One of life’s greatest contradictions is that one starts a blog to write about all of life’s happenings, but when life is happening, one has no time to blog. I think Socrates said that. Maybe it was me. Ever since I took a 200 level philosophy class in college I often confuse myself with Socrates, even though we are very different. Socrates had a large and consistent body of work. I haven’t written a “real” blog since June 11th. Socrates attended the now legendary history performance at San Dimas High School. I merely smoked pot and laid bitches in high school. One thing Socrates and I do have in common however is wordily catching up all the peeps on our most recent thoughts and going-ons.
I expect this blog to be very very long. This is coming from a guy who thinks most of his blogs are short, when really they are long. I like words. They’re fun. Did you know there is a word to describe almost anything? If there’s not a word to describe something, hot and heavy elephant sex for instance, you can assign one. In this case, hot and heavy elephant sex shall be known as Dallas.
Due to the expected length of this blog, I’ve decided to go away with the whole, My Brother, My Ladyfriend, My Blah Blah, when referencing people. To incorrectly quote Jeff (formerly My Chicago Friend or My College Roommate in Chicago) it, “played its course a long time ago.” However, some people may not want their names typed up and published on the Internet for strangers to read. That could result in identity theft. I may remain vague about people, but I’ll try to be less cutesy. Agreed?
In addition to being the new name for hot and heavy elephant sex and a city that Debbie did, Dallas is also my brother’s name. That’s a trifecta!
I don’t want anyone to complain about the expected length of this blog. I’m sorry if it will take more than five minutes to read. Get over it. I expect it to be shorter than a book, so that’s good. Besides, I’ll conveniently break this blog into sections with links that tell you, the Novice Reader, “You’ve reached a stopping point. How exhausting. You should probably go sit down or watch TV. I’m so proud of you.” The nice thing about stopping points is you can then start reading at the same point. They are pessimistically named. Henceforth, they are starting points.
If you’re curious, here are the different starting points you will find in this blog. In addition to simply listing them, I’ve linked them to their corresponding location on the blog. You are welcome.
1) San Antonio
2) Chicago
3) Bachelor Party
4) Chaos and Please Kill Me Now
5) Four Days, Two Days, One Day, None
6) Rehearsal/Day of Wedding
7) The Hotel Part One
8) The Honeymoon
9) The Wedding
10) The Hotel Part Two
San Antonio
I should have written a blog about San Antonio a long time ago. As of today, the trip was almost four months ago. To make it appear more topical, I’ll use what we in the writing business call creative license and change the dates of this trip to early June. This way it looks like it actually fit into the wedding timeline when in all reality, it was in March. I’m also going to skip the part about how Jeff ordered airline tickets for the wrong week and subsequently told Dave the wrong day, so he ordered incorrect tickets too because I don’t want Jeff to feel stupid. Next, I’m going to create a fake friend, Theo, and have him do all the stuff my friends and I wouldn’t appreciate being assigned. At some point I’ll kill him off, as to not cause confusion with real life. We will later eulogize Theo at the wedding and it will be sad. We will later eulogize Theo at the wedding and it will be touching. By doing this, I’ve turned autobiographical essays into fiction. This means unlike my normal blogs, I can exaggerate and/or embellish when necessary.
In April, when home for Christmas, two of my college roommates, Dave, Jeff and I were back in our hometown of Cedar Falls, Iowa 50613. As we drank, we talked about how we needed to visit our friend Ian who lives in San Antonio. It was agreed upon that this had to happen prior to my impending nuptials (July 4th—go America) because, as married men will have you know, life ends upon marriage. We looked at the calendar and since it was April when we had this discussion and the marriage was in July, clearly we had to have the trip in early June, which was only five weeks away. Thus it’s topical to discuss now. A further agreement was reached: we would drive to San Antonio, staying overnight at our friends’ house in Tulsa, Oklahoma on night one. At the end of the trip, we would then take separate one-way flights back to a destination airport of our choice (mine would be Moline!).
I met Ian on the first day of fourth grade on the swing set at my elementary school. I was a lonely fat kid with no friends. He was a lonely new kid with no friends. We talked a little before school and then found each other on the swing set again at lunch. The first Friday of my fourth grade year I was in my backyard when I heard someone shouting my name. It was Ian. He had rollerblades on and was riding a bike. It turned out the strange new kid lived behind me. We became best friends quick, partly because neither one of us had a lot of other friends and partly because we were both unique. Throughout the years our relationship has taken several different turns, best friends, sibling rivals, back to best friends again, but we’d always be close. He moved to San Antonio a few years back with a woman who he no longer dates. He’s one of the most content and interesting individuals I’ve ever met. He’s never really cared much about what society considers normal, and he’s proved to me on several occasions that marching to the beat of your own drummer is much more exciting than marching to the beat of everyone else’s.
Jeff rented a car in Chicago on June 1st, just five weeks ago, and drove to the QC to pick me up. Since neither of us is wordy, we forced ourselves to make five hours of awkward conversation as we drove to Kansas City to pick up Dave. “So Jeff, how’s Science?” I’d ask. “Good Jay, how’s Business?” he’d answer. Then we picked up Dave and Theo. We all talked about how awesome this trip was going to be. We talked of its legendary potential and how excited we were for it to start. After two hours of this nauseating pre-trip pampering, Dave asked as we pulled into a gas station, “So when do we stop talking about how awesome this trip is going to be and actually make it awesome?” I decided, “How about right now? This gas station will be the turning point.” At the gas station, we bought American Beers and Flavored Mountain Dew to drink and Doritos to eat. Upon getting in the car, we firmly established how much fun we were having.
No sooner than forty minutes after our fun had started we pulled into a town named Coffeyville, Kansas. Here is Coffeyville’s history: Sometimes God smiles upon you; sometimes you are born in Coffeyville. This town happened to have a manufacturing facility owned by the very company whose computer I currently use to type this blog. Due to this, I claimed this could someday be my home, and we needed to find a bar and have our (well, my) first June drink. We drove up and down the six streets that created the lovely culture-rich mosaic of Coffeyville before we stopped and asked ourselves, “Does this town have a bar?” Then the neon lights of both an “open” and a “Bud Light” sign shone into the car. We found Murray’s Diner w/ Full Bar. Inside Murray’s Diner there were three fellow patrons and six female employees. We sat at the bar. I ordered a tall, double Jack and Coke and a Philly cheese steak because I’m going through some weight problems. The restaurant started to shut down, so we made idle banter with the waitresses in order to earn the right to stay and drink a little longer. The waitresses, sad and lonely small town girls of all ages, told us about the fun bar to go to in Coffeyville. They really wanted us to go with them. Fortunately the three of us all had girlfriends we loved back home and an aversion to herpes, so we opted to get back in the car and head towards Tulsa.
In Tulsa, we avoided the temptation to eat at any of the 800 Sonic restaurants that litter the streets and arrived safely at our friends Steve and Abby’s house. I don’t remember much of the particulars because the first thing Steve said to me was, “Hey, I got this bottle of Crown Royal and I don’t like the stuff. Does anyone want it?” I do remember that Steve giggled at just about everything any of us said, Dave and I finished a bottle of Crown Royal, I ranted about how the primaries will never end and Hillary is ruining the country (which is weird, because this happened in June), Abby made us breakfast but burnt a lot of muffins, Steve proudly proclaimed he spent a day putting up some elaborate lettering on the wall which I proudly told him looked crooked, I smoked a cigar, I ate half a bag of Doritos, and I didn’t brush my teeth before bed. The next morning we woke up, bought some delicious Sonic food, hopped in our rental mobile and left for San Antonio.
The drive itself was a great bonding experience. We wrote a movie. More correct, we remade the movie Parent Trap as directed by M Night Shymalan. It was about two kids, one white kid and one Latino kid who arrived at summer camp to find they looked exactly like one another save for the tan discrepancy. The two boys eventually get into a fight and end up in a cabin all by themselves. On a fateful rainy night Richard saw a picture of Miguel’s papa. “Is that your papa” Richard asked? “Mi Mama dice.” Miguel said. In poorly translated English that means, “My mama says so. I’ve never met my father. He simply sends money from the United States every few weeks.” The two realized in a graphic and explicit conversation that the same man impregnated both of their mamas. The two boys agreed to pull the old switcheroo at the end of camp—Miguel going home with Richard’s family and vice versa. Since Richard was really tan at the end of camp, no one seemed to notice the difference until winter when a still dark Miguel wouldn’t stop trying to weed Richard’s family garden and Richard didn’t seem pleased with the bright colored clothing and maracas he got for Christmas. Suffice it to say, the white mother, being much more prudish than the saucy Latino mother, was a wreck when she found out about her husband’s indiscretions. She asked her dad what she should do. He then confessed he once cheated on her mother with a Latino woman. He showed her a picture he inexplicably carried in his wallet all these years. The picture of Grandpa’s Latin princess is the same woman who is the mother of the mother of Miguel. Cue Gong. Moving on…
Entering Texas, a large, “BUY PORN HERE” sign greeted us. Soon after a sign that said, “Texas, the proud home of George W. Bush,” lied to us. Does the fact your home state offers porn before claiming you make you at all reflect upon your life Mr. W? Twelve hours and forty phone calls from Ian later (not because we were lost, but because Ian wouldn’t leave us the fuck alone), we finally arrived in San Antonio. Along with Ian, our Marine friend Justin was there. It started innocently enough. We ate supper and had two drinks each. We then went back to Ian’s where we were to stay for the nights of June 2nd and June 4th. June 3rd was to be for camping, not, as it turned out to be, breakfasting with strippers.
At Ian’s we started to drink. A lot. You know how sometimes people walk up to you and say, “Wow I drank so much,” then they tell you how much they drank? Never be impressed with them again. We drank a lot. Those people who walked up to you didn’t drink much at all. The drinking may have impaired our decision making, as evidenced by the fact at 2:00am Ian and I decided to walk his dog around a poor Latin neighborhood to find a place we could buy cigars. Luckily for us we found an open gas station about one mile away from his house. It was right off the interstate at closing time, so naturally it was filled with riff-raff. Exuding charm, I asked the counter-lady, “Do you have any Al Capone cigars?” She stared at me. I amended my order. “Do you have any Black and Milds?” The man standing next to me, a really tall black man with lots of tattoos said, “I want a Black and Mild.” His short friend, also black but with more tattoos and scarier teeth said, “Do you know who this is?” He pointed at the tall man. “No,” I said. What was this short man thinking? I’m from Iowa. Up until that June 2nd evening, I’d never seen a real live black person (except for Theo who is fictional and probably shouldn’t count). The short man said, “He’s from Bone Thugs N Harmony.” Let the record show I did not believe this man. However, not wanting to die I said, “Get him a pack of Black and Milds too.” I walked outside and in the parking lot sat a giant Escalade with “B Thugs,” or some equivalent on the license plate. I bought a multi-millionaire platinum recording artist a cigar. What have you done with your life?
Later that night, we decided to go to bed even though we were really hungry--especially Theo because the dude smoked a lot of weed. Ian though, not believing in food, had only Chocolate Skittles and frozen pizzas but no oven for us to eat. Theo offered to grill them for us on the grill, but under his mental condition that seemed like a bad idea. Theo started feverishly digging through the fridge and found string cheese. I had never in my life seen anyone so damn happy to eat string cheese. The night ended when Justin drunk dialed every girl we knew in high school and yelled at them for not sleeping with any of us (note: I really was never that angry), Theo passed out after eating string cheese, and I smoked a delicious cigar under the same moonlit sky as a Bone Thug.
Day two in San Antonio got off to a later start than expected because most of us woke up wanting to die. We planned to go tubing down a river later that day and end the night camping. To start the day we went to a pretentious restaurant that served breakfast for $14 and sucked. We then went shopping in a mall that sold absolutely nothing of value because tourists are stupid. I respect wasting money and my heritage though so I purchased a wrestling luchador mask for fifty dollars. If you find yourself wondering why I’m telling you any of this nonsense, it’s because the six of us wasted the entire day piddling around San Antonio and didn’t leave to go tubing or camping until 7:00pm. Keep in mind this is a Sunday night in a month not regularly camped in (um, June?). Also, Ian didn’t let us know that the campsite was over an hour away from his house. Regardless, we stocked up on camping food and camping libations and headed out for the country.
Two hours later as we drove from campsite to campsite trying to find an open one I became irritated, hungry, and a little drunk from the alcohol I drank in the back of the car (Don’t worry, there be no law in Texas. Spit.). I finally told Ian, “We’re not camping.” We regrouped at a delicious restaurant and decided since this trip was sort of technically a bachelor party type get together we should probably go to a strip club. I’d never enjoyed strip clubs up to that point in my life and didn’t expect to like this one, but what the hell, it beat driving around in the dark.
