests positive for syphilis, he doesn't have to tell me about it, and the state doesn't have to tell me about it, which makes me wonder what the point is at all.

Anyway, we filled out our application and paid our eighteen dollars and suddenly the clerk was asking us to raise our right hand and I was like, Holy $h!t, she's gonna do this RIGHT NOW, but she just laughed and reassured us she was only swearing us in.

So now we have a marriage license. Out of all the elements we've planned for this wedding so far--hall, flowers, music, and so on--this piece of paper is one of the only things actually required for this to happen. I told Luke I'm now fully within my legal rights to call him "Hus." I'll earn the "band" part in fourteen days--literally.

The Name Game

Only twenty-four hours later and Luke and I have already accomplished several items on our to-do list: we finished booking hotel rooms for the honeymoon, found one of two Bible passages for the ceremony, approved the song list for our mixed CD, and made arrangements for this Friday to obtain our marriage license--which, by the way, a big thanks to the anonymous commenter who mentioned that the Indiana rubella law had been repealed. All of you who assured me my American hair dryer can perform to its full capacity in Canada are pretty spiffy, too.

I'm tired. Even though Luke's been finished with his night gig for just about a week, I can't seem to get into bed any earlier than midnight, which means I get under seven hours of sleep, which means I'm ready to drop by the time I get home, and I vow to hit the sheets by 10:30 to make up for it, but then I get caught up in reading my blogs and visiting the AMC message board and scribbling the different combinations of my name (first name plus maiden name, first name plus married name, first name plus maiden name plus last name with a hypen, first name plus maiden name plus married name with just a space, and so on) as well as the new contenders for the name of our firstborn daughter. (It's a tie between Audrey and Norah, which just goes to show you how in sync we are with popular media.)

Yesterday someone at work learned I was getting married and asked if I was keeping my name. A funny question, seeing as that topic had taken over my entire being up until two days ago. When I was younger, I never imagined NOT taking my husband's name. I certainly didn't know anyone who hadn't, and with a last name like mine, I couldn't wait to meet a nice boy named John Smith and officially lose legal ties to the beast that most people tackle with the same facial expression worn when devouring a greasy steak sandwich. It's the double A that throws them off, another funny once you learn that neither A is actually pronounced like an A but more like a short-U/long-I combination.

When my name changes to this, I will lose two As and gain no As. An A-less last name. After twenty-six years and two college degrees and one nationally distributed pee article I'm ready to don a black veil and weep into my pillow, because dammit, it's my NAME. I stamp it on press releases and include it in bylines for company newsletters. I sign it on credit cards and meticulously spell it out for telemarketers trying to squeeze the last fifty dollars out of my bank account to purchase the newest version of Pro-Activ, which I would totally buy if Luke wasn't making me try every generic off-shoot known to man first. OK, maybe just two, and Klear Action really does work, so run to Super Target and get your box today!

(Come back, Frema! The point! It's over here!)

After a lot of back and forth, I've decided to take Luke's name. And I'm happy about it. I like Luke's last name. More importantly, I love Luke. I love that he and I and any babies we make together will be connected by such a tangible, emotionally charged bond. But I will list both when writing anything for print. For better or worse, that name is a part of me, just like my brown eyes and spinach dip obsession and tendency to pick corn strands out of my teeth with my pinky, and I don't agree with erasing all traces of it simply because I've switched from a Miss to a Missus. If I'm ever lucky enough to publish a memoir, I want my eighth-grade homeroom teacher to know her former student accomplished what she had hoped to do since the age of seven. I want to autograph copies for my parents and witness their pride in seeing the name we all share proudly centered on the book jacket. I want to mail one to my childhood self to show her that she done good.

Or maybe I'm just a self-centered narcissist who enjoys being difficult. Who's to say? Ladies, did any of you struggle over taking a new name?

Also, it's one minute to midnight. The vicious cycle, she continues. Bah.

But Will My Hair Dryer Work In Canada?

OK, so I've combed through my drunk post about eight times now, and each time I'm surprised to find only one misspelling. Not that I had any deep insights or even a point, but still! One typo! Apparently I proofread better when intoxicated. And also quote movies that my readers must have banished from their memory banks. Hell-o! Did anyone catch my awesome Troop Beverly Hills reference? Moving on....

Today marks sixteen days 'til the wedding, and there's still a whole lotta $h!t to do before then. Let's take the journey together, shall we?

Frema's Crazy-@$$ To-Do List

- Make peace with the fact that Luke has seen my wedding dress because I am an idiot and asked him to upload my pictures from Saturday. However, seeing as we already live together and our hall was booked two weeks before he put the ring on my finger, I'm thinking the whole traditional-wedding thing has kind of gone to pot, anyway. (It fits perfectly, though! Praise Jesus!)

- Send thank-you cards for bachelorette party

- Prepare naughty underthings for wedding night/honeymoon

- Provide hall with final headcount

- Provide hall with final payment

- Finalize song list for wedding favors (Mixed CDs! How cool are we?)

- Burn CDs

- Determine song list for reception

- Select non-romantic yet appropriately gushy song for father/daughter dance

- Secure travel arrangements for Niagara Falls

- Take blood test for marriage license (Damn Indiana and their stupid sexist laws. Why is it OK to marry off syphilis-ridden men but not women?)

- Obtain marriage license

- Meet with photographers to plan out day

- Map out reception

- Select Bible passages for ceremony readings

- Pick up garter, slippers, and other post-ceremony attire

- Scour Macy's for a new solution to The Crease

- Scour Super Target for the perfect non-smudge mascara

- Prepare gifts for rehearsal dinner

- Organize seating arrangements

- Plead with Luke one more time for the playing of "YMCA"

- Clean apartment so we can return from our honeymoon just to bask in the glory of our newly wedded bliss

- Clean out and wash car so we can drive through Michigan and Canada while basking in the glory of our newly wedded bliss

- Secure AMC recording with a trusted friend or relative, as we will be gone more than five days and I need to be there when Pine Valley learns that Erica's embryo was shamelessly stolen during an abortion procedure thirty years ago and that Tad and Dixie's daughter survived the car crash in Switzerland and that Dr. Greg Madden is to blame for it ALL

- Remind Luke how my frugal spending has earned me a clothing budget for Niagara Falls

- At some point purchase a foreign-outlet-friendly hair dryer for Niagara Falls (?)

- - -

This last one has me sort of stumped, because I didn't realize until this morning that Canadian outlets might be different than U.S. outlets and my friend Kendra couldn't blow-dry her hair in Italy so maybe my hair dryer will be useless and I won't be having any of THAT.

Also, you know your shopping spree is meant to be when you receive a discount coupon from New York and Company three weeks before your wedding. The only reunion that could possibly rival my return to my favorite clothing store after a six-month hiatus is this. And that's saying something.

Don't Let Nobody Say Frema Doesn't Keep Her Promises

Tonight was my bachelorette party. I am a bachelorette! And also in a drunken way.

It is 2:40 a.m. in the morning. To this minute, I have digested three vodka and cranberries, one shot of apple pucker, one amaretto stone sour (which was quite nasty), a buttery nipple, tequila rose, more cranberry stuff, and three shots of Sex on the Beach, which were poured into my mouth while kneeling on the bar in front of a lot of people. I danced with a pole and received many high-fives. There were piggy back rides. I was a rock star. !

Also, I pinched six butts. And even a few breasts. My own buttocks were slapped often by my well-meaning bridesmaids and they even wanted me to wear my bra over my shirt. Appalling!

Before I got there, I was nervous. I was afraid I wouldn't be a good bachelorette. I told the girls beforehand that I didn't want fake penises and I didn't want strippers. Only once tonight before I left did I wonder if I would miss having a stripper. But I did not. I went to the bar and it took a long time for me to warm up. I got a deck of bachelorette cards and one of the commands was to order a Horny Girl Scout. I was a Girl Scout once. I won "Junior of the Year" when I was nine. My competition was my best friend, Karen. But I still won, even without a lot of patches. We don't need no stinking patches!

There were crazy people at the bar. There were many lone men dancing by themselves with glow-stick bracelets. Many were trying to get all up in my business. I told them I was getting married in three weeks. I'm getting married in three weeks! I also had my hair appointment today, and it was good. After three hours and much dolleros, my hair is short and cinnamony again. I did the Cha Cha Slide but still don't know how to do the Charlie Brown. Did I mention I danced on a bar? But the guys were pretty nasty. I'm so glad I'm getting married to a good man. V. happy. Also, I danced to "My Humps" and "The Perculator." I got the alchohol rock in the pit of my stomach after my amaretto so I sat on the toilet. That helped. And water helped. Thanks, Amber!

I love Luke very much. Am very tired right now but very happy to be his bachelorette. And I love my home girls. And sliders. I had three, and some fries. Samantha thinks I will be up again soon. We shall see.

I love the Internet! This is all for you. Because we are in platonic love.

Settled

This blog is, at least. For now. On Tuesday I was overcome with an immediate desire to jazz up my template AS SOON AS POSSIBLE, a hard task when your html knowledge is limited to creating tags for bold and italic. Things got worse before they got better, to which at least one of you can testify, but it all paid off, because while thousands of bloggers have text boxes with rounded corners and a background color equivalent to the dried insides of your nose, my header is a really green shade of green.

My, but I have a way with words.

To make up for my skimpy number of entries this week, I solemnly swear to post in all my intoxicated-bachelorette glory before passing out in front of my sister's toilet this Saturday night. And also to report the results of my hair appointment. And whether or not I can still get into my wedding dress, as I'm scheduled to pick it up tomorrow. Oh, the suspense of it all!

