MY WEDDING

It was so wonderful and I fear I won't have time to write about everything that happened, but at minimum here are some pictures:

Holmes!!

5.18.14 - Picnic in the park

This morning I spent hours putting together an itinerary for this coming week. I'm surprised at how much there is to keep track of even with as simple of a wedding as I've planned. I'm also very excited because the wedding and the days leading up to it are going to be so much fun! So many friends I haven't seen in so long--some I've never technically met before! And several people have contacted me in the last couple days to tell me how excited they are too. Talking about the food and music and set up and the after party--the more plans, the more exciting it is.

Also, recently Jack and I have had a lot more food in our fridge than we normally do. This is mostly because I took any food from the SF house that would go bad between now and when the first renters show up. I'm leaving for MO on Tuesday so if Jack doesn't eat that food between now and when he joins me it'll just be wasted. SO. Today I also made an elaborate fruit salad and an elaborate actual salad, and I threw in the gourmet cheese and crackers (elopement gift from the professor I work for!). Then Jack and I enjoyed the lovely weather by having a picnic in the park!

Alas, I didn't take any pictures. But here's a picture from Google Images "cheese picnic," which is kind of what it was like.

He has a big final tomorrow and he spent a lot of the picnic studying. I worked on my long overdue scrapbook (I'm so far behind) and generally had a pleasant time. Plus, any time I make Jack delicious food he gets really happy and tells me what a great woman I am, which is kind of funny. In fact today, when he discovered there was turkey bacon in the salad, he told me to name anything and I could have it, because I had given him bacon. Ha. If only that were true. :-P

5.14.14 - Flattery

On rare occasion loved ones of mine have told me that, when facing a difficult situation, they tried to imagine what I would do and did that. There might be higher compliments, but offhand I can't think of any! Very cool.

5.13.14 - When the lights go down in the city...

When I was a teenager I lived in the Midwest and my dad lived in San Francisco. My siblings and I used to visit him about once a month for a weekend. The combination of getting to see the parent you don't live with, getting to skip a day or two of school, and contrasting the stunning beauty of the bay area with my suburban hometown made San Francisco positively magical to me.

I was so in love with the city. I had postcards of it in my room back home. I had a cartoon map of it behind my bedroom door. I had (and still have, actually) a San Francisco snow globe that included Alcatraz, the Transamerica Pyramid, Coit Tower, and, of course, the Golden Gate Bridge. I used to stare at that snow globe and imagine I was in the city, and miss it.

This is the exact globe, actually.

Once my dad left a voicemail on my phone of him sitting on top of Fort Point, under the Golden Gate Bridge, during foggy weather. The voicemail included the foghorn, and I used to replay it and close my eyes and imagine I was also sitting under the Golden Gate.

I moved to San Francisco when I was 19. I waitressed at a local pizza place for a year while waiting for in-state tuition. I went to the City College of San Francisco for almost four years. I lived just across the bay in Berkeley for two more, and down in San Mateo for another year after that.

Of course living in a place is very different than visiting it for weekend getaways. And of course there are aspects of the city I dislike--no place is perfect. But in all the time I've lived in the bay area, I never fully got used to the sheer beauty of it. I love driving into the city, whether over the Golden Gate, over the Bay Bridge, or even coming from the south on 101. In each case, when the city first comes into view I think it's gorgeous.

And by now I have so many memories that further enrich the experience. The last few months I've been here a lot helping prepare my dad's house to be rented. The last one or two trips I've felt so very sentimental as I enter the city. Not tearful, not quite, but near that. Maybe it's because my life is entering a really new phase. This August I will have lived in California as an adult for 10 years. I keep thinking about what my life was like 10 years ago, and wondering what I'll be looking back on 10 years from now. Renting out the SF house adds to the poignancy, since it's possible none of my family will permanently live in San Francisco again. The end of an era.

The last few days I've been driving all around the city running errands for Dad as we finish up prepping the house. I realized I don't mind driving around at all, especially late at night, as it gives me an excuse to reminisce to myself about the places I'm driving past, to appreciate the beauty and the memories. I don't know why I feel as if I'm saying goodbye--we are only setting up a vacation rental home so we'll be able to come back and meet together at the house many times over still. Even so, I'm so nostalgic about it. This morning I drove past the Palace of Fine Arts on my way back from an errand and marveled at how many times--since childhood--I've walked around that place. I also drove through the Persidio along the same bus route that took me from the community college nearly every day for years, and thought about how much work that was and how proud I am to have finished it and come as far as I have. I also thought about the clubs and fun nights with Renata, and the visits from out-of-state friends.

The first time we ever hung out--at a club in SF. 2007.

Sarah and me on Mt. Tam. 2004.

All this to say: there's already been a lot of beauty and good memories in my life, and I'm not even 30 yet. I think I'm a very lucky person.

Sunflower centerpieces

My maid of honor and I are going to make fake sunflowers as centerpieces for the reception. I don't know which kind will try yet, but I'm sure they'll be awesome!

Embracing yourself.

I feel the same way when I see women in public without makeup. I like that look. It looks like confidence.

I can walk.

My dad was in a motorcycle accident a little over a week ago and fractured his pelvis. Now he can barely get around on crutches. Makes me realize how much I take being mobile for granted. I'm so glad I can get up from this laptop and saunter to the kitchen for a snack or walk over to the bedroom to crash without even giving it a 2nd thought. Lucky.