It being a Sunday night, the strip club had roughly twelve patrons, of which we were six. This meant we had the fortune of having every stripper come sit at our table and tell us their life stories. Every one of them went like this: “This isn’t my real job. I do this for fun honey. I work as a (insert professional sounding job). I have dogs and two kids. Oh, it’s my turn to dance. Come up and visit!” It might be that at stripper school they tell you, “evoke sympathy from your potential john by telling him of your children.” In me it evoked feelings of sadness for you, me, and the big blue Earth. One stripper, Peaches, seemed different though. She sat by us and didn’t seem to be begging for money. In fact, she seemed to genuinely like us, especially Theo, who said she smelled divine. At closing time, we decided to go to breakfast and somehow Peaches got invited along. She agreed to come, but we had to wait awkwardly outside the club because strippers can’t leave with clients. It would look bad for the women who rubbed their naked bodies against strangers to leave with a man. What would people think about their morals?
At the breakfast restaurant, which was much more reasonably priced and better than the one from earlier that day, Theo and Peaches really hit it off. Here’s what she told us: “My name is Veronica. This isn’t my real job. I do this for fun honey. I work as a nurse. I have dogs and two kids. I don’t have many friends. I’m glad you came to visit.” Theo, recently sex deprived and always neurotic, started to tell her of all the great aspects of San Antonio’s history. She said that sounded interesting. There in that strange breakfast restaurant on an early Monday morning in June, love blossomed.
As you will find out, their relationship moved very quickly. She immediately texted him when she got home to let him know she was safe and sound. The two of them spent the entire next day texting each other deep and sometimes disgusting things. I’ve generally reserved text sex for day never of a relationship. Theo moved there in less than 24 hours. They did agree to meet later, possibly go shopping or something. As common sense advisor, Justin advised Theo not to let her find out where he lives as she might be crazy and dishonest. He assumed this because of the stripping.
The next day our only plans consisted of sitting on a front porch drinking. At some point that night we planned to go to a concert of a band whose music is described as Surfer/Swing music. Before the concert we went and met two of Ian’s good friends, a woman who didn’t like the White Stripes latest CD and thus probably has mild brain retardation and a woman who seemed way too peace and lovey for this conservative business man. Personality quirks aside, the two were quite nice and were enjoyable to sit on a porch with. In fact, sitting on a porch eating tacos and drinking whiskey all day makes it perfectly understandable why people from warm climates never get anything done.
The day picked up when Theo decided to take all remaining alcohol and finish it all before 4:00. He then started dancing in the front street and soon passed out in the front yard with his hand down his pants. He appeared to be talking to his girlfriend on his cellphone too, but I don’t think the hand in his pants was not related to that. We tried to wake Theo up for the concert with magic, snapping, cold water, screaming, kicking, and biting but nothing worked. Thus, we locked him in the house with a dying cell phone, no food, and no Tylenol and left for the concert.
What made the band great to watch, aside from Ian “dancing” or “impersonating a coma patient in an Earthquake” or whatever it is you call what drunk white people do in front of crowds is the fact that THEE San Antonio Swing Society was on hand. That’s right, I was in a room with the THEE San Antonio Swing Society. We continued the general theme of the trip-binge drinking-with Justin taking charge. He spent his entire bank account on drinks while becoming a hyperactive drunk monkey who insisted on taking pictures and slapping people. I was almost ready to kill him when I noticed I had about eight missed calls from Theo. Evidently he woke up and found that all the doors were locked from the outside. Let that be a lesson to you children: Don’t trust hippies. Who the hell has doors that lock from the outside?
After an uneventful exodus from the bar we picked up Theo and returned to Ian’s. As we fell asleep that night, Jeff, Dave, and I stayed up and talked about a variety of inconsequential topics. Justin, who earlier in the night set the world record for speed talking and hadn’t shut up since 7:30, had officially driven Jeff insane. After Justin fell asleep every time he breathed loud or moved in his sleep Jeff would exasperatedly yell at him to shut up and threw ice at him. It makes sense if you think about it. The three of us making fun of someone else and talking about nonsense brought me back to college and our late nights watching Legends of the Hidden Temple and/or appreciating the fine art of soft core pornography. While I have no intention of ever having to share a small room with two other men again (at least on a regular basis), a weird part of me is glad I did.
The next day, after a brief lunch with our new stripper friend and a stop at a drive-thru liquor store (the hell?), we parted ways for the time being. San Antonio was hot, hippies and rap stars littered the streets, and Theo could have killed himself with such reckless behavior. That said, it would now and forever be one of my favorite places.
Chicago
My creative license has paid off. In reality, I returned home from San Antonio and had two months of activities (attended a wedding shower, attended a wedding shower, attended a retirement party, attended a wedding shower, worked on invites, took the GMAT, purchased Grand Theft Auto, buried a grandmother, interviewed for grad school, joined a church, attended my sister’s graduation party, got turned down by grad school, and of course, worked diligently to ensure my company’s manufacturing parts were packaged with the upmost quality) before going to Chicago to pick up one of Kelsey’s bridesmaids from the airport. However, since none of that makes for a good story, I can skip all of it. John Adams may have said, “facts are stubborn things,” but clearly he never heard of revisionist history. The same revisionist history that made Andrew Jackson a presidential folk hero instead of a racist bigot, I’ll use to pretend I never got far too drunk in Des Moines in May because of a magic table at a Spanish restaurant that would automatically double my drink order. Since this never happened, I certainly never passed out in the back of a taxi cab and threw up all over another one of Kelsey’s bridesmaid’s parking lots. This is perfect. While I’m at it, I never carved the f-word into the music room floor in sixth grade, apologized to my ex-boss for me not taking well his being an asshole, or bit that leopard.
For those of you unfamiliar, Chicago is located on Lake Michigan, has a giant airport, two baseball teams (one of which no one cared about until three years ago), the tallest building in the US, lots of construction, absolutely no traffic flow, lots of people from Iowa, and Oprah. Jeff, as his former nickname, My Chicago Friend, would lead you to believe, lives in Chicago, next door to Oprah. He currently attends the University of Chicago, the same grad school that turned me down, and studies science. His goal is to someday create a small genome troll that we can purchase and use as our own personal scientist. Some people are confused as to the viability of such a product. Those people clearly have never filled their car with gas and asked themselves, “Between what amounts of gas will my car reach its optimal gas mileage?” or asked themselves, “Can a set of fraternal twins feature one regular and one albino child?” With a small personal scientist around (troll-size for easy transit), you will never be confused again. You thought Wikipedia was awesome, just wait.
In a true tribute to Jeff, this micro blog will be tangential. It’s all good. He used the word parenthetically in his wedding toast.
As you know, our government recently tried to mask their gross incompetence by sending us all $600 checks. These checks, designed to stimulate the economy by giving people extra money to spend with no abandon on foreign cars and foreign electronics in reality didn’t even cover the basic cost increases of gas, food, and everything that derives itself from gas and food. The checks also allowed people to give the well-run airline industry some extra money as a reward for excellent customer service. Because of this, Bridesmaid Barb, who lives in Houston, TX, was able to attend Kelsey’s bachelorette party planned for Saturday, June 7th. I agreed to pick her up from the airport Saturday morning since the Moline airport is both unreliable and expensive.
Since he moved to Chicago, I have seen Jeff several times, probably somewhere in the teens or twenties. Every single one of these times however has not been in Chicago. Even though for my first two years out of college I had “four days off” each week and for the last year we’ve lived only three hours apart, I have been a terrible friend and never visited Chicago. I thought Barb’s impending arrival was a great excuse to go to Chicago on Friday and partake in some evening activities with Jeff and his girlfriend Bridgette. I might have spelled Bridgette wrong. She’ll get over it. Jeff agreed to host me for the evening.
I left for Chicago around 6:00 that Friday. At around 7:30 I received a call from Theo who wanted to update me on the latest between him and Veronica. What I did not mention in the end of the San Antonio blog is that when all of us left, Theo and Veronica stayed together and shopped that day. At some point in the mall, they started making out. According to Theo, it was the greatest kiss of all time. It also had some charming effect where Theo stopped using reason and logic to guide his decisions but hormones and penal cravings. He called to tell me that in only two weeks time he’s decided it might not work out between him and Veronica. I said, “Maybe it was just not to be.” He disagreed. She could have been the one, but she just didn’t communicate well. She sometimes would go away on trips with her kids, who he suspected had hearing problems, without letting him know. I asked him if maybe that was because he only knew her two weeks. He didn’t think so. I changed subjects and asked him if he planned to bring anyone to the wedding. He said he wanted Veronica to come and he’d continue to work on her.
I get to Chicago at 9:00, hungry and thirsty. Jeff, Bridgette, and I took a cab four blocks to a delicious Mexican restaurant. There was a three drink minimum, so the three of us made sure we drank the correct amount of margaritas.
Jeff and I have an interesting history. We’ve known each other since seventh grade when we initially shared an interest in Michael Crichton novels and he made fun of the “geek binder” I carried my schoolwork around in. At the time I was fat and unpopular, and Jeff was nerdy and unpopular. We didn’t associate in the same nerd circles, but we kept in touch through our advanced math classes. At some point between ninth and tenth grade, I lost a lot of weight. This gave me the confidence to tell everyone what I thought about them. For some reason, instead of people hating the former fat kid with the blossoming ego, they found him enjoyable and kept him around. The cool kids liked me! Great! Then, the summer before my senior year in high school some friends and I went to see the overrated movie Gladiator. Jeff and a couple of other guys from high school were there. We started talking and enjoyed it quite a bit. At that point I realized Jeff was cool enough to associate with us cool kids. It was nice to have him around because sometimes, and I mean this to offend all you stupid people, it’s nice to talk to other smart people. We ended up living together for three years at Iowa State along with Dave and Dan.
In addition to being old friends, we have the tendency to encourage the other to steal. There is a restaurant in Cedar Falls that had a really unique statue by the front door. When we were back in town for our freshman homecoming, Jeff encouraged me to steal it. I wussed out and told him no. He told me to hold the door. I opened the door, and he rocketed away with the Small Man statue.
After margaritas, Jeff, Bridgette, and I walked to another bar. I learned at this bar that anyone who lives in a big city and can’t find someone to intercourse regularly should probably kill themselves. Everyone everywhere was looking to get theirs. The three of us ended up at a table next to a bachelor party for a minor league hockey player. The party drifted over and swallowed our table, so we made conversation with minor league hockey players. In fact, one of them is supposed to make it big this year. I would tell you his name, but because he’s a hockey player I forgot it. Either way, I tried to bullshit my way through talk of the Stanley Cup finals even though the last full hockey game I watched was the movie Miracle. The point of this conversation is that because we needed to be cool in front of the jocks, we lost all track of time and ordered drink after drink. The bartender shouted closing time, and we left.
My three favorite Jeff memories: 1) The time he came home from the bars with a swollen eye because two frat guys beat him up. Earlier in the night he decided he wanted to beat some frat guy up, but since they travel in packs, he lost. Also earlier in the night several of us had filled Jeff’s room with a stack of thirty pizza boxes. He did not find it amusing upon his return. He entered the apartment, stormed back to his room, kicked all the pizza boxes, and went to the shower. I left my room and saw blood on the wall. I opened the bathroom door and asked Jeff if he was okay. “Yup,” he responded. I asked him if he was bleeding. “Yup,” he responded. I asked him if it was the wrong night to fill his room with pizza boxes. “Yup,” he responded. 2) The time in Iowa City after the Cyclones beat the Hawkeyes with an amazing comeback he got all upset at how pissy and morose our Hawk friends were being. We decided to leave town and on the way to pick up Dan he leaned out the window and started talking to everyone like we were in the movie Sling Blade. Since students at the University of Iowa only watched Joe Dirt, they were confused. 3) The time he dressed as angry Walter from the Big Lebowski and ended up drinking himself into an angry irrational oblivion.
Even though our bar closed, I insisted we go to another bar on the way home. We found one and walked up to the bar. I asked if we could pay cash for three quick shots. She told me I could only order shots and pay in cash. I said that’s exactly what I wanted. There were two waitresses/bartendresses. One of them was a man-woman while the other was a girl who thought she was much prettier than she was. The “pretty” bartender ended up serving us our drinks. She wore a low-cut shirt with a big metallic object in the middle of her breasts. I asked the woman, “Ma’am, what is the giant object between your breasts?” Not a fan of the question, she said, “It’s a bottle opener. It’s for opening bottles.” Here’s the thing, and I say this as a man who is now fully committed to one set of bosoms for the rest of his life: Women, if you wear an incredibly low cut shirt, your breasts will be looked at. If you place any sort of object between your breasts in the incredibly low cut shirt, your breasts will be looked at and the object will be asked about. You can’t be angry. It’s genetics. Just ask my genome troll.