We Are Too Close To The Wedding To Be Dealing With Hair Color Issues

The morning of the wedding shower, I went into my favorite Chi-town hair salon for a badly needed cut and color. My botch job from January resulted in the infamous, should-be-trademarked Severus Snape hair style, and it needed immediate attention, but I waited until April, because we have no money and I'm responsible like that.

And on that day, my hair was done. It was cut. It was colored. The roots were a little bright, but overall, fabulous. I received many compliments at the shower, and I felt an overabundance of warm and fuzzies for my pinch-hitter stylist.

Then Monday morning rolled around, and I washed it.

After squeezing my hair gently with a hand towel and nourishing it with expensive product and diffusing it with the utmost love and respect, I surveyed the final results and discovered that the top layer was still too long, but also, so were my ends, creating an undesirable flat crown and even more undesirable layery divide. Also, the color; it was no longer looking as light and shiny and cinnamony as it appeared just two days ago--in fact, it was alarmingly similar to Severus's patent-pending shade, the shade I spent EIGHTY DOLLARS to get rid of. Except the roots, of course, which continued to beam bright as the sun.

For weeks I've tried to ignore it, telling myself it'll lighten up, that the curls will eventually take their regular shape. But today is April 18, and the curls, they are not bouncy yet. More importantly, THE HAIR HAS NOT LIGHTENED UP.

Therefore, this Saturday afternoon, only several hours before I'm scheduled to live it up on the south side of Chicago in honor of my impending nuptials, I'll be sitting in Melanie's chair, freaking out over highlighting options and bleaching options and correcting options and any other options that'll encourage the hair on my head to behave itself in time for the wedding. C'mon, ladies (hair strands are female, right?), we're gettin' ourselves MARRIED here. In front of photographers who stripped my bank account of many, many dollars. This blatant defiance of authority will just. Not. Do.

Life After May 12th

In exactly one month from today, Luke and I will be married. I'll walk down this aisle, clutching onto my father's arm, fearful that a high heel might catch on a broken piece of brick. We'll say "I do" in front of the family and friends we love most after vowing to honor and cherish each other, for better or worse, in sickness and in health, for as long as we both shall live. There will be first dances and banana cake and beef fajitas and a bouquet toss with my actual bouquet. What a wonderful day it will be.

Even more exhilerating, though, is everything to follow. I've been thinking about it a lot more lately, probably because evidence of our new life is tucked into every nook and cranny of this apartment, in the form of flatware and bedding and camping gear and Good Housekeeping cookbooks. As Luke participates in his second job interview in two weeks, so are we also etching out our path.

The first hurdle: apartment hunting. Space that was luxurious for one person has translated into "cozy" for two, especially when one of those persons has nowhere to stash her Sweet Valley High collection and is therefore resigned to housing them in a Tupperware bin partially blocking the doorway, much to the dismay of the other. We know we want to save for a year or two before purchasing a house (we refuse to pay PMI insurance. Refuse!), but we don't want to wait that long for babies, so the space that is cozy for two would likely be unbearable for three, even if the little bugger spends its first two months of life alternating between Mommy and Daddy's dresser drawers for naps.

Last year I signed a thirteen-month lease to take advantage of my complex's "first month free" offer. Upon our return from Niagara Falls, we'll start pouring through apartment guides and Web sites to determine new housing candidates and settle on a winner by June 30.

I can't explain why this simple course of action is so exciting to me. It's not like I've never looked for an apartment before. In the last three years, I've moved three times. I lived in a house for the first time in my life and scored my first roommate (not to be confused with scoring with my roommate). I tackled the personal milestone of living alone, and then again with someone else, someone with whom you're allowed to apply "score" in the proper sense. Nothing about this process will be new, except the paperwork bearing my signature will feature Luke's last name instead of my own, a last name with no double As, no apostrophe, no chance of a mispronounciation like "Maytag."

We'll have other decisions to make, too, once we've re-established DINK status, like when to replace Luke's '91 Chevy Lumina, which can't be trusted outside city limits. Should we even have two cars? Would it be more practical to get by on the Cobalt instead? Speaking of the Cobalt, should we pay it off before starting a house fund? What kind of house do we want in the first place? Will I stay at my current job or pursue my not-so-newfangled notion of becoming a teacher? If I do, how will that affect my desire to stay at home with our kids?

There are no answers to these questions, but for once I'm not scared of them. Instead, I can barely sit still. We'll finally start living the dream we chose for ourselves the minute Luke gave his notice at the Rensselaer Republican last fall. We'll be together in every way that counts, planning for a future with no road blocks, no exit ramps, no tolls. The possibilities are endless.

We couldn't have asked for a more appropriate wedding gift.

They Don't Cover This In Pre-Marital Counseling

I don't know what Luke and I were thinking, dedicating so much time to piddly matters like our family's religion when there were clearly deeper, more life-altering subjects bubbling just below the surface. I discovered this last night, while perusing through our DJ's song list and realizing my future husband was serious when he said there would be no "U Can't Touch This" at our wedding reception.

Before we even started dating, we knew our musical tastes weren't a hundred percent compatible. He liked They Might Be Giants and Beth Orton, while my CD collection suffered from chronic Boy Bandism--NKOTB, Hi-Five, N'Sync, Backstreet Boys, 98 Degrees; you know, the essentials--with recurring bouts of Cheesy Pop and Early Nineties Rap, the kind of rap my sixth-grade friends jammed to while their parents were at work, the kind of rap that earned me a week's grounding when it was found pulsating through my boombox. What can I say? George and Lyn were not big fans of directives like "Let me lick you up and down 'til you say Stop."

Anyway, now that I'm old enough to control the dial on my CD player, I often find myself drawn to stations that highlight tunes from my early years, banned and non-banned alike. And this has naturally influenced the types of songs I consider DJ-friendly. I mean really, people, who wouldn't want to Ride The Train and be Dangerous on the Dance Floor while ingesting large quantities of alcohol and very scrumptious cake?

Apparently Luke, who is of the mindset that our reception should feature mostly contemporary music, even though "My Humps" is the only current song he knows, and THAT is only because I have a passionate love for it that defies all logic, reason, and hatred for the phrase "lovely lady lumps" (though Fergie does deserve props for her mad use of alliteration, and YES, Samantha, that is the same Stacy from Kids, Incorporated). He thinks "The Perculator" is just a coffee attachment, and if that's not good enough reason to sport a paper bag over my head with the words "I Don't Know This Man" when we're out in public, he's actually banned the playing of "YMCA," only the biggest dance staple to feature homosexual, role-playing, culturally diverse men in the UNIVERSE. Next thing you know he'll be telling me that "The Macarena" wasn't a movement at all but in fact a presidential conspiracy to encourage the shocking and gratuitous use of The Elbow. You know, because elbows are needed for the bending of the arm, a motion that plays a critical part in getting one's hands from the head to the hips.

Is there any hope for us? Also, what songs get your feet moving?

Shower The People You Love With Teenage Literary Drama Actually Geared Towards Pre-Pubescent Girls

Finally, the moment you've all been waiting for: the reveal of those individuals who fought long and hard for their chance to receive a small piece of Heaven that is Sweet Valley High. Number Twelve, Isabel, Lauren R., and Fraulein N., pull out your bangle bracelets, roll up the cuffs of your jeans, and prepare to be amused by the delightful antics of Elizabeth and Jessica Wakefield as they learn about life and love with their crazy gang of bookworms, playboys, cheerleaders, and jocks.

Choosing a winner was really hard, not only because every woman is worthy of the wisdom SVH can bring, but also because only four people expressed any interest in receiving one, and how could I deem one gal's reason as more valid than another? I mean, would you be able to choose between a first-time mother about to go into labor versus a stressed out bride-to-be versus a working mom looking to make peace with the gaping hole in her teenage existence versus a woman who wants to reconnect with the series that introduced her to Linda Ronstadt? Cuz I sure couldn't. Also, I'm a little bit in love with all of you for leaving such great comments when you visit, so the idea of strengthening the Internet bond I feel we now share by declaring everyone a winner is really the best way to go. So, if I don't have your address already, be sure to send it to my gmail so we can get on with the sharing as soon as possible.

In other news, in case you couldn't tell by these blogs, Luke and I were given a totally awesome wedding shower by my sister and my parents. There was spiked punch, Frema's landslide winning of The Toilet Paper Game, and the congregation of blog readers and writers alike.

 

Lost A Sock, Number Twelve, and me.

Auntie Betty, Ryan, and Brooke. Unlike her digital-photo companions, Ryan is not a faithful reader of this blog, but I didn't remember to get a picture of Betty and Brooke together, so there you go.

Our towel cake. I have never heard of such things being used outside of weddings in my family, but apparently to someone they are a traditional element of bridal showers, and my mother has taken it upon herself to carry this tradition on with us. Yes, my momma made that, with her own two, carpel tunnel-ridden hands, no less. Talk about having a kick-@$$ heirloom to pass on to your kids.

Edited to add: OMG, I can't believe I forgot to showcase the coolest readers of all. Our families! Here we are with Luke's parents, Daddy D. and MJD. Don't be surprised if both sides ostracize me for making such a fatal error in judgement.

Samantha and me. She's been the best matron of honor a girl could ever ask for.

Sunday was the day we met with our pastor for the first of two premarital counseling sessions, which took place in Joe's Crab Shack after the late-morning service. A man of many opinions but few words, Pastor Tim's message to us was simple: remember what brought the two of you to this point and never lose sight of it, no matter what. Be aware of what your partner loves most about you and work hard to nurture that part of yourself. And finally, "Take a good, long look at the person sitting next to you, because that's all you need to make your marriage successful. Each of you will serve as an anchor for the other."