5.10.14 - Doug visit

I managed to stay productive for most of today while Jack was at work, though the stuff I was working on was usually not grading papers. Did a bunch of household chores, edited a piece for my friend Josh, sent our DJ most of our wedding music, and worked out for the first time in like a month and a half (I know, it's a disgrace!)

But the best part of the day was going to a sushi place downtown with Jack and our good old friend Doug. I got to meet Doug's girlfriend for the first time, even though they've been together over a year! She was sweet! She's very talkative and enthusiastic, and she told the story of how she and Doug got together, and it was a great story. Funny and romantic--she's a good storyteller. It made me proud of Doug, too, because the romance was mostly on his end and he really outdid most guys I've heard of. He basically learned to play a song she likes on accordion--it took him like a month--and surprised her with it outside her window at midnight one night. Pretty impressive.

Anyway so it was really nice getting to see them. We haven't seen Doug since last October, but it's nice whenever we get to.

Right after dinner, before they biked on their merry way.

After we got home, Jack and I looked up some easy youtube videos of new dance moves to try. We didn't actually try them yet but I expect when we have time we could learn a lot more. We also watched old home videos of Jack and Doug and others playing wall ball in Berkeley back in the day. While we were watching them and reminiscing about how long Jack has lived in CA now, Jack took our wedding rings out of the boxes and handing me mine. He wanted us to try them on together and see how they look with each other. We aren't going to really start wearing them until after the ring exchange at our reception (in only a couple weeks), but I thought it was a sweet gesture. He's clearly very happy about it. :)

5.9.14 - You rock me harder than some downtown band!

Listening to my country music playlist while getting chores done this morning. This song is so cheerful!

Song here.

5.8.14 - New Friends

Tonight I had dinner with a friend from my program. This is the 2nd time we've hung out, and both times we talked easily for hours. She's in a similar position in her life to mine, and she will be in the area I live in for a long time (in contrast with other friends from my program who move back to their home states once they graduate). I'm just happy to be forming friendships with more longevity. Also, she is getting married in a couple months and they plan to start a family right away, similar to my plans. I suspect it may be easier to be friends with other parents once I'm a mom, so maybe that'll work out okay too!

5.5.14 - Rocketism

Email from Jill:

Today Ed was drugged and slept through most of the day.  Rocket kept opening the door to the room whispering "Dad?".  After being told to stop several times by Jill he did it again and when she reprimanded him and told him again not to he asked "Why".

"Because it's his birthday, he's sleeping and it's not nice to wake him up when he's sleeping".

Rocket: "But I wake you up all the time"

5.5.14 - The Jefferson Move

Last Thursday Dad rented the moving truck to take a whole bunch of stuff from his house in San Francisco to his house in Colorado. Some of my friends came over and helped us start loading the truck Thursday night. We continued Friday morning and early afternoon, and Dad was getting increasingly stressed because he was determined to leave early Saturday morning but we still had a lot to do.

Then he went to pick up his newly-repaired motorcycle, and while riding it back home, he got in an accident. He's going to be okay, but he fractured his pelvis. Obviously he couldn't take the moving truck cross country, so he asked me to do it. So I did. (Well, I didn't really--one of his construction workers drove the truck, I simply accompanied the guy in case he needed a backup driver.)

There are a few things I want to remember for my Joy Inventory:

1. There was a stretch of desert (I think it was still in Nevada) where some of the rocky terrain smoothed out to very light patches of sand with a lot of dark, almost black rocks among them. This stretch is on the side of highway 80 in the middle of nowhere--we hadn't seen a town and wouldn't see a town for awhile. But I noticed most of the black rocks had been arranged in the white sand to spell messages: "Hi!" and "Jake loves Andrea" and shapes of hearts and things. In fact, it looked as if there weren't any black rocks left that weren't part of some message. You could barely see the messages because we were driving by so quickly, but I was thinking of all the people over all the years that had pulled over on this stretch of highway to create their little piece of timelessness for all the other drivers to see. It was really sweet.
2. I live in the parts of California where the Epic Beauty is the ocean. I love looking at it. It's so vast, and it makes me think of what lies on the other side, and about how huge the world is, and the universe. But this road trip also made me realize how much I enjoy the Epic Beauty of mountains. They make me think of what it was like for generations past to travel through them, how difficult that must have been and how brave they were. And they make me think of the phrase "purple mountains majesty" (even though none of them look purple to me). The mountains make me think of AMERICA in a very patriotic and nostalgic way.
3. I also saw a lot of long, colorful trains sliding pat the country side with the mountains as backdrop. That was pretty and nostalgic too.
4. We finally got to Colorado and I'm staying in Dad's house here, but no one else is here. It's very strange to be in this house when it's empty, as normally I'm only here for big family trips like Thanksgiving. Late last night it felt kind of lonely, but then I came upstairs and saw my stepmom had put up a whole bunch of framed photos along the hallway outside the bedrooms. There are photos of my siblings and me when we were kids, photos of my step- and half-siblings when they were littler and more recent ones, and all the photos are memories of happy and silly and sweet times. I walked down the hallway slowly and looked at every single one and felt overwhelmingly grateful to have a family I love so much (especially in light of recent events, given Dad is still alive!)

Leaving California, passing through the Sierra Nevada.