One shot later, we walked back towards Jeff’s apartment. On the way there I really wanted to steal something. Unfortunately, shops were closed and breaking windows is taking good fun too far. Luckily for me, some store had a rolled up rug outside. Clearly this rug was mine now. I picked up the rug and brought it back to Jeff’s. Once there, I unrolled the rug in front of the Small Man statue he still has and uses. Jeff and I then got very hungry and decided it would be a good idea to walk to the grocery store and buy frozen pizza. Then…..grocery store….bought strangers gas even though they lied to us….sat outside by the grill….stained my shirt with….talked with Ian on the phone….woke up. Details are sketchy. I woke up next to an uneaten pizza with a mouth that tasted like cigarettes.
Jeff cooked me a delicious breakfast I was too hung-over to eat and off to the airport I went.
Bachelor Party
Two weeks after the trip to Chicago, it was Jeff’s turn (along with several other close friends and family members) to visit me. It was time for the Bachelor Party. In the interim two weeks I attended another wedding shower where I thought I invented mixing Sprite with whiskey. Using creative license, I hereby claim to be the inventor of the popular 7 and 7 drink you all enjoy. My fiancé also had her bachelorette party that resulted in several pictures of her with a two-foot dildo that she probably thought looked small in comparison to the penis she is used to, her grandmother pole-dancing on a party bus, my mother winning a beer drinking contest and then drunk dialing her sons like a college sophomore to tell them about it, and her aunt walking away amazed at just how naughty elementary school teachers act at parties.
The original plan for the bachelor party was to have everyone meet in Milwaukee for a Brewers’ game and then get hotel rooms and drink about the town. This plan would have been terrible. In fact, looking at this plan now, I have no idea what I was thinking. My dad, who has done his fair share of drinking in his day, suggested we meet in the Quad Cities, get a party bus, ride said party bus to Milwaukee, tailgate, watch baseball, ride previously said party bus back to the Quad Cities, and amicably part ways. For the quantitative types, this plan would result in well over twelve hours of consecutive beverage consumption. Appropriately, this party would be on a Saturday. Normal people don’t work on Saturdays.
Before we get to Saturday though, we should rewind to the middle of that week, when my cousin Matt, my brother Dallas, Jeff, Theo, Dave, and Hampton (formerly My Friend Who Looks Jewish but Isn’t) called and asked if they could all come up the Friday before the Saturday that was to be the bachelor party. I called the fiancé and said, “Babe, you’re going to have to find somewhere to stay this weekend,” and said yes to all of them. (Yes, my fiancé and I lived in sin prior to the wedding. Unfortunately financial sense beat out outdated codes of morality.) Matt arrived first at around 6:00 on Friday night. Matt and I sat in the basement and talked about marriage and children and growing up. He asked me how I was doing. How was I doing? I hadn’t thought about it. In two weeks I’d be married. Never mind the fact I’d dated the same woman for eight years, in two weeks it’d be forever. A seed of uh-oh was planted.
Matt is my older cousin. We had a lot in common growing up, even if our interests and weight fluctuated regularly. He often made up lies about his friends dressing up in tin foil and/or lighting their hands on fire and ringing random doorbells asking for help, which I believe is where I got my keen sense of nonsense and exaggeration. He went through several phases growing up—he once wore a beanie, he once drew nothing but dragons, he once whittled a lot, but the same Matt was always there—quick to irreverence. My favorite Matt memory? Our family would take annual weeklong trips to cabins up in Minnesota. When we were younger, we’d all sit around and joke around. When we were older, we’d all sit around and drink and joke around. One summer, Matt and I drunkenly forced Dallas to play Upwords with us. Because Matt and I had been drinking, we made the rule that he and I could make up any combination of letters and call it a word, but Dallas had to use real words. Dallas didn’t find the rules fair as he couldn’t very well build off of words like TFEWQ and PWQNIIBV. Every time my little mushroom brother would complain Matt would laugh his loud giggle he inherited from Grandpa and tell Dallas he better not cheat. Dallas hated Matt the rest of the vacation.
In an amazing bit of happenstance, Dave, Dallas, and Hampton all arrived within three minutes of each other around 6:30. This is especially amazing if you know that none of them are ever on time for anything ever. Theo and Jeff weren’t expected until later that night.
Logic told us we should go get delicious bar food. Why bar food? Because bar food was served at bars. We started the night at a local rib joint where three of the idiots with me incorrectly ordered pork tenderloin sandwiches. Dave and myself ate a half slab of ribs. This will be important later. Upon leaving the restaurant bar (for those curious Hampton is always the driver. He doesn’t drink. He also looks like a child molester.), we called Nate (formerly my Irish friend) and Karen (his ladyfriend). They were playing darts at a local tavern, so we drove there to meet them. The next three hours passed innocently enough… drinks… popcorn… darts… talk of a late night meal. Eventually Jeff and Theo showed up. Then I called Kelsey’s brother Joe to see if he came to town early. He said of course he did. I asked if he wanted to meet us out. He said of course he did. Not only did we now have another sober driver, we had one that drove a van. Sweet.
Not much can be said about the tavern itself. At one point Hampton and I traded punches to further the game we started at my sister’s May graduation. A game I call “Trading Punches with Hampton.” There is no malice or ill intent. It’s simply a game men play to prove who has higher testosterone levels. It’s important amongst men to have more testosterone then your friends. Around midnight Nate and Karen said they were going to go order delicious loose meat sandwiches at a 24-hour diner in the QC called Ross’ Diner. Joe and I, familiar with the restaurant, explained to the rest of our party what a Magic Mountain was. It was this: A piece of Texas Toast covered in loose meat, covered in French fries, covered in cheese, covered in onions, and thrown onto a plate. The alcohol told all of us this would be a great idea. We hopped in Joe’s van and headed for Ross’. In the van, people talked about how it would make more sense to go to a strip club. Debate ensued. One group wanted delicious loose meat sandwiches. Another group wanted strippers. A compromise was reached: it’s unfortunate no strip joint called Loose Meat Loose Meat offering both existed.
It’s never a good idea to let an inebriated mind take over when food is around. That’s how obesity happens. In addition to ordering a Magic Mountain, I ordered a fountain Diet Pepsi with free refills and drank seven or so. By the end of the meal, part of my body said, “sleep child, you full,” another part said, “eat more, you drunk,” and another part said, “PEPSI! YOU PEPSI!” I felt better than Jeff though. He decided to not only finish his abominable Magic Mountain but Matt’s too. Unbeknownst to him, Kelsey and I were out of toilet paper at the time. In approximately seven hours from that moment, Jeff would hate me. We took our checks and walked towards the door. I noticed Ross’ had 4th of July paraphernalia strewn about the restaurant. Obviously since I was to be married on the 4th of July, I could help myself to any of the Go America gear I wanted. I took two small American flags and put them in my pocket.
At this point, I had been standing in line to pay for approximately sixty-seven seconds which was too long. Kelsey’s brother Joe stood next to me. I asked him if I should pay. He giggled, because he rarely speaks. I said I think I’m going to go. He giggled. I opened the door and walked out. Joe followed. I believe Joe already paid. Joe and I found Matt and Dallas at the van whom I immediately asked, “Guess who didn’t pay for their meal?” Those jerks both responded, “Us!” The four of us then hopped in the van and drive away, waving our triumphant flags of glory.
For some reason Joe dropped us off at a gas station and left. We stood outside the gas station at which some point Jeff, Dave, Hampton, and Theo arrived. We made idle chit chat when all of a sudden a man from across the street with terribly hunched posture hobbled over to the group. He said, “I’m crazy. Whoopee la la.” Okay, not really. During our conversation with this man someone told him I was to be married soon. The strange hobbling man who wanders the streets of Davenport, IA said, “My advice: Get a pre-nup. I lost two businesses to my ex-wives, including that body shop across the street.” I told him how sorry I was to hear about his divorces. He said he should have seen it coming--the woman left him for the Budweiser deliveryman. Agreed. Who doesn’t suspect the driver? At some point his marital wisdom became too much for me to bear, and I said he was a sage and a prophet. I told him he gave the best advice I’d ever heard. He seemed confused by this. I don’t think many people look up to this man. He turned to waddle away triumphantly and I shouted, “I never caught your name, so I’ll call you Henry.” Henry shouted his real name back to us, but it vanished in the distance as he did.
The next morning, after somehow getting home from the gas station and smoking wonderful cigars, I had the privilege of waking up to an angry Jeff asking why the hell I didn’t have any toilet paper. I’ve avoided descriptions thus far. Since our sophomore year in college Jeff has looked similar to how you would picture the chubbier older brother of Jesus. He told me that it’s just cruel to have people eat Magic Mountains at night and not have toilet paper in the morning. Unbeknownst to him, I had both ribs AND a Magic Mountain. I won. This day would be awesome.
After waiting for everyone to arrive at the house, we had the following cast of characters ready to hop on the bus: Myself, Dallas, Jeff, Matt, Dave, Hampton, Joe, Theo, Alan (work buddy), Brent (another work buddy), Mike (Kelsey’s Dad), Jim (Kelsey’s Uncle), My Dad, and Travis (the driver whose real name is probably something else). Drinking for three hours straight on the way to Milwaukee had the following highlights…Dad “paced himself” which meant he didn’t crack open beer seven until two hours into the journey…the bus itself couldn’t simultaneously air condition the cab of the bus and the party area; the driver seemed offended when we told him to sweat it out…Joe giggled a lot, because he rarely speaks, while quietly drinking half a bottle of vodka…I avoided the temptation to steal Mentos from a gas station…we explained my Dad’s Kurt Russell admiration...
Dad’s Kurt Russell admiration: It stems from the fact he read an article when Dallas and I were in junior high about how Kurt Russell never took a drug in his life. For some reason Dad always seems to think every celebrity or strange person is on drugs. Case in point when we drove to my freshman orientation at Minnesota State University, Mankato a nervous fellow freshman got into a slight fender bender with Dad. Dad’s response? “I think I smelled liquor on his breath, and he was probably high.” Even though Dallas and I gave no indication he or I planned to use narcotics, as a good parent Dad continuously told us the evils or marijuana and crack. He usually told us this with a beer in his hand. Dad always cited Kurt Russell as a reason to stay on the path of straight and narrow. “The guy has had a consistently successful career plus he’s sleeping with Goldie Hawn.” Dallas and I would tell him neither of us found Goldie that attractive, and he’d tell us we were wrong. Over the years Dallas and I discovered that we both heard the Kurt Russell story about fifty times. It quickly became a running joke where we’d ask Dad about Kurt Russell and he’d become blissful in his retelling of Kurt’s clean lifestyle. Six years later we let him know that we knew and that Kurt Russell was the sole reason neither of us partook in drugs. Regardless, when Kurt Russell is brought up, he still gets excited—a little too excited.
…Dallas made fun of my ridiculously shiny forehead…I punched Hampton…the CD player broke and ate my Modest Mouse CD...Joe giggled…Dave tried not to fall asleep…Theo took four shots of Beam…Dad explained his Ace Card Theory…
Dad’s Ace Card Theory: In life, every person is given one “ace card.” When you get a DUI, you play your ace card. The first DUI doesn’t carry nearly the consequences the second and third DUIs do. His lesson: never drink drunk if you’ve used your ace card. Inexplicably, he’s never been caught using his ace card.
…I discovered Sour Cream and Onion Ritz chips are amazing…I lost $6 trying to win millions on Illinois lottery scratch cards…Hampton punched me…Joe giggled, a little louder than last time…Dad told us about his confusion about midgets…
Dad’s Confusion About Midgets: Dad is confessed that somewhere in this great Earth there is a hiding place where all the Little People go after Christmas. Why Christmas? Because for some reason Dad thinks that you see little people everywhere around the Holidays. Really you don’t, but I think he confuses the sacrilegious elf imagery adorning our shops with real little people. Either way, he thinks they go somewhere to hide each year when they are done playing elves in our local malls. That’s my dad.
…the driver turned the air conditioning off for us to cool himself off…we yelled at the driver…the air conditioning got turned back on…we arrived, cool and refreshed.
If you’ve never been to Miller Park and wonder why we chose Milwaukee over Wrigley field, here’s why. While we took out the grilling paraphernalia three things happened: We lost Joe. He told someone he was going to steal a football and left. We giggled in his stead. Dave danced in the street. He wanted to earn a dollar.
Dave is my artsy friend. Artsy means always looking a little out there and acting unusual. Today he wore a bizarre hat and a loose button-up shirt. He seemed confused why no one would give an honest man a dollar for dancing in the streets. Most likely it was because he looked homeless and no one thinks homeless people are honest. There were two parking lot attendants at the stadium. One had long flowing blond hair and enjoyed Dave’s dancing. I know this because he started wiggling his crotch and dancing himself when he parked cars. The other man, presumably a failed cop or former military grunt, did not enjoy Dave’s dancing. He kept yelling at the boy, “Sir. Please get out of the street.” Dave, who by this point had no idea what was going on, did not listen. The man both frustrated because he had never experienced any sort of real power in his life shouted and grew red. Luckily for him, Dave got bored and left the street. Grunt seemed happy. Life’s about winning the small battles.