It was a new experience, sitting in front of a person who didn't know the details of our relationship and yet listening to the best advice on marriage I'd ever heard. And explaining to him what it is about Luke that I love so much moved me in a way I didn't expect. It was as if I was looking at him in a new light. Luke is prepared to love me for the rest of my life. He'll be by my side through new jobs and the birth of our babies and the loss of my parents and the purchase of our first home (though hopefully not in that order). We'll celebrate second honeymoons and golden anniversaries and the beauty of compounding interest with our 401(k)s. And one day, after we've retired and our children are grown, we'll be like those sweet little couples I see walking hand-in-hand down the street, shuffling along at a snail's pace, barely talking, happy enough just to be in the presence of the other. Thinking about it chokes me up inside, because I know how lucky I am to have crossed paths with a man of Luke's caliber; I know some people go through their whole existence never being part of such a happy accident, never knowing what it feels like to be loved so intimately and so completely by another human being. That feeling is the best reason I have to bow my head and give thanks to God.

On that note, I leave you with the most unique gifts we received on Saturday, courtesy of our beloved Number Twelve:

Brenda's Ability To Do Good Hair: Denied!

By now, everyone who reads this site knows I heart Brenda, my Chicago hairdresser, because apparently stylists in Naptown can only shape and color celebrity styles for the likes of Eighties Madonna and Severus Snape. One of the first things I did when Luke and I got engaged was to make salon appointments for my bridesmaids, flower girl, and me, so there was no chance in hell that Brenda wouldn't NOT do my hair. I was on it like flies on that stick-paper thing my parents leave in the basement because, well, they don't like flies.

Guess what? Brenda's not doing my hair.

It's tragic, actually. On Friday the 13th, she broke two bones in her right hand, her magic hand, the hand that gives me bouncy layers and the side bangs I love so much. She's at work but limited to answering phones and sweeping up hair for the next four to six weeks. It's like having Mariah Carey pre-Charm Bracelet wipe spittle from Hilary Duff's microphone at the Grammys.

I called the salon yesterday and transferred my upcoming Saturday morning appointment to Kasia, a stylist with a great reputation for updos, and the other person scheduled to help Brenda with my wedding party, and there's still at least a slight chance she'll be in tip-top shape come May 12th, so all should be well. But I'd like to take this opportunity to brag about Gina, one of my very awesome bridesmaids, because she is the only reason I discovered this potentially life-changing information. Seeing as I discovered Enve through her seven years ago, she became aware of the situation at her own cut-and-color and immediately contacted me so alternate arrangements could be made. It's in instances like these that a wife-to-be truly needs her bridesmaids. Don't fuss over silly things like bachelorette parties or finding something blue. Just let me know if my hairdresser ends up in the ER.

This weekend will be a busy one, as tomorrow Samantha and my family are throwing Luke and me what is sure to be a beautiful wedding shower, and Sunday we have our first pre-marital counseling session with the pastor who will marry us. One of the subjects will be religion, which I really am feeling much better about these days, as Luke and I continue to talk openly about what kind of church life we want with and for our children. I also broached the subject with my mom last night, something I was pretty nervous about because I never want my parents to think that I'm unhappy with the way they brought me up. I didn't want them to become defensive of their choices, especially since they made some really great choices, and to be totally honest, I was also afraid they'd think I was ruining my chance at Eternal Salvation by even considering converting to a Protestant denomination. For better or worse, whether I get it or not, I will always seek their approval.

The conversation I had with my mother proved (once again) how little credit I give my parents sometimes. She reminded me about the similar faith journey she took around my age that brought her to Catholicism, years after she and my father got married. She said Luke and I are going to do the best thing for our family, and as long as we believe in God, everything will be fine. Well, that and infant baptism, which we do, so it's all good. For the first time in months, I'm at peace.

Note: the SVH contest will run through the weekend, because I'm leaving for Chicago today and don't want to make such a difficult decision in such a short time frame. So if you want a book, it's not too late to beg for one. And I promise not to give Luke any special consideration. Really. It's anybody's game.

Booked. Also, Slightly Less Freaked. I Think.

Two rooms at this hotel for the Sunday and Monday night after the wedding, with additional plans to stay over in Michigan that Saturday and Tuesday, to break the eight-hour drive up a little. Today I received permission from my boss to take a week-and-a-half break from work beginning with the Wednesday before the wedding, which allows me some time to sort through last-minute reception details and also have one week where Luke and I can simply enjoy our new married status. As I look at the calendar, I realize by this time in May I'll have been Mrs. Useless Clutter for almost two weeks. Wow.

And I'm feeling good. We've been doing a lot of reading on different Christian denominations, attempting to pinpoint our non-negotiables. It's harder than you think. For example, Catholicism believes in the Assumption of the Blessed Mother--that her physical body was transported into Heaven in addition to her soul. It teaches she was a virgin throughout her life, despite being a married woman. There are prayers for Mary, special devotions and stories about her appearing to St. Bernadette of Lourdes, the children of Fatima, and other faithful Catholics around the world.

However, in the Protestant tradition, Mary is regarded simply as another saint in the communion of saints. The "foremost of saints," according to this Web site, but Luke didn't learn the Hail Mary. He never prayed the Rosary. For him, there was no Assumption, no perpetual virginity on her behalf, because there is no basis for either one in scripture. And if there's no basis for this in scripture, why is the church teaching it? Where did these ideas come from? Church officials? Those who saw her? While we're asking questions, do I truly believe these miracles took place? If I do, how could I not raise my children in Catholicism, if it turns out no other denomination of Christianity supports them? And if I don't, how could I not leave the church?

I'm working ideas out even as I type this, so obviously I don't have any answers. For the first time in my life, I'm taking the time to question my beliefs and how they came to be regarded as truths by the Catholic church. Can you believe I got through parochial high school and college without knowing the whole perpetual virgin thing? I may not have given anything up for Lent, but I don't think it's a coincidence my religious exploration is taking place during the same time Jesus was dealing with some difficult issues of his own.

And throughout all of these hard questions, questions that might lead to answers that surprise us both, Luke still wants to be my husband. Despite my recent tendency to subject our relationship to the unforgiving glow of the pre-marital microscope, he's not once doubted his decision to make a commitment to me that will last the rest of our lives. "Are you sure you want to marry me?" I say after filling our apartment with post-sloppy joe flatulence. "Are you sure you want to marry me?" flys out of my mouth after sharing that I can't really consider other religions before I've thoroughly investigated my own. But no matter how many times I ask the question, no matter how many ways I ask, his answer is always the same. Yes. Yes. Yes. Words can't express how grateful I am that he continues to have such faith, in himself, in me, in us.

Even more earth-shattering than my personal spiritual journey is that we were able to enjoy drinks, steak, and ribs on Saturday night courtesy of Vibes Music, which shelled out EIGHTY DOLLARS for two stacks' worth of used CDs, the titles of which escape me now. I can, however, tell you what they *didn't* take: The Best of Piano by Candlelight Volume 2. Jamiroquai's Synkronized. Lenny Kravitz's Five. The Spice Girls' appropriately titled disc, Spice. Thus, I'll spend at least part of this week hunting down alternative sources through which my questionable musical taste can be savored by the masses.

Lastly, in regards to the SVH contest: forget about another quiz sure to stump friends and family alike, because I just took the damn thing again as "Frema" and only scored an 80. Apparently when I made the quiz last March I was still high on Spider-Man 2 and thought Toby Maguire had more sex appeal than Kiefer Sutherland; now I'm seriously wondering where my brains were at because who doesn't agree Kiefer Sutherland and his urgent scratchy voice are the hottest things ever to grace the Earth? If I had a list like this, he'd be number one, hands-down. If I had one. Which I don't, Luke. Just saying.

ANYWAY, the contest. Let's try this: Why don't you tell me about an important lesson you learned from Francine Pascal's endearing-yet-often-simplified-and-over-the-top series? Like, I just reread Forbidden Love, where Maria and Michael get engaged even though they're not supposed to be dating because of some Romeo and Juliet type feud their parents are involved in. They have to do this project for history class where they pretend to be married for two weeks and manage a budget and deal with problems facing their imaginary children. Michael learns that Maria doesn't want to be a housewife and Maria learns that Michael is comfortable using "belt therapy" to correct their son's juvenile delinquency. In the end, they break up, the families reunite, and Maria ends up dating Winston Egbert.

The lesson? Who cares? I still can't get over Sweet Valley High sanctioning the teaching of marriage and family values in history class. But you'll do a much better job than me. To the best answer, the spoils.

There Are Various Possible Titles For This Post

So Far Nine People Are Coming To The Wedding, Not Counting Me, Luke, the Pastor, His Parents, My Parents, Our Brothers And Sisters, Their Significant Others, The Bridesmaids, The Groomsmen, The Flower Girl And Her Mother, Who Also Happens To Be My Aunt And One Of My Favorite People, And Random Strangers Because We're Holding It At A Public Park

What Happens When Luke Works Nights

The Wakefields Made Me Do It

But first, a word on my hiatus. Things have been shakin' in the Frema/Useless Clutter household. In a nutshell, the freak-outs, they're getting worse. A couple of weeks ago a discussion about blogs turned into a discussion about Dooce, the Internet's most well-known blogger, which turned into a discussion about marriage, which turned into a discussion about clinical depression, which turned into a discussion about whether or not clinically depressed individuals should bear children, which turned into me crying actual tears because Luke will surely want to divorce me when I am diagnosed with clinical depression.

Last Wednesday I came home sobbing because my recent submission to this Web site led to frantic searches on the Internet about interfaith marriages and a train of thought that concluded Luke and I can't get married because he doesn't make the Sign of the Cross or believe in Purgatory. I'm not even sure that I believe in Purgatory, but one can only assume my old Catholic-school uniforms will prove equivalent to a "Get Out of Hell Free" card on Judgment Day.

