REHEARSAL DINNER, 1997
--
It takes some of us a long time to get it right.
We met in 1989 and I don't remember it. Larry does. He thought I was cute. I ... look, I issued a lot of library cards to a lot of people during my 14 years at that job. 8~) So, he met me in 1989, but I didn't meet him till 1990 when we found ourselves in the same circle of friends. We all went out in a big group on Friday nights and he became one of my best friends.
But that's all he was. I was busy for the next 4 years with a series of relationships. The third of these involved another in the group, and got serious in 1993. In fact we asked our Very Good Friend Larry, who was a mail order minister, to officiate at our barefoot, sunset wedding ceremony.
Our friendship with Larry continued. When job issues and a need to be near his children took him back up north, I felt a loss I could not explain.
The story of my first marriage would take a book, but I'll say I was committed to it and gave it everything but my life. After 13 months I ended it. It was time to pick a place I wanted to live, make it my own and start over. The first time I drove over the bridge into Wilmington, NC, the little coastal city nestled against the Cape Fear river won me over. I rented an apartment and returned to my interim place to collect my stuff.
Larry had kept up with a common friend. Her daughter lived in my building, and as I was loading my car, a voice called to me from the balcony: "Somebody is wondering where you've gone!" Larry and I began writing letters.
Meanwhile, down in NC I went color-mad. I'd always coordinated things before. Now I bought bright colored towels and blankets: purple, magenta, emerald green. I loved my quilts and the Tidal Creek health food store down the road, and my funny old shelter cat, and my Spencer Gifts bubble lamp -- I thought this thing would entrance the cat, but he ignored it -- and most of all I loved my door key, that no one else had a copy of. I biked, and I shopped too much, although I had moved out of The Marital Home quickly and left some basics behind. I attended womens' support groups. Church singles. An office job stapling things and running a copy machine. All women.
Columbus Day weekend of 1995, my dear friend Larry came to visit. Since then we always celebrate Columbus Day.
On April 25, 1997, I married the minister who had married me to my first husband. I've kept one picture of my first wedding because someone very important to me is in it. Besides, we haul it out when we tell people our story and they respond with: "You're kidding." I've joked that we should go on afternoon talk shows, but, nah. We'll just tell the story and watch people smile.
As i began to write this entry I tuned up the "Loud!" playlist in my music files and came across this song:
We'll raise our glasses, to
puzzle pieces,
and the way they fit together
we never saw till now.
Here's to questions that
meet their answers
in the bright light of hindsight.
It will all come clear somehow.
........"Here's to Hindsight" - Tara Leigh Cobble
--
It takes some of us a long time to get it right.
We met in 1989 and I don't remember it. Larry does. He thought I was cute. I ... look, I issued a lot of library cards to a lot of people during my 14 years at that job. 8~) So, he met me in 1989, but I didn't meet him till 1990 when we found ourselves in the same circle of friends. We all went out in a big group on Friday nights and he became one of my best friends.
But that's all he was. I was busy for the next 4 years with a series of relationships. The third of these involved another in the group, and got serious in 1993. In fact we asked our Very Good Friend Larry, who was a mail order minister, to officiate at our barefoot, sunset wedding ceremony.
Our friendship with Larry continued. When job issues and a need to be near his children took him back up north, I felt a loss I could not explain.
The story of my first marriage would take a book, but I'll say I was committed to it and gave it everything but my life. After 13 months I ended it. It was time to pick a place I wanted to live, make it my own and start over. The first time I drove over the bridge into Wilmington, NC, the little coastal city nestled against the Cape Fear river won me over. I rented an apartment and returned to my interim place to collect my stuff.
Larry had kept up with a common friend. Her daughter lived in my building, and as I was loading my car, a voice called to me from the balcony: "Somebody is wondering where you've gone!" Larry and I began writing letters.
Meanwhile, down in NC I went color-mad. I'd always coordinated things before. Now I bought bright colored towels and blankets: purple, magenta, emerald green. I loved my quilts and the Tidal Creek health food store down the road, and my funny old shelter cat, and my Spencer Gifts bubble lamp -- I thought this thing would entrance the cat, but he ignored it -- and most of all I loved my door key, that no one else had a copy of. I biked, and I shopped too much, although I had moved out of The Marital Home quickly and left some basics behind. I attended womens' support groups. Church singles. An office job stapling things and running a copy machine. All women.
Columbus Day weekend of 1995, my dear friend Larry came to visit. Since then we always celebrate Columbus Day.
On April 25, 1997, I married the minister who had married me to my first husband. I've kept one picture of my first wedding because someone very important to me is in it. Besides, we haul it out when we tell people our story and they respond with: "You're kidding." I've joked that we should go on afternoon talk shows, but, nah. We'll just tell the story and watch people smile.
As i began to write this entry I tuned up the "Loud!" playlist in my music files and came across this song:
We'll raise our glasses, to
puzzle pieces,
and the way they fit together
we never saw till now.
Here's to questions that
meet their answers
in the bright light of hindsight.
It will all come clear somehow.
........"Here's to Hindsight" - Tara Leigh Cobble
1 comment:
What a great, great story! Thanks for sharing!
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