Eventually it was time to go to the game. Right before the game, Brent accidentally called Kelsey on my phone and hung up. We’re not sure why he did this. Also right before the game, Joe came back with a football and went to pour the rest of his vodka into a water bottle. I told him he could get kicked out, expecting a giggle. He told me, “I’ve been to over 23 Dave Matthews Bands concerts. I think I know how to sneak a drink into a venue.” Amazed he could speak, I giggled and left.
The game itself was notable for several reasons. The first was Dad ordered enough beer to drunk an army. He sat in the row behind me to the left. Every time I turned to the left, a recently purchased beer would be passed by me. I even drank some. I hate beer. It tastes like stale goat pee. We also had one of those trans-racial women by us who thought she was infinitely cuter than she was. Boy did she like us, especially Jeff. Jeff did not like her though, because he had a girlfriend whom he loved and an aversion to loud-mouthed obnoxious women. Unfortunately for Dave and me, his aversion to loud-mouthed obnoxious women developed after college. The Mutt was there with two other women. The Mutt and one of the other women were married to men who were probably happy to not be there with them. They kept trying to hook up their non-married friends with any of us willing to sex a stranger. None of us were. Mutt said, “She’s not desperate or anything. We’re desperate FOR her.” I bet that makes her feel good.
At some point during the game, Joe, Dallas, Theo, and I decide to go buy concessions. While I dropped $100 on overpriced t-shirts and Brewers beanie babies, Joe picked up a light blue Brewers bat and walked away without paying. The concession women did not notice. Joe stood there looking at the stand he just stole from and pointed a bat at them. I then took the already stolen bat out of Joe’s hands and walked away. Joe giggled. We then walked back towards our seat when Joe saw an activity where small children could race as their favorite sausage. Yep. Joe thought the girl who worked the activity was cute, so he started to talk to her. He started to talk to her a lot. I heard him say more in three minutes of conversation to this girl than I’d heard him speak in eight years. Joe refused to stop talking to the girl, so the rest of us went and sat down.
Without going into detail, if Baltimore Orioles right fielder Nick Markakis ever commits suicide, I like to think our group had something to do with that. Up until that point he probably never knew his mother never loved him and that his wife used his money to fund the culling of orphans.
The game ended. One of the two teams won! Yeah! As soon as we got on the bus Joe, the same Joe who mentioned three words the entire way up there, explained to us all how he not only got a free hat from a, “hot blond girl,” but got the sausage race girl to agree to Facebook him. For those who don’t know, Facebook is a social networking website whose goal is to stop all direct interaction with real humans. Thus hypocrites the blogger. Because of his double score Joe stopped giggling and started talking. He started talking a lot. At this point he may not have stopped talking. He told us all how he was the greatest human being to walk the planet and that nothing could stop him. He told us how he was such a ladies’ man. Then, without my knowing it, he started to text his sister the following: Dad is pissed. Jay got arrested for stealing Starbursts. Etc. Combining these text messages with Brent’s inexplicable call of my fiancé before the game, Kelsey got really worried. It didn’t help that Kelsey was with her mother who then became worried about her husband, Kelsey’s Dad.
We started to get tired on the five hour ride home (longer because stupid Travis didn’t know how to get home and got lost) and people dozed on and off. I sat by Hampton and thought it would be a great idea to punch him. Instead of punching him in the side as per the rules of the Game, I punched him in the cheek. Everyone then forced Hampton to punch me back in the face. Everyone held me down and Hampton punched me in the upper cheek, right below the eye. The Game was over, Hampton had won. Hampton doesn’t win often, so good for him. We took our seats again and just as everyone started to get real quiet, Alan’s liquor kicked in and he started screaming, “Whoo!” and making fun of Dad. Dad later described Alan as “mouthy when he drank.” Luckily for us Alan used so much energy screaming, he fell asleep before his screaming turned anyone into a savage.
We arrived in Davenport around 1:45am. No one planned to go to a strip club all day, but Theo convinced everyone it would be a good idea. I could barely stand and didn’t want to be another, “that’s when I threw up on the stripper” bachelors, but I caved and got in the car. During the ten minute drive there during which I kept telling Hampton how useless he was for not knowing how to get there without my directions, everyone realized there might be a cover charge. No one liked that idea. Sure enough, when we got to the club it was $10 per person. There was an air show in town that weekend and my friends might have been put off by the pilot in the door that said, “come on in gentleman and have a little fun with us,” because they refused to pay too. One quick ten minute drive (during which stupid Hampton needed more directions) later, and we returned home and immediately slept.
I don’t normally get hung-over, so much to my surprise I had the worst headache of my life the next morning. I then threw up. I then brushed my teeth and looked in the mirror to see I had a black eye where Hampton punched me. I’d never had a black eye my entire life until two weeks before my wedding. I was a winner.
Chaos and Please Kill Me Now
What this blog has thus led you to believe is that the weeks approaching a wedding consist of seeing friends, drinking way too much, and getting black eyes from squirrely dudes with bad moustaches. In between the weekends are weeks, and that’s where stuff like work and planning happened. With the exception of my college roommate Dan becoming my hero, I don’t remember the timelines of any of this stuff. While there may be some creative license used here and there, for the most part this section is honest.
In the month of June 2008 I was a completely useless human being. I was useless at work. More accurate, I was even more useless at work than I normally am. I was useless at home. I built up in my head that there was so much to do at both home and work that I did a poor job doing anything. People at work got frustrated because I didn’t follow through on anything. Kelsey got frustrated because I didn’t follow through on anything. She, rightfully so, took that as a sign I wasn’t excited to get married. This was not the case. I hate tasks and execution. I like normal, mundane lives interrupted with the occasional social interaction. Going to a job I enjoy but have zero passion for followed by going home to work on wedding stuff started to get to me.
This was a completely unfair reaction for me to have. During the entire engagement and especially the last month leading up to the wedding, Kelsey was amazing. Anyone who knows my lovely wife will admit she can have a temper and be prone to mood swings, but she was completely even keel during the wedding planning. She put up with my being an oaf. Everyday I would come home and she had taken a major task off our to-do list. If anyone is interested in getting married, I’d recommend you borrow my wife as a fiancé, because she was excellent.
My journey into uselessness began on a random Thursday in the beginning of June. It’s no secret God disdains the Midwest this year. After a harsh winter and an icky spring, the start of summer welcomed us with record flood waters. Iowa was a warzone. On this random Thursday, Kelsey and I went to sleep in the basement because our house was in the dead center of a projected path of a possible tornado. The basement is where I have what we call my “Man Room.” It has my opulent TV, my excessive movie collection, my unnecessary videogame equipment, and my unread books. At some point in the night Kelsey woke me up to tell me the basement was raining. Sure enough, the entire floor had half an inch of water on it. Before moving on, I want to state that several people in my hometown of Cedar Falls experienced flooding of horrific magnitudes. What I experienced was not flooding. It was a slight inconvenience that happened at a complete inopportune time. We had to take all my movies off of their shelves and take up all of the carpet squares. My room, the room that made me feel like I was part of the home, was gone. All of my stuff was crammed into a tiny storage area.
For some reason the fact my basement was torn apart really bothered me. I’m not one for looking into symbolism, so I won’t attempt to develop a deep reason as to why. I flat out didn’t like not having my sanctuary available. Upstairs we had no room for anything because the wedding had thrown up all over our house, and downstairs we had nothing. The fact I couldn’t put the room back together for a week due to more expected rain really got to me. We did have other stuff to do, and I became fixated on fixing a room that didn’t really need to be put together for another month.
The mood swings that set in because of the flooding didn’t go away when everyone I talked to continued to ask, “How did I feel?” I won’t lie. I was nervous. You should be nervous, it’s a wedding. It didn’t occur to me until my cousin Matt asked me on bachelor party Friday that this was a big deal. I sort of just float through life and show excitement over inconsequential matters—new movies I really like…professional wrestling…a well told Batman story…etc…while the life events that should evoke excitement are met with an, “eh.” The strange thing about it all is that most of the people asking the question don’t really care. They think they are being funny. They’re not. They say the same old tired joke everyone else is. That’s not to say those truly close to me weren’t genuinely curious, I’m talking about the random faceless people I’m forced to interact with on the phone each day. “Dead Man Walking,” said Stranger A. Strangers B, C, D, E, and F laughed.
I wanted to get married. I knew that. I’ll put it in the only terms I know. As an entertainment fan I generally live in a world of anticipation. I look forward to the next great motion picture while waxing nostalgia over past ones. I’m either looking ahead or looking behind. I never care too much about what’s currently in theaters. In other words, I don’t know how to feel about the present. My engagement was similar. I loved the memories Kelsey and I built together. I could picture us in ten years with three kids, but I couldn’t for the life of me realize the wedding was less than one month away. It didn’t seem real. The house slowly filled with pink and green flowers and fabric; gifts started arriving; company continued to visit; and I sat there wanting to live like it was any given month of my life. I couldn’t put that into words before, but I can now. Kelsey deserved better than that.
It didn’t help that people as a whole are an entirely selfish species and don’t do anything to help out anyone. Let’s explain a very simple process: RSVPs. When someone sends out an invitation, they generally include an RSVP. On the RSVP there are two boxes to check, one says, “Yep. I’ll be there.” Another one says, “Nope. Sorry.” All you have to do as a human is grab a pen, pencil, bottle of lipstick, or really anything that upon contact with paper will leave a mark and check one of the boxes. The RSVP always comes with a stamp on it, so you can simply put the RSVP back in the mailbox you just picked it up in. Hell, if you happen to be carrying a pencil while getting the mail, boom, done. Good job. The problem is people don’t send RSVPs for a variety of reasons. This would be okay if an engaged couple didn’t have to have a headcount for every single vendor that they deal with or anything else to do, but unfortunately that’s not the case. Now, plenty of people lost their RSVP, which is understandable, but they called and said, “Hey I can’t make it,” or, “Hey I can make it.” Those are simple phrases. It’s really easy to do.
What happened in our case: I spent an entire Saturday I could have used putting my Man Room back together and called an entire list of people who didn’t bother sending in an RSVP. Every single person I called told me the same thing, “Oh. I thought I sent it in.” No you didn’t. You didn’t think that. I understand you enjoyed me wasting $.42 and five minutes of my life to see whether or not you could come to the wedding, but at least man up and say, “Yeah. I’m an ass. Sorry.” The nice thing about calling everyone though is you really get to see who your friends are. Ian for instance didn’t send in his RSVP at the time of calling because he tried way too hard to come up with something funny to put on the RSVP.
A close friend of mine from high school, Theo’s sister also named Theo, didn’t RSVP. All through high school I considered her my best friend. We would often times talk on the phone late at night or somehow find a way to be in the same place at the same time and watch some asinine TV show together. I called her leading up to my engagement party and never got a response. I called her several times after the engagement and never got a response. I didn’t think much of it until I never received an RSVP from her. I called her the day I called everyone, and she was only person who never called back. Finally I texted her. She texted back five words: “Sorry. Can’t come. Family reunion.” I considered her my best friend and sure, we’ve drifted apart since college, but still, I would have gone out of the way to be at her wedding. Then I got to thinking about her and my relationship and realized she was never that honest with me. Maybe she was more important to me then I was ever important to her. She was the girl I liked to talk to when everything else got on my nerves, and I was just the pleasant fat guy who cheered her up when the assholes she dated spurned her. She would lie to me. She would hide things from me. I would tell her everything. It took eight years and someone too self-absorbed to send back a fucking RSVP to make me realize I’m done with that.
Another close friend of mine, Theo’s brother also named Theo, claimed to not have received an RSVP. He claimed this even though I called him personally to tell him to save the date. When I called him and apologized he didn’t receive an invitation (even though I knew he did) he told me he’d definitely be there. He didn’t show up. I’m not as upset about this though because from the minute he started telling people he wasn’t invited I knew he created the excuse he thought would justify his not coming no matter what he said later. That’s who he is.
It might be petty to focus on two people when several people did go out of their way to spend a holiday with us, but if you had asked me my two best friends in high school I would have said Theo and Theo. The least they could have done is send in the card as to not make my $.42 a waste.
While I may have been regressing into a psychological wreck, useless in all respects, and pissy with my friends, there were plenty of shining lights. For one, my future bride was amazing and did not ever get deterred from the end goal of throwing the best wedding celebration of all time. For two, my brother called once a week to make sure I was sane and doing okay.
This meant a lot. Let me explain my brother’s and my relationship. We make fun of stuff, drink, and play videogames together. When we were little we didn’t get along, partially because he looked like a mushroom and partially because I was too stupid to understand his jokes. I eventually understood his wit and realized he was an okay guy. He’s been a great brother who does a good job of keeping a family of stubborn bastards at ease with his aloof attitude and “lazy” approach at life. He’s been Theo a time or two in his life, but that hasn’t stopped him from living life and becoming a borderline responsible adult who everyone enjoys being around. He will someday be a best-selling and/or highly respected author. His writing is much better than mine. See.