When confessing all of these tidbits and more to Lost A Sock during a four-hour Steak-N-Shake marathon on Friday night, she shook her head in amazement and said, "What does Luke do when you say all these things to him?"

What does he do? He listens until I'm done, says something Calming and Insightful about God loving all people, not just Catholics, reminds me that we'll work it all out, and sighs, "I wish you would talk to me first before you get yourself so upset." And then he rewards my honesty with a trip to Wendy's, which is probably the best reason to marry anyone.

This weekend, though, was not about the freak-outs. It was about receiving the first RSVPs for our wedding. Watching our pastor and his new wife exchange vows in front of God and an entire congregation. Holding two babies two days in a row and kissing a nose that was only three days old. (Congratulations new Auntie Brooke and second-time Grandma Betty!) Looking through pictures with my mother and thinking about how brave my parents were to make such adult decisions before they were even old enough to drink. Digging out boxes from the basement to find the cases to my CDs, a dusty but necessary action in order to sell them for cash. Along the way I stumbled upon collections of books gathered during high school and college, the majority of which I'd obtained from a former English professor who would leave old books outside the door to his office, free for the taking for those interested in owning their very own copy of The Left-Hander’s Guide to Life. So I decided to sell them, too. My mother was slightly suspicious, as if a lack of funds had possibly forced us out of our apartment and onto the nearest highway exit ramp panhandling for change. "You guys are OK, right?" she asked. "You have food and everything?"

She would've been reassured tonight, as I used the $22.25 earned from selling my literary treasures and twelve dollars of my state tax refund to purchase a pair of old-school Nancy Drew hardcovers, two Christopher Pike books, three Choose Your Own Adventures, and sixty-nine installments of Sweet Valley High.

In my defense, Luke began temping again on Monday night and it's been very lonely and the Sweet Valley High books were only a quarter a piece. Plus, I want to share them with my own little girls, because any daughters of mine and maybe even sons will be required to know who the Wakefield twins are, which one is older, and what their dress size is, because these three facts are drilled into your brain by page five of every book in the series. Plus plus, their characters never engaged in premarital sex, used the Lord's name in vain, or subjected themselves to illegal drug activity—well, except one character. Regina Morrow, the deaf girl who dated flirtatious playboy Bruce Patman and was a kind and loving person until she found out Bruce was dating Jessica's best friend Amy behind her back. Blinded by Heartbreak and Betrayal, she attended a party where she was introduced to cocaine, had a rare adverse reaction to the drug and actually DIED. Then SVH had a memorial service where Elizabeth gave a Deep and Moving speech about Regina's life, and her parents took the day off work and the twins' older brother came home from college to talk about Why Drugs Are Bad but also The Importance Of Communicating With Your Parents If You Ever Feel That Drugs Are The Only Answer To Your Problems. If you're interested in sharing these lessons with your own children, you owe it to them and yourself to read Number 40: On the Edge and Number 41: Outcast.

To top things off, I said "Screw frugality!" and spent four ninety-five on a personal pan cheese pizza and five breadsticks from Pizza Hut.

Three fast-food splurges in a seven-day period. My doctor and my bank account must be so proud.

The. Freakin'. End.

Emily Post is Rolling in Her Grave

Seventy envelopes personally addressed and sealed (read: licked). One hundred and thirty-nine desired guests slated to receive news of our marital shenanigans. But for a few name and addessing issues, the wedding invitations are done.

As The Big Day is just two months from today, Luke and I are a wee bit early on the whole invite thing. Blame it on Easter, because when trying to determine an RSVP date we counted back four weeks from Friday, May 12, and arrived at Friday, April 14, which happens to be Good Friday this year, and we figured, maybe final headcounts for cake and beef fajitas could be tallied on a day that doesn't mourn Jesus's death on the cross. It didn't feel right going later then that, seeing as we'll need a little time to reconcile the final bill, so we went with the Monday before. A month back from that brings us to last Friday, and since everything'll go out with tomorrow's mail, Frema and Useless Clutter are actually three days behind schedule. Slackers.

For those unfamiliar with putting together a formal invitation, included in your slew of reception announcements and response cards is a how-to that explains how names should be written, what you do with all that tissue paper, etc. It provides fascinating tidbits about the rationale behind using two envelopes per invitation (it ensures the delivery of the invitation itself in a clean envelope, of course!) and how to formulate addresses (cities, states, and numbered streets are written out in full). It also heeds stern warnings (the inner envelope always carries the last names only, with no address).

Based on these and other helpful hints, I'm assuming the following actions would earn us an "F" at the Emily Post Institute:

• Writing "Auntie Diane and Uncle Steve" on the inner envelope (Hi, Auntie Diane!)
• Writing "Frema and Luke" on the return flap
• (Accidentally) writing "Frema and Luke Clutter" on the return flap
• Using actual numbers to represent 103rd Street (and really, what's the alternative? "A Hundred and Third Street"? Does that sound like hick talk to anyone but me?)
• Tracing the "u" in Luke's name to disguise a penmanship malfunction, a la engagement scrapbook
• Elevating the zip code above the "perfectly spaced" envelope addressing guide line because I started to write a six but realized in mid-flow it needed to be a four, so I transformed the six's top arc into a curvaceous but still acceptable horizontal slash component for the line that joins the four's two vertical elements

Luke and I discussed re-doing the ones that featured such unthinkable etiquette errors but ultimately decided there were bigger fish to fry, like: Just how tacky is it to play your opening wedding march out of a boom box?

Holy Crap.

It's because of posts like this that you'd think the concept had already taken hold in my brain, that my babble about being a good mom and wanting to shower love on my children would be the second realization, not the first. But no. It wasn't until Samantha confirmed the date for my bachelorette party that I thought, "Oh. My. God." Apparently the promise of dancing and alcohol was enough to stir my deepest fears.

I'm getting married.

Hear that? MARRIED. I'm going to be somebody's wife, which means wedding rings and joint tax returns and amended prefixes and a new last name and thank-you cards for gifts signed from the new Mr. and Mrs. and also, did I mention I'll be somebody's wife?

It's not like I never understood that life was going to change. I've been counting on it. I'm excited for the dreams that Luke and I have to finally come to fruition. It just never seemed real until now, and now it's so real it's scary. And laughable, if you think about it. I'm brought to tears if my VCR skips an AMC episode. I'm not very good at loading the dishwasher after dinner, even though Luke's the one who cooks and it's an unwritten law that the cook never cleans up his own mess. I don't know how to change fuses. I'm scared of ducks. And this morning I was speeding on 465 South and ended up skidding into a half-circle to avoid smashing the bumper of the car in front of me on the exit ramp. Have I not learned anything? What the hell business do I have being somebody's other half?

All of this is inspiring a genuine excitement for my bachelorette party, as I'm beginning to grasp what the night will mean for me. For example, I will salute the many accomplishments once tackled as a Smug Singleton, including but not limited to:

• Working through an undying love for Randy Wooten via symbolic and moving verse.
• Penning a riveting New Kids On the Block three-part series.
• Memorizing the words to all the singles released by Wilson Phillips.
• Finishing Flowers in the Attic before I entered seventh grade.
• Earning dough by rolling pretzels (pun TOTALLY intended) at Navy Pier.
• Catching the eye of the guy who ran the Ferris Wheel at Navy Pier.
• Getting free rides on the Ferris Wheel at Navy Pier.
• Hiding hickeys from my parents, no thanks to that spoon-in-the-freezer trick.
• Paying for my own high-school senior portraits.
• Discovering the joy that is Lionel Richie.
• Breaking up with someone on my own terms.

And then, of course, there are the mistakes:

• Disbanding the Chicago Chicks Club, similar to the Baby-Sitters Club in that there were weekly dues and a club notebook but really we just bought candy and wrote curse words in Mad Libs books.
• Asking my mother what an orgasm was before I entered eighth grade.
• Thinking my acne would disappear if I laid off the Reese's.
• Not realizing I'd lose weight if I'd lay off the Reese's.
• Gleefully spending tuition refunds on purses and shoes.
• Missing Lost a Sock's wedding reception.
• Almost taking a hike through the woods with a guy who sold paintings door-to-door.
• OK, I went out with him, but at least I didn't go hiking through the damn woods.
• ...OK, only because my family feared that such a hike might guarantee me a chalk outline or, at the very least, special ad space on a Dean's milk carton.
• Falling for that "glow-in-the-dark picture" line. In my defense, I was very lonely and the room was very dark and there very well could have been a glow-in-the-dark picture.
• Letting The Boyfriend Who Went For Three Weeks Without Calling keep the Pokemon cards he stole from my work.
• Memorizing the words to all the singles released by Wilson Phillips.

If after reading all of that, Luke STILL wants to marry me? He can't say I didn't warn him.

This One's For The Children

Lately I've gotten into the habit of thinking about my children--not children I have right now, of course, but the ones I hope to produce someday. Except less about the actual kids themselves and more about the material items I intend for them to inherit, items that will provide them with both a rich family history and tangible keepsake of A Mother's Love. In January, when Luke and I ordered pictures from Dan and Samantha's wedding, three wallet-sized orders were placed for pictures featuring the two of us, the newlyweds, and my entire family specifically for inclusion in Amelia, Lucy, and Nathan's baby books. When Luke's brother and sister-in-law offered us prints from their daughter's first-year photo shoot, I requested four; one five-by-seven for framing and three wallets for possible scrapbooking projects. In both scenarios, three seemed like a good number because that is the maximum capacity I've set for my womb, and naturally the best representation for that would be two girls and a boy because I'm better with girls' names. Even the possibility of a fourth throws all my plans out of wack, because THAT kid would have to steal my five-by-sevens and therefore come across as Mom and Dad's favorite. Perhaps the others could be appeased with Mommy's old diaries--who WOULDN'T be excited to know that the woman who gave them life used to make herself throw up?

Anyway, last night was relatively tame for Luke and me, so I figured it was about time to start filling out the engagement book we received from the wonderful Lost A Sock at the beginning of the year. I imagined myself writing pages about the start of our romance; pasting in photographs from our formative days; transcribing sage advice from family and friends who know us best. That is, until I actually put pen to paper. Then I was all, "Mommy is a freakin' idiot."

My first mistake? Messing up the "B" in my non-Internet first name. THE FIRST LETTER, people, and I had already doomed the entire book. In my signature B--as in signature standard, not signature hand-writing--the two vertical buttocks are interlocked tightly together with a perky little loop similar to that of a bunny-eared shoe lace. However, this B was wildly out of control, as if each buttock were experiencing some sort of hive-inducing allergic reaction to the other.

To make matters worse, I have the brilliant notion to fix the B by tracing over it several times, which not only doesn't bridge the gap but instead plumps up the right vertical buttock, which is just plain embarrassing to the left one. It's as if the pen was possessed with the penmanship of a nine-year-old boy who sees dead people.

Anyway, I'm disheartened but determined to press forward with the Creating of the Special Memories. The middle of the first line is divided with an "and," so I write our names in the appropriate spaces, tossing in an ampersandish symbol for good measure. I get to the second line but can't figure out what it's for, so I scribble in our wedding date. Then I get to "who were married on the ____ " and the lightbulb goes off, and I shout, "Aw, f*&^."

At this point I have a few options:

1) Invest in a bottle of white-out and get cracking so that Amelia, Lucy, and Nathan don't think their mommy is an idiot who can't follow even the simplest of instructions.

2) Buy a new copy of the journal and start over, because everyone deserves a white-out-free engagement book.

3) Leave the book as is and spend the rest of my life making it up to them.

Frema Had A Gun

That's a lie; Luke was actually declared Master of the Barcode Scanner here on Saturday night while we spent THREE HOURS moseying down aisles of bedding, kitchenware, and household appliances. Like those towels? Beep! went the gun. Can't decide on a dish pattern? Then Beep! Beep!, because would it really be so horrible to own multiple dish patterns? Between the two of us we already have four: White, Plastic Wal-Mart Tropical Paradise, The Ones With Rust On the Edges From Drying Under The Pots, and That One Brown Plate My Mom Got From The Thrift Store.

I've always had mixed feelings about registries and bridal showers. While I enjoy participating in them for others, I didn't think Luke and I necessarily qualified, as the whole point is to help a couple join their lives together, and we already did that in September. We have a plethora of bedding and kitchenware and household appliances. Never mind what kind of shape they're in (see our dishes), but we have them, so the only reason to register would be to get new bedding and new kitchenware and new household appliances, and how greedy is that? When I started sharing these ideas, though, I thought my family and friends would go into cardiac arrest. I heard everything from "But you deserve a shower!" to "If you don't register, people won't get you anything at all!" I don't completely buy into either of those sentiments but finally decided that OK, we can have a shower, and fine, we'll register, and if anyone is offended by our actions, nobody's pointing a barcode scanner at their heads. They can RSVP with a big fat "no."

As we oohed and aahed over photo albums and vaccuum cleaners and syrup dispensers, I remembered another reason to be wary of registering: the possibility of getting emotionally attached to our wish list. Before we went in, Luke and I had no idea what we wanted. By the end of the night, I was feening for "our" red, white, and blue country-style quilt, matching luggage set, and ultra-savvy coffee pot. (And I don't even drink coffee; it was that cool, people.) It's hard not to think about what you might get when people come out of the woodwork firing questions like "Where are you registered?" and "What do you need?" And every time, I can't help but think that really, we don't need anything, but it sure is touching to see how much loved ones want to help you prepare for your new life. That's something you just can't register for.

In other news, the last few days have been chock full of other accomplishments as well. We completed our tax returns, found a way to pay my almost seven-hundred-dollar car insurance premium in cash, discovered there was no mold in my bahsketti container*, and caught up on three episodes of All My Children (apparently I have the will power of an Elmer's Glue stick). We also took stock of our wedding finances and realized that almost half of The Big Day is paid in full. If that doesn't put a little kick in your step, I don't know what would.

* I still threw the container away, though, because eeew.

Wedding Forecast: Pensive

A surprisingly productive two days took place in Merrillville this weekend. In addition to making another hefty deposit on our hall, Luke and I finally, finally booked a DJ and selected a hotel for our wedding night, two chores that had elevated themselves to the current bane of our existence. For the first time in a while, I'm allowing myself to get excited about this wedding.

I'm also feeling reflective. On the drive back to Indianapolis, the two of us talked about how the life-changing nature of an upcoming marriage shakes up all sorts of thoughts and questions you previously assumed you'd buried. As a person who spent so much of her earlier years looking for acceptance, I now find myself taking to the mirror under the pretense that my eyes actually belong to someone else, to people who, for better or worse, influenced my core.

I think about the two major relationships I was a part of before I met Luke and wonder how they're doing, if they think of me, what they might think if they knew I was about to take a husband. I remember entering into each one with levels of infatuation that almost swallowed me whole, believing that this time I'd finally met someone who understood and appreciated my countless little complications and wanted to be involved in all aspects of my life, not just the part that liked to go out with his friends on Saturday nights. Each time I thought, "This is it, now I'm happy," and just like that, I'd see signs that this person was just another alteration in my romantic wardrobe, like a pretty suit that seems to fit at the store but clings too tightly to your stomach once you've brought it home.

In the last one, I knew months beforehand that I'd have to break up with him. I also knew I didn't have strength to do it without "just cause," so I carried on in this probationary manner until one day he almost left for work without kissing me good-bye. I can see myself laying in bed, holding on to the covers, watching him put on his shoes, locate his wallet, grab his jacket in silence, even though he knew I'd been up for the last half hour. It wasn't until his hand was on the doorknob that his head popped back in a kneejerk "Shit!" reaction and he walked over to give me a peck on the lips. And then I watched him go, already starting to cry, because for some reason, that was It, The Last Straw, because I knew with every fiber of my being that I should have been acknowledged before the bottoms of his heels had settled into his Nikes, not after, and certainly not as an afterthought.

I think about the girlfriends I have and wonder which ones are sincerely happy for me, which ones think I'm crazy, and which ones can't believe that I'm doing it first. I wonder if some of them think I'm desperate to get married because I'm planning a wedding with someone who's still looking for a job.

I think about my parents and wonder if they're as ready as they think they are to receive grandchildren from their oldest daughter, a girl who still enjoys chocolate milk and needs twenty bucks from time to time.

I think about a male friend of mine, someone who served as my biggest crush and confidant through all of high school and most of college, and wonder if he ever realizes that countless sexual encounters can never compare to the affection found in one back rub.

I think about the girl I was ten years ago, who wrotes pages of journal entries about how confused she was, how lonely she was, how sad she felt knowing that her whole day depended on just one phone call, and it's been three weeks, why the hell won't you act like a man and call me, you son of a bitch, and wonder if there's a way to let her know that she doesn't have be angry anymore; that everything turned out just fine.

Because it did.

Bridezillanoia

When it comes to weddings, it's amazing how heavy a cross the people you love will carry just so you can save face. In the last three weeks, I've read countless stories about brides and grooms and the extent of their presumption and lack of tact: inserting bank slips with their checking account number in the invitation; eliminating members of the wedding party minutes before the ceremony because a dress or tux didn't fit quite right; asking the punch server to man the bar for the duration of the reception; using thank-you notes to ask for a larger-sized gift because your initial one didn't cover the price of your plate.

The female half of this couple is known to all as Bridezilla, the woman who noticed you weren't wearing the right cut of underwear underneath your dress but conveniently overlooked the shade of blue you turned into when she told you the bridesmaids dresses were purchased in bulk on clearance at Macy's and that she got you a size 12, the size you wore in seventh grade back when the two of you were BFFs, instead of the 18 you are today, which meant additional fabric and hours of alterations and hurt feelings about being made to feel that you are the size of Moby Dick, the latter being the only thing you get for free. I wish I were joking, but Samantha recounted this story to me on Saturday, the date on the calendar marked for our wedding shopping extravaganza.

Since I've been engaged, my bridesmaids have asked a lot of questions about my expectations for their appearance. Apparently I should have a checklist for them in regards to how their hair should be worn, where to purchase jewelry, and what brand of shadow is acceptable to swipe across their eyelids. Apparently I have the ability to turn my bridesmaids into robots because it's My Special Day.

And my answers were: however you want, wherever you want (if you even want to wear any, because I'm not sure as hell not wearing any), and any damn color you want. However, I did make two requests: that all the dresses be the same shade of blue and that the shoes be dyed to match them. I came in that afternoon with twenty pages of computer print-outs and catalog pages and a shrug of my shoulders when they asked what they were trying on first. "You tell me," I said. And off we went.

The first hour was not unlike Goldilocks's trip in The Three Little Bears; the first four dresses were labeled Too Ichy, Too Sexy For a Thirteen-Year-Old, Pretty But Eh, and Too Light Blue, But Too Bad Frema Wasn't Going For Black, Because We Would Totally Wear This In Black. One dress we were all excited about was featured in the spring catalog but not scheduled for distribution until mid-February, so we said a silent prayer in its memory and tried our best to move on.

The next one on the menu didn't elicit a whole lotta wa-hoo, so we gave the catalog another flip-through, and lo and behold, every gosh-darn one of them fell in love with the dress on the left.

The shoes were just as interesting, with each girl starting out with something different but eventually choosing these. All my efforts to allow for individuality were for naught.

Or were they?