For three, I was getting married! Dammit, that’s exciting. While I psyched myself into the weird what-if fears that come with a life-changing experience, nothing could change the fact I was one lucky dude. For four, I had a redemption project on my plate—the creation of the wedding slideshows.
Not being a big fan of projects, the wedding wore on me much more than it did Kelsey. I wanted a day of relaxation and to have a night of fun with my fiancé. I never expected the US Postal Service would deliver that wish. Dan, a college roommate, could not attend the wedding. For the record, he called about three days after the invites were sent out to let me know. That’s how you RSVP. Anyways, a long box showed up on our doorstep six days before the wedding that contained Rock Band for the Playstation 3. I won’t go into detail about the game, but just know it is awesome. Without gushing, let me explain why I will now replace the expression, “a gift from God,” with, “a gift from Dan.” This gift is exactly what Kelsey and I needed. Kelsey found it addicting and could back off some of the wedding stuff. She had completed it all anyway. She had started to get lost in the details. I could back off the strange mental malaise my brain had forced itself into.
We invited over a friend of ours, Nicole, who we knew would make a perfect lead singer because she has zero issues singing incredibly loud in front of anyone. When Nicole left, Kelsey and I continued to play the game for about an hour. The two of us sat together having fun, no wedding stuff, no one else, just her and me. It felt good. It felt right. For the first time, I stopped worrying about the worry and started being excited for the cause of it.
The week passed, details were taken care of. My biggest concern heading into the wedding was that Kelsey hadn’t slept in a month. She worked late into the night and nervous energy woke her up early. It didn’t help that little issues kept arising—our bus people never sent us the contract they promised (probably because they turned out to be useless), the rehearsal dinner invitation had some misspelled words and incorrect locations, the weather forecasts changed daily, we weren’t sure how to set up the wedding itself, we hadn’t packed for the honeymoon and had people coming into town in five minutes, and sadly, Theo and Veronica broke up.
Four Days, Two Days, One Day, None
Rock Island, Illinois, where the wedding was to be held, is in interesting place. In this case, interesting is a euphemism for scary and pathetic. Of the four Quad Cities, it’s by far the worst. As a whole the Quad Cities has more ugly people per capita than any other area in the country. Of that ugly, Rock Island is a whole special kind of ugly. People wander the streets aimlessly because they can no longer afford tape to hold up the tarp that replaced the broken window in their 1989 Chevy Cavalier. Every cigarette is laced with marijuana. Not one person has normal teeth. It’s rare to find more than three consecutive buildings operational at any given time. Several buildings look condemned but are boarded up lazily. Let’s put it this way: part of my job duties is to find packaging suppliers to help my company. I have two in Rock Island. One hires mentally and physically handicapped people to complete “easier” tasks. The other hires normal Rock Island citizens. Guess which one consistently performs better than the other? If you said, “Author, that’s a retarded question,” I’d say you’re doubly correct.
I bring this up because four days before the wedding Kelsey and I needed to go to an official Rock Island building to obtain a marriage license. Mapquest directions first took me to the nearby county jail/courthouse. I eventually found the correct building. Kelsey and I went in to the office excited to complete this major event in our lives. What we didn’t realize is the goal of all city employees is to suck the fun out of life and the will to live out of you. We tried joking with Frump, the desk clerk, but did not get even a smile. She made it abundantly clear the oath we were about to take was only valid in Rock Island, and we couldn’t get married anywhere else. We said we know. The oath then started. It was your standard answer-in-the-affirmative-when-asked oath. Only in Rock Island would the following question be asked however: “To your knowledge, have you ever been married previously?” Not to my knowledge.
With the wedding license out of the way and the wedding planned, we could relax and wait for family and friends to start pouring into town. Our first guests were to arrive Wednesday. Anne (my sister and a bridesmaid), Barb (Kelsey’s college roommate and bridesmaid), and Allison (Kelsey’s childhood friend and maid of honor) were the first three to arrive. At some point in the night, Joe, (Kelsey’s brother and a groomsmen) came over and Anne, he, and I played Rock Band while Kelsey, Allison, and Barb worried over the fact Nikki’s (Kelsey’s college roommate and bridesmaid) flight was cancelled and now had to spend the night with a stranger in Detroit. Really though, who hasn’t done that before? Then Rachael (Kelsey’s fifth and final bridesmaid and our designated third wheel) showed up. The house was getting packed. What wasn’t packed was anything for the honeymoon. This made both of us nervous, Kelsey more so because as a male, I can pack in five minutes for a trip of any given length. God bless our genetics.
I got a call from Ian who told me his connecting flight from Chicago to Moline had been cancelled. I told him to call Jeff and see if he could stay there. I then forgot to call Jeff and tell him I told Ian to do this. When I called Jeff an hour later he made sure to let me know how worthless I am when it comes to passing on prompt information.
The moment I knew the wedding had officially started was when a random mixture of four people listed above were playing Rock Band and a random woman I’d never seen before walked into the basement and started handing out Leinenkugels. Since a stranger that hands out free beer is better than a friend who doesn’t, I didn’t even flinch. Thirty seconds after The Stranger made herself at home, Kelsey’s Aunt Kris walked down the stairs. Kris played the music for our wedding. I mention this now only because she didn’t seem to understand the point of practicing for hours to master Rock Band when you could learn to play an actual instrument. Obviously she doesn’t understand that the goal of our generation is to find computer simulations for all formerly real activities. I eventually learned from Kris the strange woman who entered had a name, Cyle (with a hard c; that may be the wrong spelling but again, creative license) and was her partner. I learned this approximately two hours after being offered beer. I also learned Cyle wasn’t strange at all, just generous.
For the record, Kris is one of my favorite people on Earth for the following reasons: she introduced me to Starbucks; she not only understands why I alphabetize my movie collection, but she said people who think it’s silly I alphabetize my movie collection are fools; she brought me to a fetish store in San Francisco called, “Your Mother Doesn’t Know;” her dog is cool; and she played a beautiful guitar at the wedding.
With Nikki’s and Ian’s flights being cancelled, we had only one more person we expected to arrive that night: Kelsey’s Aunt Mindy. She eventually arrived a little after midnight, we greeted her at the airport, and Kelsey and I went home to sleep. We thought we were done with the airport for the time being.
We thought this incorrectly. One of my ushers, Justin, was scheduled to land at around 8:30 the following morning. I completely forgot about this. Originally I planned to have Ian pick Justin up from the airport, so I never made any sort of mental note to myself to follow through on this. To top it off, I put my phone on silent before going to sleep. The next morning, Kelsey and I woke up to her cell phone ringing. Caller ID told us Kelsey’s phone didn’t recognize the number. Kelsey and I both have an irrational fear of the phone, so we didn’t answer it. Now awake, I checked my phone to see Ian and Justin both called twice, and Ian texted me, “You gonna pick up Justin?” Justin had been at the airport for an hour.
He and I met as sophomores in high school. We bonded one night driving around late at night looking for a better party to be at then the one we left. We ended up driving by all the houses of all the girls we knew to see if they were awake. Being unbelievably creepy made for great bonding. We enjoyed each other in high school because we were both odd. He is a spastic individual, who is very loyal to those he respects. He’s currently in the Marines learning some top-secret stuff that he can’t tell us. He tends to start talking very fast when he gets worked up about something. I worked with him throughout high school at the Cedar Falls Lutheran Home. We wore purple shirts, black jeans, and served elderly people various flavors of pureed food. Every day after work we’d leave covered in dishwater and old person food. Justin somehow lost his virginity our senior year in high school when he stopped by a girl’s house after work wearing the purple and black and food. Even showered I couldn’t get anyone to have sex with me in high school. Also, my mom is convinced that Justin stole all of our spoons whenever he ate ice cream over at house. My mom might need serious psychological help.
At some point that day, I met with Damon, the former Baptist Minister and current employee of the retail corporation I once called my employer. We met to go over the final notes about the wedding, as he was to marry Kelsey and I.
At some point that day, Kelsey and I packed for the honeymoon.
At some point that day, I thought it was great so many people came to town for us.
At some point that day, I wondered how much a one-way to flight to Japan cost.
At some point that day, I found out it was out of my price range.
At some point that day, my old high school crush April called me. April is great, but one thing you must know about her is that if she calls, she will talk to you for well over an hour. Even though it was the day before my wedding, which she RSVPd for properly and would attend thank you very much, she wanted to talk just as normal.
At some point that day, I told April to stop talking and I’d talk to her more the next day.
You’d think with one day until d-day, there would be more stories from the day. Alas, there is not. I really should have skipped this section of the blog. It didn’t help that I wrote it half asleep in a chair after a long week. I woke up at one point to find I had written the sentence, “That’s when the tim and the iced.” Let’s go ahead and assign that phrase the meaning, “Let’s move on to something better.”
Rehearsal/Day of Wedding
When planning a wedding, conflict will arise. It is inevitable. What is no good about this conflict is that it generally involves family members and you, family members and your spouse, or you and your spouse. I don’t like conflict over real issues. I’ll debate to the grave over subjects of little importance (for example: Indiana Jones 4 is a terrible terrible movie. It is one of the worst movies I’ve ever seen. People who say, “Yeah, but it’s Indiana Jones,” are the same type of people who claim Bush’s presidency is a success because since That Day we haven’t been attacked. Any movie that features Cate Blanchett’s face melting for no God Damned reason, a spaceship hidden within the lost city of gold, the alcoholic kid from Transformers swinging through the trees with monkeys, and inconsistent magnetism is bad. The fact, “it’s Indiana Jones,” makes it worse. Got that? Good.) See how that works? If you were to come up to me with a differing opinion, I would not let you leave until you either conceded in argument or hated me, whatever came first--of which I have no preference. I don’t like arguing about is real issues. (for example: “Jay, you know that girl you really like, and I am constantly asking you for updates on your feelings about? Well, I made out with her even though I had no feelings for her. I just couldn’t believe someone who put so little effort into looking good could get a girl I couldn’t. I’m glad I proved you wrong,” Theo said. “I forgive you Theo,” I said.)
The thing about inevitable conflicts is that they are generally laughed about a few years later but never seem funny at the time. Theo agreed to help us send out the rehearsal dinner invitations. This was a great help to us, but when they arrived, my lovely bride’s first name was spelled wrong and the name of the restaurant the event was to be held at was wrong. Let the record show Kelsey (according to the invite: Kuelsey), did not bat an eye at the misspelling. She laughed and thought it was amusing. Me? It ticked me off. I wanted them reprinted. I hate it when people misspell my first name. Partly because if you misspell my first name you clearly have a lot of issues and should probably give up on life and partly because I think it’s disrespectful. For whatever reason, we humans take great pride in the arbitrary set of letters assigned to us at birth, even if the arbitrary set of letters combines to form gibberish, like Xanataka.
I called Theo to see if we could get the invitations replaced thinking to myself, “Theo will obviously say yes. Theo will see right away that this needs to be fixed.” What I failed to realize is that Theo and I are a lot alike. Instead of seeing the problem as something needing to be fixed, Theo saw it as a personal failure, felt incredibly guilty, and started to convince Theo’s self that the current invite would be fine. That’s what I would have done. That’s what Theo did.
With my obsessive-compulsive nature and weakened psychological state, I started to worry that the rest of the details about the rehearsal would also be sloppy. Luckily for me, I was wrong. I won’t bore you with details of the rehearsal itself. We all met at the site of the wedding and walked through the wedding. Really, that was it. The only real notable issue was that I wore makeup. I did not wear makeup to cover up the black eye Hampton gave me two weeks ago. Luckily for Hampton, that was gone. I used makeup to cover up the two giant symmetrical zits the stress and the stressful overeating had created on my chin.
There I stood. A man who spent the prior three weeks in a tanning bed and used Crest White Strips now stood outside wearing makeup. In case you’re curious, my dog is small and has a pink collar; I moved out of my apartment to move into a house Kelsey owns and rebuilt with her father; and I like Gene Kelly movies. Gender roles be damned!
After the rehearsal, everyone ended up at the correct restaurant for the rehearsal dinner instead of the fictional one listed on the invitation. This was good. I didn’t want to have to fish any of my friends out of some bizarre fantasy land the night before I got married. I won’t go at length explaining each and every person there. We ate, we drank, we told stories about the time growing up when Ian lied about the theater being closed because he was too lazy to go see the movie Congo and thus didn’t want anyone else to go either. I told the groomsmen to behave and not to drink too much that night. They looked at me as if I told them, “Then I rolled over and stabbed your sister in the eye.”
At some point, Kelsey and I decided it would be a good idea to leave. People kept buying me drinks and according to American custom I didn’t turn any of them down. We then realized I didn’t know where I was staying that night. For weeks we wondered where I was to sleep the night before the wedding. We didn’t want to see each other wedding morning, but we didn’t want to waste money on a hotel room either. I could have slept on one of the many visitors’ hotel room floors, but then that would just be stupid. We decided I’d sleep in the basement. My Man Room My repaired sanctuary.
When we got home Kelsey went to bed, and I went downstairs. I attempted to write a bit. I don’t know what I attempted to write. At first I tried writing obscure, random letters to marketing campaigns I disagree with, but none of those worked out. I tried to write brief snippets of what eventually became this blog in the form of letters to friends. I tried to put down what about the wedding made me so nervous, but I’m not a good writer and have no idea how to deal with emotion. I eventually fell asleep on my laptop with an unfinished story titled, “Two Weddings and a Flood,” that had two and a half poorly written sentences: Tomorrow is my wedding day. I’m getting married tomorrow. I can’t believe….That’s it. That’s the entire story. I had trouble sleeping that night, which most people would. It’s like the night before Christmas only better because the gifts I’d get the next day would be a financial burden on several families instead of just one. Thus there would be more. At some point my phone rang, I saw it was my friend Brad. I couldn’t think of a reason he would be calling me, so I silenced the call, shut the computer, and dreamt of a ninja on a cloud skateboard, sent here by a Chinese cop to save the future baby. Let the record show, my last dream as a “free man” involved ninjas. Ten points to me.
The next day I told the groomsmen to be ready at 9:00am. I would pick them up. We would head to Blackhawk Lodge (the site of the wedding) and set up chairs and tables, etc. I woke up at 8:50. Yes, I overslept for my wedding day. If only the stupid behavior ended there. I texted the guys and told them to go ahead and sleep in—I’d be there at 9:45. Justin called me and said they were already awake and to get my ass over here. I then texted everyone back except for Joe and said I’d just meet them all out there. We head out to the Lodge to start setting up decorations at around 9:20. At 10:00, Joe called and asked, “Um. Did you guys leave without me?” Yes Joe, sorry. Times I forgot Joe that day: 1.
Ian is a man of many talents. He can help you get a balanced, future-oriented high risk stock portfolio. He can chase tornadoes. He can explain every little nook and cranny of San Antonio to people. Another talent he has is he knows how to set up events. He walked into the room, surveyed the tables, and knew exactly where every piece of furniture should be set to give people optimal room. It cut our set up time in half. This was good, because while everyone was working up a sweat moving tables and chairs I tried to get the slideshow movies I created to work on the projector.
For the two weeks leading up to the wedding, my responsibility was to create the wedding slideshow videos. They were your standard pictures set to music motifs, but it took quite some time because I not only wanted to sync the pictures with the beats of songs, but because I’m incredibly arrogant and wanted a lot of pictures of me looking awesome. I made two false assumptions while making the video: The first, I would be able to transfer the videos to my work computer, hook it up to the projector I borrowed from work, and play the video. The second, if that didn’t work, I would be able to connect my Mac to the projector. Because neither of these assumptions was true, I had the privilege of a Sitcom Wedding Day!
A combination of the fact our chairs for the ceremony did not arrive and the vendor who was supposed to deliver them was closed, the fact Kelsey and the girls were due to show up any minute, and the fact I desperately needed to find a way to connect my Mac to the projector allowed for Dallas, Jeff, Matt, John, and Joe to hop in a car and go look for an adapter of some sort.
Meet John. He has yet to be discussed because his biggest pre-marital role took place in Des Moines during the trip I magically erased. In addition to Justin, he was an usher for the wedding. He was the best friend I had in college that I did not already know from my hometown. Our friendship started oddly enough—we both took an impossibly difficult Monday/Wednesday night econ course. On the first day of the semester the class dismissed, and we both walked off in the same direction. It became very clear that we both were going across campus in the same direction, so we started to make awkward small talk with each other. It turned out both of us had girlfriends two years younger then us that started at Iowa State that year. We continued to make small talk throughout the semester and both assumed we’d never see each other after the class was over. Then we started to have every single class together. At some point we figured out that our Friday schedules ended at 1:00, and we both went home to play videogames after class. We decided it would make way more sense if we played videogames and drank Long Island iced-teas together. Thus, Long-Island Fridays were born. Jon, his wife Jess, Kelsey, and I have remained close and rarely see each other without someone feeling like death the next day.
Back to my Sitcom Wedding Day…you’ve all seen Full House. Some of you actually pretend to like Full House for some reason. Remember the episode with Uncle Jesse’s and Aunt Becky’s wedding? Chaos! Jesse ended up parachuting into an apple cart and got sent to jail. Becky freaked out, but all ended well. Or what about Chandler running away and smoking cigarettes the day of he and Monica’s wedding? Turk forgetting to get the day off for Carla’s wedding? Marshall getting his hair cut off before walking down the aisle with Lily? Sitcoms…where a wedding is never a wedding without some added drama. Mine? I had to find an adapter to connect a Mac computer to a business PC. If you know anything about Macs, they sometimes have a stubborn refusal to work with any sort of business product. If they did, they wouldn’t be cool and artsy and materialistic people like me wouldn’t buy them.
We started our search at the Best Buy in Moline. Because of the quantity of people in the car, Joe had to sit in the back “SUV” section with no seat. He did so without saying a word. Because of this, we initially forgot him in the back of the car at Best Buy. Times I forgot Joe that day: 2. They of course did not sell Apple products like some Best Buy stores. This is because people in the Illinois Quad Cities buy computers with names like Delf and Catway at Costco. They called over to the Davenport store to see if they carried the adapter and sure enough, they did.
Let me now explain something about the Quad Cities. There are four of them. I’ve mentioned that. There are two cities on the Illinois side and two cities on the Iowa side. For those unfamiliar with geography, a big scary river named the Mississippi divides the two states. Thus to cross from the Iowa QC to the Illinois QC, one needs to cross a bridge. While the bridge takes no more than one minute to cross, many people, myself included, have created a strange mental block that makes it seem like going across the river will take a lot more time than it does.
Evidently the River Effect hits strangers too, because no one wanted to cross the river to go to the Best Buy in Davenport that we knew for a fact had the needed adapter to save my wedding, my marriage, and my life. Matt made the suggestion to go to Radio Shack, even though no one has ever found anything they need at any Radio Shack anywhere in the country. We drove there anyway. I diagonally parked across two parking spots to indicate panic and hurry. We walked in, several of us not showered, and walked around the store. Joe enjoyed looking at the hard-bodied Latin girl who worked there. Dallas enjoyed shopping for VHS rewinders and giant calculators whose selling point was, “It’s the size of a notebook! Never lose your calculator again!” About three minutes into our Radio Shack experience, we started to question why the chain still existed. They sold nothing of value and their staff, aside from exciting my brother in law, added nothing.
Upon leaving Radio Shack, I demoted Matt from the front seat to the back for his absolutely stupid idea. We then went to Staples. We almost forgot Joe in the car again (Times I forgot Joe that day: 3) Would they sell a Mac adapter at a store aimed at attracting small businesses? Of course not. We did get to see my Nebraskan relatives leaving the store however. They wore awesome knee high socks with their sandals. My one cousin, Logan, is a rather portly young lad who acts forty years older than his age (17). He enjoys antiquing and singing in a barbershop quartet. All solid hobbies for sure, but not something you’d expect from a seventeen year old. To his credit, he looked thrilled to be at Staples.
Exactly forty-five minutes after being told the piece we needed was in Davenport, we resigned ourselves to having to cross the river. Forty-seven minutes after being told the piece we needed was in Davenport, we were at the Davenport Best Buy. Joe started to feel nauseous at some point during the drive, so to help him out I started to drive like Dale Earnhardt Jr, pre hilariously ironic death (Times I remembered Joe that day: 1). We picked up the adapter and then received a call from one of the bridesmaids or mothers or something that told us to pick up three bags of ice for the wedding. Unfortunately the only place in the car to hold ice was where Joe sat. On the way back to the Lodge, poor forgotten and queasy Joe had to now sit on bags of ice. Just to make him feel more comfortable, I started to tell him of the many ways I planned to sex his sister. Joe couldn’t have been happier that in three hours I’d be his brother in law. I knew this because he started to giggle.
At the Lodge, we immediately got yelled at by Justin and Ian who in our absence set up the “missing” chairs that finally arrived. I ignored them because I was the damned groom and could do whatever the hell I wanted to as long as the bride allowed it. Four hours to go, I set up the slideshow. If this didn’t work, I would have killed someone. Probably Justin. He deserved it anyways for stealing all my god-damned spoons. I had to eat chicken noodle soup with a fork all through high school. I plugged the projector into the Mac and wah-la, beautiful pictures appeared on the screen. The wedding (at least my portion of it) were saved. I then realized I hadn’t had anything to eat, the sandwiches we ordered were gone, and I needed to cross the river, shower, and re-cross the river in the course of one hour.
Jeff and I left the Lodge and stopped at the worst Fazoli’s on the planet. Appropriately, my last meal as a free man was spaghetti. That’s appropriate because spaghetti is my favorite food. Do you see how that works? I dropped Jeff off at The Hotel, got home, confused the hell out of my poor dog by essentially pouring spaghetti down my throat, jumped in the shower (which was cold because I didn’t want to get heated up wink wink nudge nudge), and put on my suit. Already having slept in that day, I didn’t want to miss my 3:00 time to be at The Hotel for pictures…I looked at the clock to see it was 2:57. Great. I hopped in the car and headed for hotel. Halfway across the river I realized I forgot my tie. Double great. For what seemed like the 80th time that day I crossed the river again, went home, and grabbed the tie. Even though I took a cold shower and had the air conditioning on full blast, I could not stop sweating. All the nervous energy, all the tension, all the what-ifs came to a head right then and there. Once I walked into the hotel (at 3:12), it was done. Momentum would carry me through. Was I ready? Did it matter?
The Hotel Part One
The irony about writing an incredibly (too) long catch-up blog about a wedding that happened over a month ago, is that several other events happen within the month that warrant talking about. To quote the horrid song made-famous by Aerosmith featured in Rock Band, “the train kept a rollin’.” I could bore you with the insidious details of a very hectic month, but I won’t. Maybe after you all learn about my wedding and the wily love-making that occurred on my honeymoon, I could write another forty page blog about the last two weeks of July. It would start, “I woke up in the morning and went to work. Work was really exciting! I was able to find a cheaper packaging product than I found the day before. Go Google!” Look forward to it. I’ll title it Marriage 2: Real Life.
Where were we? I believe we last saw me as I walked through The Hotel’s doors around 3:12 on my wedding day. Let’s carry on…
Partly because of the fact I spent the hour before it became 3:12 rushing around like a mad man, eating spaghetti, and forgetting my tie, partly because of my acute obesity, and partly because of nerves, I could not stop sweating once I got to the hotel. I looked good in the suit, damn good, but I wouldn’t look good if I continued to create my own personal humidity chamber. When I arrived at Jeff’s room everyone immediately commented on my perpetual sweating problem. They were either complete jerks or worried I had some sort of glandular problem because they kept probing and probing. Eventually I found some sort of towel that became my designated sweat towel for the night. I stood there as the suit I wore became a microwave me and wiped my balding head dry every three minutes or so. It’s a good thing I was about to get married, because Kelsey’s love got grandfathered in when I still had hair and pretended to care about my appearance. I’m now free to gain nine hundred pounds and bald away. You all thought my forehead shined before?
As is custom, we men tried to put our ties on, did a poor job of it, and eventually had my dad do it. We made fun of each other. We made fun of me. We drank beer. I don’t even like beer, but I drank beer. It was lime flavored. Lime flavored Skittles are my favorite. I should have had pre-marriage Skittles but I did not. The day of the wedding, this is how my brain worked. Annoying yes?
At some point our photographer, Stephen walked in. He handed me a small reddish-pink book Kelsey had bought me two weeks prior. I don’t think either of us knew what to do, but he just said, “Um, here, I was supposed to give you this.” I took the book and all the smart asses sitting about the room said, “Oooh story time!” They then backed me into the corner, and with tongue firmly in cheek, I started to read I Like You by Sandol Stoddard. Looking back on this day, my second favorite moment will be the reading of this book.
When Kelsey gave me the book a week before, we read it together on the couch. We liked it, but in her opinion I didn’t like it enough. She wanted to give it to me at the perfect time—the perfect moment that I’d remember forever. With the chaos of the day now behind me, standing in the middle of my closest friends reading a book they feigned interest in, didn’t seem perfect. It didn’t start perfect. It became perfect.
The book, whose text can be found here, describes why people like whom they like. Essentially, we like people who see the same bits of absurdity in reality that we do. Now, as I showed the room the pictures and read the book, we all made fun of it. Then we got to the reason Kelsey bought the book. The book said, and I read:
On the 4th of July I like you because it's the 4th of July
On the fifth of July, I like you too
If you and I had some drums and some horns and some horses
If we had some hats and some flags and some fire engines
We could be a HOLIDAY
We could be a CELEBRATION
We could be a WHOLE PARADE
See what I mean?