For the last few weeks my stomach has been in knots about this day, so much so that I actually understood why brides-to-be would come off so anal about hair and make-up and underwear styles. How much easier it would have been for me to just e-mail a link to a dress and shoes I liked and ask them to have both paid in full by such-and-such a date. It would have saved me one trip to Chicago, six bucks in tolls, five different opinions from five very different people, and two hours of everybody's time. And if that's what would've gone down, I would have gotten not one word of complaint. Like I said, the amount of BS your friends and family will take to make you happy is unbelievable. I don't know that I could be as gracious.

However, for as many mistakes I am destined to make throughout this process, the one thing I will pat myself on the back for is my flexibility in allowing these women to actively participate in the selection of their attire. Seeing as they're wearing the dresses and they're wearing the shoes and they're footing the bill, it's not only courteous but ideal for them to have that say. But the fact that they were so easygoing in order to avoid my having a nervous breakdown in the dressing room makes me love Samantha, Donna, Gina, and Trina all the more.

* Note to acknowledge that one bridesmaid, my sister Ryan, was unable to make the trip due to heavy-duty study plans for a test she has tomorrow, so I suppose during our shopping date there will be less "It's all about you" and more "Yeah. Here's your costume. Enjoy."

A Girl Can Dream, Can't She?

In the last two weeks, major changes have taken place within my company's managerial structure, changes resulting in unfortunate repercussions on my own position. Because I've learned from the experiences of others, I won't discuss it further, but that made it all the nicer when on Wednesday night, Luke and I took advantage of an engagement-inspired gift certificate to a snazzy restaurant downtown. We dined on appetizers, entrees, and desserts, and in between courses tried to talk about what we thought our life as a married couple will be like. I say "tried" because stuffing one's mouth with free bread and butter can put a damper on meaningful conversation.

However, I did a lot of thinking later, and it emphasized just how excited I am to get past this wedding planning and finally say "I do" to a man more wonderful than I ever could have imagined for myself in front of the people I love most. The moment our lips lock in our first post-marital kiss, we'll officially be a family.

Then it's on to the good stuff.

We'll spend a blissful three days at Niagara Falls and come home to find that my witty Web site has reached the eyes of a youthful, savvy agent with a keen eye for good grammar and an even better understanding of the human condition. She'll (of course such a person would have to be a woman) look beyond my smallish reading audience and realize that when placed on a platform for all the world to see, I will touch the hearts of millions. Millions!

With a twenty-thousand dollar tax-free book advance check nestled safely in my pocket, I will go back to my cubicle only to rescue my Wal-Mart floor lamp, grossly-out-of-date-for-Valentine's-Day Christmas tree, and framed picture of Luke in a sandhole at the beach. We'll use the advance to pay off our credit cards and the balance on my Cobalt, and with the last five bucks, we'll buy one of those "Get three cherries and win a million dollars!" cards, and oh my goodness, what are the odds, look, we've won! After paying off my student loans using only rolls of pennies (just to spite them, the money-hungry bastards), we will be completely debt-free and Luke will open the coffee shop he's always wanted while I stay at home and have a baby every year of my life until I'm forty-two.

But until then, lunch is over. Back to work.

All My Videotapes

Before I begin, I have to acknowledge a couple of things:

1) Yesterday I found the business card of the DJ in partnership with her dead husband, and listed under Acts was "Little People." This has cinched my "Don't Call Us, We'll Call You" gut reaction, though a sliver of me is curious as to the events that would transpire at my wedding reception if under their wing. A belly-dancing dwarf would make a nice addition to the wedding album, don't you think?

2) Two important people in my life recently jumpstarted their own journey into the land of the World Wide Web, as documented on Lost a Sock and The Magic of Books. What most stands out to me about these women is that they've both contemplated this move for months but put it off because, as mothers of young children, they felt they didn't have the time. However, so powerful were their creative urges that they had no choice but to surrender to the seduction of the Internet.

Which kind of brings me to me, someone considered to be pretty busy herself, what with a job, fiancé, wedding in the works, teenage girl to mentor, and possible career change on the horizon (another post, but soon, I promise). My personal free time is limited to only a few hours a week and must be used wisely. Therefore, I have executed another bold decision:

The discontinuation of my All My Children recording.

...

OK, so maybe this doesn't inspire the kind of heart-stopping uproar my cable-scrapping did, but this is a huge milestone in the Frema-Useless Clutter household. Back when I had cable, I had SoapNet. I loved SoapNet. I could spend some time recovering from work before watching my favorite daytime characters in action at seven o'clock every night. Miss a show? No worries! SoapNet understands that life gets in the way of television; that's why they re-run the entire week's worth of episodes on Saturday night and Sunday afternoon, giving you three chances to enjoy the comings and goings of the residents in Pine Valley. While I waited for little hand to strike seven, I passed the time by watching 90210, Melrose Place, and Days of Our Lives. Afterwards, if I was trying especially hard to avoid my required reading for school, I became re-aquainted with General Hospital.

What started as a piqued interest in a baby switch soon grew into an obsession. There were stacks of VHS tapes featuring weeks worth of episodes that had to be viewed before commiting to current storylines. Once I spent the entire weekend on the couch, ooohing and aaahing over staged love scenes and giving my thumb an intimate remote-control workout. I was bragging to coworkers that I hadn't missed an episode of AMC in almost a year. Scary stuff.

And then I moved to Indianapolis and realized I couldn't afford cable. Poof! went SoapNet. Poof! went the dedication to shows I had to sneak to watch as a kid. Poof! went AMC until recently because I was too lazy to program the VCR. And now it has Poofed! again.

Will I miss it? Hell yes. I like Pine Valley. I like watching people fall in love and out of love and poison their neighbors and kidnap their own baby because her first ex-husband said he died in childbirth but really was given to his barren sister on One Life to Live. It's easy to forget wedding dress worries and the realization that you're in the wrong field when you're nursing a bowl of Breyer's on the couch with the likes of Erica Kane, a woman far too sophisticated to be trapped in an abandoned wearhouse minutes before she's scheduled to interview Geraldo Rivera on her new talk show.

But the tapes, they've started piling up once again, and it hit me that spending three hours catching up on shows that aired around my birthday is not the best use of my time. For Luke, for my wedding, for my own sanity, it's time to cut the cord.

For now.

Third Time's a Charm

The old saying is actually true, because after three weekends of drama, it look only three tries for this bride to find her match. And I'll feed you good folks the same info I gave Luke: tea-length, white, and strappy heels. It's not too far off from the creation my mother designed for me the day we announced our engagement, titled "The Mommy Said Dress" because Mommy said I might like an illustration that showed just how pretty I would look in white--none this creme or ivory-colored nonsense. Not that she was inflexible; when I shared my decision to ditch the baker's hat-slash-veil and replace the Hawaiian flowers with roses and daisies, she took it very well.

(Note: I've spent the last six minutes unsuccessfully proposing and then promptly discarding jokes in regards to my alter ego's Rocky Mountain bustline, but it's too late and I can barely keep my eyes open as it is, so I'll just cut to the chase and say yes, the breasts, they are indeed huge, and hand-drawn huge breasts are funny!, so ha, ha, ha.)

Now that we're all able to finally move on from this stage of the game, there are still a number of decisions to make that are much less fun and much more time-consuming: for starters, we still haven't booked a DJ. Luke had an appointment with one this Saturday while I was off swishing around in fat dresses with heavy embroidery, but he wasn't charmed enough to part with a deposit. I don't blame him; word is that Pamela owned the company with her husband until he passed away last year. However, she has no problems continuing to pass out materials featuring their last Glamour Shots photo and perky language that states she and Lonnie do solumnly pledge to offer the best music service around. It's kinda like in the second season of Roseanne when Rosie was a shampoo girl for Crystal's beauty salon in Lanford where the boss always talked about her late husband Arthur, even though Arthur died more than thirty years ago and they were married a whopping eleven months. Suffice it to say that any references to deceased spouses that wrongly imply they are not deceased will not encourage future business.

But that's not all! In case we anticipate lulls or snags in the reception's schedule, Pamela is willing to treat us to a Polynesian belly dance. Interesting how Lonnie isn't mentioned at all in that service.

Other tasks we have excelled at avoiding:

• Nailing the wedding invitation list (which, due to a number of out-of-towners, is totally different from the wedding shower list, which is totally different from the head count for the meal, which is still totally "in progress")
• Blocking off rooms at a snazzy yet inexpensive hotel for the wedding night
• Selecting a snazzy yet inexpensive hotel for the wedding night
• Finding music for the ceremony, which has the potential to be a major pain in my @$$, as the deed is taking place outdoors and last I checked, the gazebo doesn't house an organ
• Selecting a hotel for our honeymoon. Destination: Niagara Falls, baby!
• Choosing a napkin color

But we did manage to witness the mediocre talents of Deborah "Don't Call Me Debbie Because Now I'm An Adult" Gibson and Todd "How I Survived into the New Millenium Without Additional Jail Time Is Beyond Me" Bridges on Skating with Celebrities. If that's not good time management, I don't know what is.

Resolution With China

The plate you see above has served as the answer to my china-resistant prayers. Turns out that Luke's grandma had earmarked her darling twelve-piece collection to him months ago, before the two of us were even engaged. I called my aunt tonight to give her the wonderful news, and she said that's wonderful, and isn't it nice that we're inheriting a wonderful family heirloom, and she would buy us something else equally wonderful. Everybody wins.

In a perfect world, after the wedding, Luke and I could store this china ourselves. Having room for delicate serving ware would mean that we've moved into our first house, a house boasting of spacious closets and a basement for storage and a backyard. It'd mean we worked extremely hard to save for a twenty-percent down payment and a few nice things to make the place ours. We'd have the proper accommodations for a dog. We'd have room for a baby.