Even if it was the 999th of July
Even if it was August
Even if it was way down at the bottom of November
Even if it was no place particular in January
I would go on choosing you
And you would go on choosing me
Over and over again
That's how it would happen every time
I don't know why
I guess I don't know why I really like you
Why do I like you
I guess I just like you
I guess I just like you because I like you.
Around “fifth” on the second line I started to cry. She liked me. I liked her. I looked up and at least three others cried too. I won’t mention their names. In a moment you can’t fake, each guy there showed me why they were there.
I closed the book. We men looked around the room and made the awkward, “What? We men we no cry,” laugh, pretended it never happened, and went on making fun of each other. At this time Stephen said, “by the way, I was supposed to take you downstairs right away.” Thanks, Stephen. I left the groomsmen. It was now time for me to see my bride. This would be the first time I would see her in her dress. We took the elevator down and my stomach started to tighten. I wouldn’t say I felt like death, because death probably feels much worse. But in a way my life flashed before my eyes. Every girl I once crushed on, every kiss that never happened, every fleeting vagina were no more--they didn’t matter. The nerves started to bleed into anticipation. What would she look like? What would the woman I spent the last eight years courting look like in The Dress?
Stephen and I walked outside, and he told me stop. Kelsey stood around the corner, out of sight. The two moms stood on the stairs waiting to see the first look. It’s strange because the world felt calm for a minute. My heart pounded, my stomach lightened, and I thought…
… of the time Kelsey broke her thumb her senior season in softball and how cute she looked in her cast. I thought of the time I got my wisdom teeth taken out and Kelsey brought me over pureed spaghetti. I thought of the time I first kissed her by asking her, “Um Kelsey, could I kiss you?” I thought about her first night in college, when her computer got a virus and her lamp crashed to the floor, and she called me to help fight dorm monsters. I thought about the first engagement. I thought about the time we drove by high school kids who had got in a car accident and she yelled out the window at them, “Learn how to drive.” I thought about the times we went to California. I thought…
Then Stephen interrupted. He told me to take two steps forward. I complied. I then saw Kelsey. I thought…
…Wow.
The strange, nervous what-ifs washed away. It’s as if they were never there. If ever I was sure about anything, it was that the woman standing before me was to be mine, now and forever.
The Honeymoon
It’s time to use more creative license. At the hotel we took some pictures of us as a couple, took some pictures with the bridal party, joked, laughed, etc etc. We then got in a bus and drove to the wedding. The driver was a jerk. Yada yada. At the wedding, people started showing up, we hid in a room. We took more pictures. Let’s skip all that. It was fun, it was time consuming, it was part of the day, but nothing stands out as particularly story worthy after what was clearly the emotional apex of the blog. We all need some time to recover. I’m a fan of non-linear storytelling (see Lost). We all want to move into the ceremony and the celebration. In doing that now however, we’d have two emotional sections in a row followed by the honeymoon and our return home. That would be two emotional sections followed by two epilogues. The third Lord of the Rings movie tried that, and it didn’t work. Thus, while we all sit and think about how great of a couple Kelsey and I are, I’m going to explain the honeymoon. I suppose I should preface any section about the honeymoon with this: Spoiler Alert—we got married. I hope that doesn’t take any of the dramatic oomph out of my upcoming description of the ceremony.
I should also mention I really really want this blog to be done. Some could say, “Why don’t you just finish it then?” The answer: I can’t. I wanted to skip the honeymoon and the ceremony. Anyone reading this was probably at the ceremony and knows all about it. The honeymoon itself will read just like any other blog…me making fun of a situation I’m in. So here’s the deal: If you’re tired of reading, or tired of me, feel free to skip the honeymoon section. Come back to it later. Go ahead and finish. Call it a day. However, if you are an obsessive compulsve completist like myself, read on.
We had a two-legged honeymoon. The first portion of the honeymoon took place in New York City. Now, as much as I’d like someday to be a rich and famous celebrity, I don’t think it will ever happen. One, I’m way too lazy. Two, I can’t follow the celebrity creed and proclaim New York to be, “The greatest city in the world.” It’s not true. New York can’t possibly be the greatest city in the world because it is filled with about 8,000,000 New Yorkers. For those who haven’t met a real one, a New Yorker likes the Yankees, shouts obscenities at strangers because what do they care, they’re from New York, sells hot dogs on a street corner, and tries to sell you a city bus tour. My favorite New Yorker is the New Yorker that pretends to not speak English even though it states clearly in his shop door that he has worked and owned a business in Times Square for fifty years.
If New York is so bad, why did we choose to go there on what’s supposed to be the best trip of our lives? Because, this is Yankee Stadium’s final year and Kelsey and I wanted to see it before it died. It was Kelsey’s idea. Isn’t she great? On top of going to Yankee Stadium, we got to see the Yankees play the Red Sox, which was great for an antagonistic wee lad like me—I could wear Red Sox clothing and talk trash with people whose brains stopped evolving ages ago.
We arrived in New York around 9:30pm the night after the wedding. Neither one of us had slept more than three hours of quality sleep in the last couple of months, so we were both dead tired. Unfortunately our hotel room was in the heart of Times Square and its mere location made us feel guilty about wanting to go to bed. We decided to walk the streets. Times Square was packed with people walking around with no real plan or goal in life, trying to find a neat cheap trinket that said: I “heart shaped drawing” NY. Kelsey and walked for about forty minutes before we asked ourselves, “What the hell are we doing? This is stupid. Times Square sucks.” With nothing to do, we decided to check out a comedy club across the street from the hotel.
I like comedy. In fact, I love comedy. I don’t get why people are serious at all. Seriousness only leads to arguments which lead to sadness. My not taking anything seriously can have adverse side effects—my boss at my first job never “got me” because I didn’t pretend to be a big bad authority figure like he did—my wife gets irritated when I don’t feel like talking about a serious issue without interjecting awkward humor—people at my current job wonder if I in fact do anything productive at all. Oh well. I’m not saying I’m hilarious. I’m just saying I enjoy hilarity, and I enjoy critiquing those who are in the business of providing it.
At the comedy club we saw six stand-up comedians that firmly established the following: woman stand-ups who continuously say the word, “pussy,” all jive like—not funny. Sorry. I also learned that any time a club announces a comedian as been, “featured on Last Comic Standing,” and not, “a finalist on Last Comic Standing,” they are REALLY not funny. That means they have only one joke that made them worthy of being put on a watered down TV show’s commercial.
After the comedy club, we went back to the hotel room and fell immediately asleep (post coitus). The next day we continued to walk around the trash-filled streets of New York City. We wanted to go to Rupert’s Hello Deli, but it was closed. We did see Mr. Big from Sex and the City walk by us. We are now kind of famous because of this. A few hours after walking around Times Square growing sad and tired for a country who feels no shame when it comes to advertising, we went to Wicked on Broaday. Coming from a complete entertainment junky, I hereby declare Wicked to be the greatest two and a half hour entertainment experience ever. One, the Wizard of Oz just kicks butt. Two, it’s always great when stories make the evil characters sympathic. And three, if you watch the play and listen to Pink Floyd’s “The Wall,” you’ll notice all sorts of strange coincidences. Yep.
After Broadway, we sped walk back to the hotel, changed clothes, washed off our feet, put on our matching Red Sox gear, and walked towards the subway. We were given specific instructions by the hotel clerk how to board the subway and get to Yankee Stadium. The only problem—for some reason New York had shut off most of the entrances to the subway. This led to a street packed of tourist Red Sox fans not knowing where the hell to go. Like all Go Americans, none of us wanted to admit this. Kelsey and I casually followed a group of people who looked like they knew. Frustrated, Kelsey finally asked the guy we followed if he knew how to get to Yankee Stadium. He did not. We eventually found someone who said they did, and the idiot group of people in Red Sox clothing naively followed him underground. Luckily, he brought us to the subway and not some underground slave camp. And boy were we ever glad to be off the hot street! There was nothing like cramming into a below ground sub with broken air conditioning along with hundreds of other sweaty baseball fans. Everyone made the same Red Sox versus Yankees jokes. It became clear to both Kelsey and I we were not going to take the subway home. It was obnoxious and smelly enough without intoxicants and Theos.
When we arrived at Yankee Stadium, everyone started to call us out for the shirts we wore—even cops. Once inside the stadium we were able to see what Yankee Stadium was all about: inconveniencing you, the consumer. The concession lines were too long and bled into the walkway so as to prevent anyone from walking to their seat. The people who were truly passionate about their Yankee baseball moonlighted as drunks, so they were crude and completely disrespectful. The bathrooms had entrance and exit doors, but New Yorkers used both as entrance doors. The New Yorkers would get furious when the entrance line at the exit door moved slower than the entrance line at the entrance door. Once in our seats, the second to last bleacher row in left field, we met the Yankees fans seated next to us. One was a Latino man named Julio. The other was a true blue New Yawker named Ted whose wife and two friends rooted for the Red Sox. They started the evening very friendly. Then they started to drink. And drink. And drink. Infinite infinite. Julio started to get really crude with his comments. His favorite activity was to profanely ask the definition of Red Sox players names. “What the F is an Ortiz?” he’d ask. “What the F is a Papelbon?” he’d shout. Because names have to mean something. “What the F is a Coco?” I answered him: it’s a bean, primarily used in chocolate. Julio, offended by my awesome trash talk said, “I’m f’in Latino. I think I know what cocoa beans are.” Good for him.
As for Ted, I’m 95% sure his wife left him after the game. He got absolutely annihilated, shouted at everyone around him, tripped over his seats and fell on top of the woman seated in front of him, hit his wife when the Red Sox scored, etc. After the 900th time he shouted, “Red Sox suck,” I asked him why it mattered if the Yankees beat the Red Sox if the Sox suck so bad. Confused, he turned to Kelsey and asked, “Who the F is this guy?” That’s my second bit of awesome trash talk. Don’t make me bust out my “your mother” jokes.
The game ended in the tenth inning. The Yankees won. Manny Ramirez could have won the game in the top of the ninth, but he decided not to lift the bat off his shoulder in a well-publicized loafing that will net him an additional $40 million over the course of his career than he would have got if he tried hard and swung the bat. Life.
While I’m not an ardent fan of the Red Sox this year—I root for all teams save for the Yankees—seeing the Yankees win still pissed me off. Because of this, while I walked out of the stadium I started to shout and clap, “Tampa Bay Tampa Bay,” until Kelsey told me to stop before I got us killed. (For those who don’t follow baseball, Tampa Bay is in first place) A very ugly woman told me I shouldn’t be shouting Tampa Bay in Red Sox clothing. Since no one will care about our actual exchange, let’s just say she had zero facts straight, and I was able to relieve some of my frustration over the Yankees’ win by arguing with her. Kelsey was not amused. We were hot, we were irritated, and we decided not to get on the subway. Unfortunately, there weren’t any cabs around, so we started to walk up a random street in the Bronx. I felt like the night might end with me purchasing a rapper a cigar.
Long story short, we found a cab, we got to the hotel, we slept three more hours, went to the airport the next day, spent twelve hours in planes or airports, landed in Aruba, got on a bus, rode said bus to our resort, discovered that Aruban McDonalds have Chips a’Hoy McFlurries, walked into our resort, checked into our resort, went to our room, left our room, ate at a buffet, and went back to our room. At this point, I had to both make brown potty and shave my face. Kelsey said she’d wait in the room because even married people don’t poo in the same room, and then we could go out and see what our resort had to offer. I was in the bathroom for three, maybe four minutes. When I came out, Kelsey was dead asleep. It was 8:30. There would be no love-making upon the shores of Aruba that eve. Instead of waking her up, I made a delicious drink with our in-room liquor dispensor (all rooms should have these), grabbed my notebook, and started what will eventually become my best-selling tell-all book. Four hours later, I was happy, drunk, and ready to sleep.
The next day we were able to discover our resort…and it was magnificent. It felt like a palace. I apologize in advance for a lack of compelling stories coming out of Aruba. Kelsey and I both grew up with fathers who like to do things on vacation. Because of this, Kelsey and I both grew up wanting to do nothing on vacation. Instead of spending one hundred dollars each day on some touristy Aruban activity, we decided to take advantage of the all-inclusive resort we’d already paid for.
Here was our Aruba: We’d wake up around 8:30-9:00am, eat breakfast, sit at the pool, read, occasionally drink, eat lunch (for me, always pizza and fries), sit at the pool, read, occasionally drink, eat supper (for me, always pizza and fries), walk around the resort, occasionally drink, read, go to sleep. We snorkelled one day and shopped another, but other than that, we just relaxed. I read about six Kurt Vonnegut books. Though that is probably fairly obvious to anyone whose read his books and read the introduction to this blog.