But right now, we live in a one-bedroom apartment. Our only storage facility is adjacent to our balcony and already filled to the brim with tupperware containers stuffed with holiday decorations, photo albums, movies we don't have the appropriate shelving to display, and our modest little barbeque grill. My home office is the space behind the TV, and our kitchen table is about five feet to the right of that. And it's going to stay this way until June 30th, at which time my lease on this place ends and we'll have made a decision on where to live next. It might be a neighborhood in which we contemplate buying property; it might be a trendy hot spot that will help us celebrate our last child-free hurrah.

The only thing we know for sure is it won't be a house. As it is, we're stretching ourselves to afford this wedding, and now I can't believe I spent the last few weeks telling everyone and their mother that our goal was to move right into a house, when really it was my goal, because dammit, I want a sense of permanency and a real home office and a place for this beautiful china and my God, I want room for a baby.

It's when stuck in such self-manifested crises that I most appreciate my husband-to-be, because Luke has calmly brought me back to Earth with the realization that life will not end if we spend another year in an apartment. After taking a minute to absorb that life-altering pearl, I decided it'd be kinda nice to spend the next twelve months just settling in and enjoying our new marital status. I want to get a new pair of shoes from Baker's without feeling guilty that I'm spending our mortgage money. I want to see a movie at the show more than once a season, and I want grab the good contact lens solution at Target. Besides, if we can hoard several thousand dollars in five months for a wedding, imagine if we took double that to save for the house that will symbolize our first step towards making a family.

In other words, I'm chilling the eff out. My brain feels much more awake. And that? Feels refreshingly nice.

The Retiring of the Meme

But first things first: the wedding dress.

I did not get a wedding dress. I DID, however, get a good dose of what happens when two very emotional people fumble through a miscommunication the night before a very emotional day. In short, the new shopping date is this Saturday at 1:00 p.m. And come hell or high water, a dress WILL be purchased. I don't care if I'm the only one who shows up and all the dresses are at least a thousand dollars and the color options are limited to bubble-gum pink, baby blue, or gray. Then bubble-gum pink it is.

While we're on the topic of unnatural coloring, a big thanks to everyone who had nice things to say about the hue of my roots. You'll all be happy to know that I have already scheduled my next cut and color with Brenda, which just happens to be the morning before Luke's and my wedding shower, which just happens to be on April Fool's Day, which just happens to be freakin' hysterical to me.

Now, on to business. The memes and I, we've had a blast. They've provided me an outlet through which to bare my soul about my five-year history, the Devil, and tapioca pudding. But the following meme will be the last I post on this Web site. Why? Because as much fun as the little buggers are, they don't inspire my best writing, and one of my goals this year is to really put my best foot forward in each entry, to give each post a purpose, even if that purpose is to simply vent my frustrations via one mangled run-on sentence or picture of me bearing an eerie resemblance to Severus Snape. That one sentence and one picture could tell more about Me than a blog survey ever could.

Here we go.

7 Things I’d Like To Do Before I Die

1. Marry the love of my life
2. Give him some babies
3. Find a job I truly love
4. Publish something not associated with urine
5. Jumpstart my own Web site, sans Blogger
6. Find eye makeup that eliminates The Crease
7. At least try on a wedding dress

7 Things I (Currently) Cannot Do

1. Declare myself debt-free
2. Finish The Chronicles of Narnia (In case you haven't noticed, The Voyage of the Dawn Treader has been featured in my sidebar for like, seven months)
3. Sleep through the night without going to the bathroom at least twice
4. Tolerate seafood
5. Stop staring at my engagement ring
6. Book a DJ
7. Go one week without bawling about Life's Injustices Regarding My Special Day

7 Things That Attract Me To Blogging

1. The challenge of finding something meaningful to say at least three to four times a week
2. Instant publishing gratification
3. The ability to post an entry in draft form and tweak it at my whim
4. Making connections with a unique community that, for the most part, puts it all out there
5. Comments, both giving and receiving
6. Learning from the experiences of others
7. Having something else to do at work

7 Things I Say The Most

1. "What are you, eight?"
2. "You know, for shits and giggles!"
3. "May 12, 2006."
4. "Thank you."
5. "I love you."
6. "Quit making that face, I hate it when you make that face!"
7. "Hooray!"

7 Books I Love

1. Flowers for Algernon, Daniel Keyes
2. Atlas Shrugged, Ayn Rand
3. The Fountainhead, Ayn Rand
4. Animal Farm, George Orwell
5. Flowers in the Attic series, V.C. Andrews
6. Harry Potter series, J.K. Rowling
7. The Complete Series, Beatrix Potter

7 Movies I Watch Over and Over Again

1. When Harry Met Sally
2. The Wedding Singer
3. High Fidelity
4. Father of the Bride
5. Austin Powers: International Man of Mystery
6. While You Were Sleeping
7. Alice in Wonderland

7 TV Shows I Thank God For

1. Friends
2. Sex and the City
3. 24
4. Scrubs
5. The Suze Orman Show
6. All My Children
7. My So-Called Life

(I made that last one up because I don't want to steal Number Twelve's tagging thunder. She and I were both originally tagged by Lisa, so I know it's coming soon.)

Medusa Lives!

When I sat down in the stylist's chair on Wednesday to FINALLY recolor and trim my hair, I held in my heart a renewed excitement about shopping for my wedding dress, because come Saturday I'd be Fresh! and Pretty! once again. My rejuvenated appearance would allow the Real Frema to shine through, not this Tired, Worn-Out version that's been dragging her feet the last couple of weeks. Feeling Fresh! and Pretty! in my new cinnamon-brown mixture would make all the difference.

And that would have happened, if Christy didn't think THIS color would look more natural and I hadn't hesitantly agreed with her.

So, instead of being the woman who radiates an Inner Glow, I have morphed into the newest Christina Ricci-From-The Addams-Family, the latest Winona Ryder-From-Beetlejuice. Behold Gothic Suicide.

On a more life-affirming note, when worn curly, the cut actually looks pretty good. The above "style" was achieved after Christy broke into hives at the idea of doing a blow-out with a round brush. "I can't do it, I just can't do it!" she cried before proceeding to wave the dryer around my head and nip at the ends with a flat iron--a far cry from the smooth and savvy look Brenda gives me back home.

My hope is that David's Bridal won't be surprised when a Medusa look-alike walks in on Saturday morning demanding a dressing room and virginal attire. Maybe they'll take bets on whether or not I can keep a razor away from my wrists long enough to make it down the aisle.

And you wonder why I still get my hair done in Chicago.

To Plate Or Not to Plate

While trying to fudge with the margins of a balance sheet I'd just pasted into PowerPoint at work, I received a phone call from my aunt, my father's sister, who also happens to be my godmother. It had been a few months since we last talked, so she asked about my job, offered congratulations on Luke's and my engagement, and wished me a happy birthday. We were on the phone no longer than five minutes before she got down to business.

"I want to buy your china," she said.

"Oh?"

"I'm looking at the catalog for Carson's, and they've got like seven patterns on sale for fifty percent off. I wanted to get you white, you know, so that they could go with everything, and they have different trim colors. Do you want blue, silver, or gold?"

"Oh!"

"If you don't get it now, you're never going to get it, you know? I figured that since you're a professional, you'll need it, you know, to entertain."

"Yeah.... Thanks, Auntie. I really appreciate you wanting to do this for us."

"So which one do you want?"

"Can I talk to Luke first?"

"Sure, sure. I wanted to get you something special, honey, since I'm your godmother. I want to do this for you."

"I know, and I appreciate it. But.... Auntie? I don't have people from work over for dinner. And we kind of weren't even thinking of china right now. We were just going to look some regular dishes--ones we could use every day."

"Well, I'm not sure how long this sale is going on...." (Flip, flip says the pages of a Carson Pierre Scott catalog, because my aunt believes that Carson's is the Greatest Store on Earth.)

"It's really nice of you to want to do this for us. But I don't even know where we'd put stuff like that right now. We don't even know where we're going to live afterwards."

"I have a girlfriend who got into a house with almost zero down. You could do that, couldn't you?"

"Yeah, but...."

And so on and so on.

I have no doubt that her intentions were sincere. Throughout the years, she's made a conscious effort to remember my birthday, buy me gifts at Christmastime, and generally establish a relationship that better mirrors one that's shared between girlfriends. And I'm grateful for that.

But that's not the point. The point is this whole china thing. I don't want china. Luke doesn't want china. Luke and I don't want china! We eat soup out of bowls from the Dollar Store that have been disfigured by the microwave and spaghetti off of plates that bear rust stains on the rim. We're simple folk, really, and have no need for plates that cost more than ten bucks apiece and/or could inspire the makings of a family feud years after our death.

"I want Momma Frema's white gold china with the blue trim she and Daddy got from Carson's!"

See? No good for anybody.

But I couldn't make my aunt see that. It makes me wonder if the gift is about me having the china or my aunt being able to say that she bought me the china. I couldn't have been any nicer about not wanting the china, any more appreciative about appreciating the sentiment but not appreciating the china. Yet still, it's all about the china.

China, china, china! And while we're at it, Appreciate!

I suppose this was to be expected. When my sister got married last summer, HER godmother was also insistent about purchasing fancy plates and went so far as to tell her to register for a nice pattern at Marshall Field's. Samantha didn't need the china, either, but she didn't want to appear ungrateful, so she went downtown at the height of the Wedding Crazy and picked something out. A few days later, the godmother, the person who asked Samantha to register for the dishes in the first place, called her back and suggested that maybe she would consider a lesser pattern at Sears?

Samantha said a paper shredder would do just fine, thank you very much.