I don’t know if I’ve ever blogged about my all-inclusive trips to Mexico. Let’s just say I spent a majority of the time drinking in a pool on those trips. I had every intention of doing the same in Aruba. Unfortunately Arubans make the drinks entirely too strong. You are served a drink in a cup a little bit large than a Dixie filled with approximately two shots worth of alcohol. Not knowing this, I told Kelsey the drinks will be weak and we could drink as much as we wanted. Thus the first day, after Kelsey got thirteen hours of sleep, we started to drink before we ate any food. One hour and four drinks later Kelsey said she didn’t feel good. She ran upstairs to the room and promptly threw up all over the bathroom. She then passed out for another five hours. Romance! Don’t worry though, she eventually woke up and Arubanly sexed me.
Aruba is an interesting place. It’s so windy that the trees actually grow in leaning over. It has no real culture of its own. It sells some Dutch merchandise, because it used to be occupied by the Dutch, but other than that, it’s essentially an American island. While this meant I didn’t have the opportunity to take a hackneyed tour of the Aruban countryside, I was able to use American dollars everywhere. It should be noted the ATMs didn’t have surchages. I could access my money for free in Aruba when the grocery store down the street from my house charges me $2.50. Life.
Snorkelling was an awesome experience. It was like swimming in a rich man’s tropical aquarium. A fish bit me.
A big concern Kelsey had going into to the trip was whether or not I’d get a sunburn. For those who haven’t seen me lately, I’m pale. I’m one shade above an albino. Don’t worry though everyone, I stood up and happily lathered 45 SPF sun tan lotion on myself every two hours. I got a dark tan. Unfortunately, it wasn’t a very deep tan. In fact, it disappeared during our three hour layover in Chicago on the flight home.
By the time the trip ended, we were ready to go home. We missed our dog. We missed our house. We wanted to start life together. After another twelve hours in airports and planes, we arrived back in Moline. Kelsey’s parents surprised us by picking us up at the airport and bringing along our bizarre little dog. This turned out to be a bad idea, as our dog has an inexplicable fear of luggage. Kelsey’s parents surprised us further when we arrived home to an immaculate house (it hadn’t been cleaned in weeks because, as mentioned, the wedding threw up all over house), cleaned up our hideous yard (we had weed trees), and built shelves in our garage (we can fit both cars in there now).
Most of the honeymoon I won’t describe. I don’t really feel like letting you in. That trip belongs to Kelsey and me. Besides, it’s time to move on, to move back. It’s time to cover the ceremony.
The Wedding
You could probably tell by the description of the honeymoon, but my recollection of wedding related events is getting progressively worse. When I initially started the blog, sometime during the third week of July, my brain worked better. Now we near the end of August’s first trimester, and the details have faded. This will make the story of the ceremony and reception all the more difficult to explain because they all three passed in a blur. Besides most of you reading this attended the event anyway. Because of this, you are well aware that I lost my ring two hours after the ceremony and stopped the dance so everyone could look for it. You are even more aware of how great a dancer I am in a fedora. You all remember Kelsey’s Dad gave an amazing and touching speech and how my brother’s humility and self-deprecation granted him the ability to follow him up and be both funny and poignant himself. You remember Ian breaking down before he got a word out and Jeff using the word “parenthetically.” You remember Anne coming out of nowhere and making the best speech of all. You remember the weather was nice unless you sat in the sun. You know Damon conducted a gorgeous and thoughtful ceremony. You know the Old 97’s song “Question” is the perfect song for someone to play while a gorgeous bride walks down the aisle. You had fun drinking margaritas and beer in your casual clothing. You thought I did a great job creating the slideshow videos. You saw the security guard steal both a plate of food and eight cupcakes. You realized Justin didn’t take any spoons. You really liked the old, wooden lodge where the wedding was held. You wondered why more people don’t have casual weddings. You enjoyed the delicious hamburgers. You danced and drank your fill. You thought, “That was the greatest wedding ever.”
Let me explain some of what you didn’t see. Let me explain what I remember.
It’s a surreal feeling standing in front of your family and friends. In reality, unless Kelsey or I win some sort of special award, that will be the only time that all the people close to us from all walks of life will be in the same area at the same time.
I mentioned in my wedding toast something to the effect of, “Without Damon this day wouldn’t have taken place,” and, “it’s no secret this day was going to happen before and didn’t.” Most of you know Kelsey and I were previously engaged and planned to be married in June of 2006. Obviously that did not happen. After a brief bout with what I call my “Dark Period,” Kelsey and I broke up for about two months. I won’t go into detail about what brought me to my Dark Period or what brought me out of it—that’s the crux of the best-selling novel I’m currently writing. I will say that there would have been no way Kelsey and I would have gotten back together if I didn’t know Damon. I mentioned earlier I don’t really know how to react to situations in the present. The day after the break-up I spoke with Damon about what to do with the ring, how I should act now, I hadn’t really ever been a single adult before, etc. He told me, “Hold onto the ring for the time being. You never know, you might want to give it back to her someday. Obviously you don’t feel that way now, but you might. Also, don’t do anything stupid.” Because of his advice, I held onto the ring, which I eventually did want to give back to her and didn’t do anything too stupid—at least nothing stupid that involved other people. In hindsight sitting around my apartment eating Chicken McNuggets and drinking whiskey wasn’t smart, but it wasn’t the stupid Damon referred to in his message.
Damon himself was my first partner at my first job out of college. When my boss originally described him to me as a, “former Baptist minister,” I thought, “Oh good, I have a Bible beating fool for a partner.” I was wrong. Damon and I soon became good friends, meeting at Starbucks for the occasional five-hour chat session. Something that bothers me about some weddings is how the officiate clearly doesn’t know the marrying couple. He/she will make a few broad references to the couple he/she met in two “get to know you” sessions, but other than that, the officiate may not know the couple as anything other than faces of a congregation. It was awesome to have someone who played a pivotal part in our relationship perform our ceremony.
They say three things go wrong at every wedding. “They” are the primarily Asian women who blog on the weddingbee.com, a website Kelsey lived on for nine months.
Our first: The chairs did not show up as planned.
The second: The bus service we hired (JoHannes Bus Service out of Rock Island if anyone is interested) was terrible. The bus driver was rude to all of our guests and didn’t bother letting anyone in the wedding party know that his last ride back to the hotel was to be his last ride back to the hotel. This left about forty drunken people, four sober people, and zero cars at the Lodge we could no longer enter.
Our third: The DJ ruined my funny. I hate wedding clichés. I do. If what I’m about to describe was used at your wedding feel free to get angry but know I don’t really care. My least favorite of all the clichés is when someone gives a speech and does some sort of hackneyed activity that proclaims the bride’s newly granted superiority to the husband. Generally a bridesmaid or a groomsmen does this during a toast. The Toaster has the husband put his hand on top of the woman’s hand. The Toaster then says, “Well New Husband, this will be the last time you’ll ever have the upper hand.” Hilarity! I’m in tears just typing about it. Luckily, all of our toasts avoided using clichés. I then wrapped up the toasts with a toast of my own. I rocked the mic like a vandal. At the end of the toast I made a joke that made everyone laugh because I said the word “asshole” unexpectedly. Now everyone could drink and dance. Then our damn DJ went and ruined it all! Before he would start any music, he brought Kelsey and I on stage and made us say, “Two things. Husband, you’ll say something you’ll say over and over again over the years and Kelsey, you’ll say something you’ll never say again.” He made Kelsey tell me I was right and told me to tell Kelsey I’m sorry. Ha ha! The DJ, with absolutely no permission granted by anyone, tried to ruin the wedding! Luckily I lost my ring and brought back the fun. That could have been a disaster.
Most people say you don’t remember anything from your wedding, and you won’t have time to eat. This is not true. I ate an entire meal. I am a fast eater, but really, no one came up to ask questions or pass congratulations while I ate. If they did, I could see why it would be difficult to finish a meal, but they didn’t. If this happened at your wedding, and you didn’t have time to eat, you have rude friends.
As for memories, I have a few. Some of these memories actually occurred at the post-wedding hotel party, but let’s use creative license one last time and throw them all together. The timelines of memories don’t matter.
I remember at the end of the night when Dallas started to pass around a giant bottle of wine on the dance floor. After passing off the bottle, I noticed Theo had one-fourth a bottle of tequila. I asked him if he planned to pass that around. He said, “Nope. It’s for me.” Already drunk at this point, he drank the remains of the tequila. Then he died. It was sad. We eulogized him.
My sister wore a patriotic headband.
Theo’s cousin whom I didn’t think knew what alcohol was, stood behind me at the bar, swayed back and forth, wrapped his tie around his head, and asked me to order him a strawberry margarita. I did.
My sister and I shared a shot of tequila.
April told me that her and Nick, April’s husband, “somehow got a hotel room with a hot tub.” I told April that at one point in my life I had a fantasy of sexing her in a hot tub on my wedding night, so I’m glad someone will get the chance. Nick looked at his drunken wife and said, “She might not be conscious later.” I told him that was never part of the fantasy.
My sister, thirteen others, and I shared another shot of tequila.
I danced to Soldier Boy better than probably anyone else has before.
Hampton put on silver pants and a flame cowboy shirt and did an amazing dance that ended in the splits.
My Uncle Scott took the fedora off my head and put it on his. He quickly realized I wore the fedora as a sweatband, grimaced, and put the fedora back on my head.
I talked to Dallas and his girlfriend Jamie about all sorts of relevant topics. Three minutes later as I talked to Theo’s cousin, I got punched in the back of the head. I turned around to see Hampton standing there, looking happy as can be. Instead of punching him back, I explained to him that he couldn’t punch the groom on his wedding day. He told me Dallas told him to punch me for saying, “Transformers was a good movie,” or something like that. I explained to him how Dallas misquoted me. Three minutes later, Hampton punched Dallas in the back of the head. My brother, quick-tempered and drunk, turned around and punched Hampton about six times, hard, in the back of the head. In the game of “Trading Punches,” I won via delegation. No one will ever give me a black eye again.
But what I remember most was how happy everyone seemed. While Kelsey and I gracefully twirled about on the dance floor we’d see her work buddies smiling and laughing, we’d see my current work buddies drinking and laughing, we’d see my high school buddies drinking, smiling, and laughing, we’d see everyone we knew or cared about care-free and relaxed. We were only two years removed from breaking up and no one seemed to care. I say that because any couple that is on, then off, then on-again wonders what people will think. Everyone shared in our accomplishment. If they were too intimidated by my White Boy Shuffle and stayed away from the dance floor, they seemed happy elsewhere. For a guy who up until that point only knew how to feel euphoria anticipatorily or retroactively, it felt great to look into the crowd, see his bride, and experience a moment of pure joy.
The Hotel Part 2
It’s over. You’ve officially read through thirty-nine pages of material written in Times New Roman font, size 12, in Microsoft Word. This may be the longest blog or story you’ve ever read. If you enjoyed reading, I’d highly recommend anything by Steven King, Kurt Vonnegut, or Charles Dickens. Actually, please don’t read Kurt Vonnegut. Don’t read Fitzgerald’s “The Great Gatsby,” either. I shamelessly ripped both of them off during this blog.
When the wedding ended and everyone realized the bus had abandoned a group of people who spent the entire evening having fun in the woods of Rock Island, Illinois there were only two possible outcomes: the whole evening would become a b-movie horror classic or everyone would eventually get home, it would just take a while. I can’t speak for everyone, but luckily Kelsey and I had a sober friend who took us to the hotel. In the car were three other women, Kelsey, and myself. I felt this was the perfect time to sing the following song:
“I’m going to the hotel to, uh, consummate my marriage.” Sung to the tune of, “I’m Going to the Chapel.” None of the three women in the car planned to consummate anything that night, so I don’t think they appreciated the detail I put into the song.
Kelsey and I walked in to The Hotel, planning to stay the night in their fancy honeymoon suite. While checking in, we looked at each other and realized neither one of us wanted to stay in a hotel that night. We wanted our normal bed. We hadn’t shared the same bed for about a month (I cut Kelsey off from the hippity-hop a month prior to the wedding; not that we ever had sex before marriage) and wanted to wake-up in familiar territory the next day. We left the check-in counter and walked into the bar.
Reminiscent of the final episode of Quantum Leap, we walked around the bar and said something to everyone that came to the wedding. We thanked them for coming. We laughed some more. Theo’s cousin put on my fedora. We ate pizza. We stopped being the center of attention and enjoyed watching the random combinations of friends and family talk. As the bar closed, we said our good-byes and drove home.
In the car, we held hands and let a wave of exhaustion crash over us. We debated picking up the dog from Grandma’s house. We decided not to. We talked about the gift-opening brunch at our Aunt Deana’s in six hours. We skirted around the issue and both admitted to the other we were way too tired for sex. We arrived at home and walked into our house like it was any other day. We got ready for bed. I helped Kelsey remove the bobby pins from her hair and untie her dress. We laid in bed, heads adjoined but legs kicked out to opposite sides, forming an upside-down v. We talked. We laughed. We decided we weren’t too tired. We slept.
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