Her godmother bought the china. One setting, to be exact, as in one cup, one plate, one bowl. Samantha returned them all and got her very first Coach purse. This is quite distressing, as I am the oldest sister and I don't even have a Coach purse.

Maybe I should reconsider my aunt's offer after all.

26th Birthday Suspense

But not about my wedding dress, even though I don't have one yet, even though I had plans to get one this past weekend. Apparently, I'm an idiot to think I can have dibs on a dressing room without making an appointment. New date: January 14th. I will break down and get thee to a reputable salon before then, because when people you haven't met offer to dye your roots themselves, something's got to be done. Maybe the whole scheduling debacle was a sign from God that my hair deserves some TLC before I start squeezing into white dresses.

Also, there are no longer any surprises about my ISF fees from the bank. Apparently, I'm also an idiot who forgets to record transactions in my register. On Saturday night, after checking a voice message from one of the tellers, I went through the last three statements online and discovered about a hundred dollars' worth of missing receipts, receipts I remember vividly and just assumed I had accounted for. Debit cards and Frema do not mix as well as she previously thought. (Quick shout-out to bank branches with Sunday hours who post deposits that same day. I love you, Yolanda!)

However, there is an air of mystery surrounding today, because at 10:00 a.m., Luke will begin an interview with one of the area's weekly newspapers. His qualifications would sooo kick this position's @$$. Send positive vibes his way. And mine, because, apparently, it's my birthday.

A Rusted Root

In the 1989 love ballad "Sacrifice" by Sir Elton John, the appeal of the extramarital affair to a married man is discussed and discarded in fewer than four minutes. Though Sir Elton admits that "temptation's strong," he argues avoiding a booty call isn't really a sacrifice, because a hot night of passion has less to offer the human spirit than a loving, respectful bond between two consensual adults. I think. In a nutshell.

But when a twenty-five-year-old-soon-to-be-married woman and her fiance decide to cut back on living expenses in order to pay for their spring wedding in cash, and said woman does her part by not having her hair trimmed or recolored for almost three months, surely even he would agree on its significance. Why isn't anyone singing about THAT?

Luke and I strengthen our money-management muscles a little bit every day. Sometimes it's turning down a matinee because that ten bucks could contribute to the deposit for the DJ. On other occasions, it's refusing an offer to go roller-skating with your sisters, even though one of us LOVES roller-skating and still has visions of making it around the rink with one of their legs gracefully floating in the air like Nancy Kerrigan except on a hardwood floor. And even sometimes when somebody is preparing to celebrate her twenty-sixth birthday on MONDAY, JANUARY 9, DON'T FORGET TO SEND WELL WISHES, FOR THE LOVE OF GOD, and desires nothing more than to partake in spinach-and-artichoke dip and babyback ribs, to hell with high cholesterol!, at the local Ruby Tuesday, that someone is still adamant about enforcing the "No eating out" rule. We are redefining the definition of restraint.

The hair, though, is not on board. Instead of being on its best behavior during this time of financial conservatism, it is unruly, beastly even, and my dark brown roots are dangerously close to eyebrow level. Roots, people! So much root that I should make my own Lifetime drama called Roots, which would be much rootier than that one movie with Oprah Winfrey. Behold the catastrophe that is my head:

Painful even for you, isn't it?

This has become a constant source of unhappiness for me, as I was used to keeping hair appointments every six weeks and firmly believe a good hair day can overpower a breakout, bad outfit, and if you're REALLY on a roll, the imposition of Aunt Flo. Now I frequently feel the need to justify why my Cute Working Girl facade is in shambles and why product can no longer keep The Curl from becoming The Afro Poof, or even worse, The Flat Yet Still Slightly Poofy Afro Poof. Pretty soon I'll be handing out business cards with a pre-emtive apology to all those forced to be within ten feet of its presence.

In the grand scheme of things, I realize and acknowledge that these problems are small. Last night, when I was holding Molly's newborn son in my arms for the first time, I knew that cable television and pretty hair were just two on a long list of items I'd gladly give up to experience the Heaven of being a mother and taking care of a family.

And P.S.: In case it's not evident by the tie-dye, clothing was the third thing to go.

Belated Apology

The last three days have been a whirlwind of activity centered around cake testing, tuxedo shopping, invitation choosing, and birthday celebrating. Plus, my good friend Molly gave birth to her second son, Jack, this morning, who just happened to be the New Year's baby for their hospital, so a big hip hip HOORAY! to the Ray family, PLUS, I've caught up on the first of two weeks of All My Children tapes and discovered that Dixie is alive! Could life get any better? I think not.

Our experiences over the weekend bring with them the potential of amazing blog entries, but I'll let Luke handle that. The thing I can't stop obsessing over is the etiquettenesss (is that even a word?) of the whole thing. Dates for singles? Kids or no kids? Perform or forgo bouquet and garter tosses? Make room for or scratch off "The Chicken Dance"? The pressure from all this decision-making is enough to break my body into a thousand tiny pieces.

However, the most interesting directive falls upon the shoulders of your guests: Guests, if you RSVP for the ceremony and reception, please plan to the attend the ceremony and reception. When you agree to take part in somebody's special day, please don't show up at the church and leave the bride and groom with apologies that you won't be at the hall because your boyfriend wants to take a nap and you are too much of an @$$wipe to stand up to him.

That @$$wipe? Would be Trophy Frema. She did it to baby Jack's momma on October 28, 2000--her wedding day.

During the ten months that Mike and I dated, I ran myself ragged trying to please him. I bought him cigarettes even though I despise them and to this day still attempt to wiggle out of my mother's requests to pick up a pack for her at the corner store. I charged extra cell phone minutes on my credit card so he could call his buddy from the aisles of Best Buy to get the name of a Nirvana CD he had to have. And I acted like it was no big deal that he didn't want to go to Molly and Kevin's wedding because it was the same weekend of his annual Halloween party, and I didn't think I was a good enough reason for the party not to go on.

I eventually guilted him into agreeing to be included on the RSVP, while he eventually guilted me into skipping the reception, saying he'd worked a long week and was really tired and just wanted to go home and sleep. So, instead of expressing my excitment at the night's upcoming festivities, I gave Molly a hug and shook Kevin's hand after their beautiful ceremony and left them standing there at the end of the service with nothing but a congratulations and our regrets. Turns out The Powers That Be found a way to punish me for my faux pas, because that same night Mike patted my stomach and casually remarked, "You didn't have this when we first started going out." Karma, she's a bitch.

Today, as I reflect on all the time and effort Luke and I have funneled into this wedding to date, it crystalizes for me just what it means to be included on somebody's guest list. It means you are wanted. It means you are loved. It means your relationship is worth a twenty-dollar meal and the price of an open bar. In other words, you are not expendable.

I also realize how lucky I am that Molly never called me out on the rudeness of my behavior, that she never tried to make me feel bad, that she continued to be my friend. During these next few months, may God bless me with the same grace and understanding this incredible woman exercised with someone who should have known better. For what it's worth, Molly, I know better now.

Quiz Show

Today is significant because:

a) It's pay day.

b) The January issue of Glamour arrived in the mail.

c) I participated in an all-you-can-eat spinach dip contest.

d) It's exactly five months to the day Luke and I say "I do"

And the answer is... D, for Dammit, It's About Freaking Time!

On the night I returned home from my trip to Minnesota, the Red Sea parted and the angels in Heaven sang a chorus of "Hallelujah" as Luke got on bended knee and asked me to be his wife. With me in sweat pants and a blubbery mess of tears. Then it was Ramen noodle soup and off to bed, because it was eleven o'clock and we were both tired and apparently we now resemble senior citizens who get pooped after a round of Bingo and an episode of Wheel of Fortune.

I have to say, thus far, our journey to the altar has been anything but traditional. The shenanigans began in mid-November, when we started talking about having a May wedding, and wouldn't it be nice to have a May wedding?

Then came the day after Thanksgiving, when the two of us not only picked out my engagement ring, but Luke had "The Talk" with my dad.

Saturday, December 3: Luke picks up the ring, which I refuse to lay eyes on again until it's slipped on my finger. I worry all the good May dates will be taken. We nail the hall for Friday, May 12, 2006, in Merrillville.

Sunday, December 4: Secure the pastor. (Yes, pastor. However, the race isn't over until the Fat Lady baptizes someone. The Catholics still have a chance!)

Monday, December 5: Book a gazebo for the ceremony.

Wednesday, December 7: Officially become engaged (read: I'm finally wearing the ring that keeps me from looking like a fool for making plans without having the goods to back them up).

This weekend was The Telling Of The Families, which means it's now OK to share our happiness with the entire Internet, which I have been dying to do since Black Friday. So now you know why my entries have been somewhat sporadic. Suppressing the information that has just about taken over my entire being was one of the hardest things I've ever done. It was worth it, though, to see everyone's faces when we sprung the news. The scene at my parents' house was like one comprehensive episode of The Brady Bunch, with Marcia and Greg building the house of cards in one corner, Bobby weeping over the disappearance of Tiger in another, and Jan yakking it up with George Glass. I finally shouted, "Everyonebequietwehavesomethingtotellyou!" Then I held up my left hand and cried, "We're engaged!"

Imagine much hugging and crying and the perusing of many, many bridal magazines.

This moment in our lives has been four and a half years in the making, originally conceived one April night when I was brave enough to bounce a check.

We're so happy.

Note: I am fully aware that the publishing date of this entry says Monday, December 12, but that the actual publishing date is Tuesday, December 13. However, if I were to officially acknowledge this by changing the date, my whole quiz gimmick would go to pot and I would have to kill Luke for being too tired to blog and thus foiling our plan to update our blogs within minutes of each other so neither could accuse the other of stealing the wedding thunder. See how well that worked out?