I See You've Won First Prize

Last night, Super Tall Girl, the Mister, and I celebrated St. Patrick’s Day! One year ago yesterday, the Mister proposed to me (and my snausage finger). I love the fact that people all over the world get together wear green, drink beer, and toast our engagement! How festive!

We had dinner at home before going out. I made beef and Guinness stew, Irish soda bread, and Guinness floats for dessert. That’s right – Guinness floats: vanilla ice cream with Guinness on top. Kind of like a coke float, but with a creamy, chocolaty, coffee flavor, and a bit of a buzz. They were deeelish!

After dinner, we went to the place where the Mister proposed and had . . . more beer! While we were toasting, I said something that Super Tall Girl made me promise to blog about today. Here it is:

Jules (to the Mister): “Oh my gosh! I’m so excited! The seamstress is putting a pocket in my wedding dress so that I don’t have to put my lipstick in your purse!”

Why would the Mister carry a purse on his wedding day, you ask? Well, as I may have mentioned before, he’s going to wear a kilt. Part of the getup is a sporran, which is basically a man purse that he wears around his waist, because kilts don’t have pockets. Actually, there’s no “basically” about it. “Sporran” means “purse” in Gaelic.

So, I’m going to marry a man in a skirt with a purse. And there’s nothing in the world manlier or sexier. Hello!?! Have you seen Rob Roy? Braveheart? In On Her Majesty’s Secret Service, an excited woman reaches up James Bond’s kilt and writes her hotel room number in lipstick on his thigh. So there we are. Back to lipstick. And then, of course, there’s the Scottish drinking song:

Well, a Scotsman clad in kilt left the bar one evening fair. And one could tell by how he walked that he'd drunk more than his share. He fumbled 'round 'till he could no longer keep his feet. And stumbled off into the grass to sleep beside the street.

Now about that time two young and lovely girls happened by. One said to the other with a twinkle in her eye. See yon sleeping Scotsman so strong and handsome built. I wonder if it's true what he wears nothing beneath the kilt.

They crept up on that sleeping Scotsman quiet as can be. Lifted up his kilt about an inch so they could see. Lo and behold for them to view beneath his Scottish skirt. Was nothin' more than God had graced him with upon his birth.

They marveled for a minute and one said, "We must be gone.Let's leave a souvenir for our friend before we move along."As a gift they left a blue silk ribbon tied into a bow. Around the bonnie star the Scott's kilt did lift and show.

Now the Scotsman rose to nature's call and headed for the trees. Behind the bush he lifts his kilt and gawks at what he sees. And in his drunken voice he says to what's before his eyes."Oh, lad I don't know where you've been, but I see you've won first prize."

Opposites Attract

After my bout of mischief at the premarital counseling required by our Church, I came to our final counseling meeting on my best behavior. It was yesterday, and the point of the meeting was our Myers-Briggs personality inventory scores.

I find myself wondering why we get these scores so late in the wedding planning process. Wouldn’t you think that incompatibility would be best learned sometime before the 50-day final countdown? And at first blush, we sure looked incompatible.

There are four elements to the Myers-Briggs test, and we only shared one. We’re both planners. In case you hadn’t noticed from this wedding planning blog.

But we’re opposites on the other three elements. I’m a feeling, intuitive extrovert, and the Mister is a thinking, sensing introvert. Ruh-roh.

Our premarital counselor didn’t bother to do more than explain the elements of the test, so I did a little online research to find out what our scores meant. Why did we feel so good together if we were so very different?

I learned that we have a duality relationship, which is summarized as the most favorable and comfortable of all relationships between personality types. One article I saw even said that duality relationships provide “complete psychological compatibility.” Whew! Here’s more:

Dual partners are like two halves of a whole unit. They usually understand each other’s intentions without any need to say a word. Your dual partner will naturally protect your weak points and appreciate the strong ones. Interaction with your dual allows you to be yourself without the need to adjust to your partner, like you would in other relationships. This often saves both partners a lot of energy which they can use for their own interests. Conflicts between duals are very rare and if there are any, they are normally short-lived and solved without pain. Your dual partner will love you just for what you are, and if there is such a thing as true love, it usually occurs in relations of duality.

There are at least two conditions to be completed for a successful relationship between duals. First, between the partners there has to be at least a minimal mutual attraction. Second, and most important, the partners must truly strive for the same or similar things. This may include common interests or life goals. In other words, two halves of the same whole must not move in the different directions, or the whole will break into pieces.

No wonder being with the Mister feels so very right. And why I feel, for the very first time in a relationship, that I can be myself, and he’ll appreciate me just as I am (and vice versa!). Since we share common interests, common life goals, and (a lot!) more than “minimal mutual attraction,” I now understand why we’re so well suited for each other.

I guess opposites really do attract.

Out Loud

My favorite part of planning the wedding so far has been the opportunity for people to say nice things to each other. After my twin died, I realized that while people say lovely things ABOUT their friends and family, people hardly ever say those things TO their loved ones. I made a conscious decision to communicate all the nice things I heard about others directly to them. Life’s too short to only hear the spiteful gossip, no? And when I’m thinking something nice, I go on and say it. Why not share the love?

When parts of the wedding involve saying kind things, it makes me even happier than I already would be planning a giant hoedown with a big white poofy dress and lots o’ cake. That’s pretty danged happy.

One opportunity we had to say the good stuff was at our awesome engagement party. First of all, it was a party to celebrate that another party is comin’ up! (The wedding. Duh!) If a party on its own is great, then a party to celebrate another party is great squared.

My MOH planned the shindig. It. Was. Amazing. We had about forty people there! Nearby friends . . .
. . . and family.

I wore the special locket with my twin’s picture inside, so he could be there too. Here I am showing it to Mrs. Pop.

Super-MOH didn’t do it all on her own – this lovely lady (I’ll call her Soul Sister) helped with the preparations and laughed so much, she got us all in on the act.

Did I mention there was cake?

But my favorite parts of our engagement party were when people got to say and write nice things. My MOH put engagement pictures of us on each table, along with bottles of wine, which the guests signed with well-wishes and funny quips.

My MOH and Pop each gave a toast.

And I toasted the host, my best girl.

My neighbor once said that he didn’t want flowers at his funeral. “Don’t wait ‘till I’m dead,” he said. I sent him the biggest bouquet I could find the very next day.

There are lots of chances to say the really important things in life. I like the few moments just before I drop off to sleep, because the good thoughts swim to the surface of consciousness like little silver bubbles. But there are regular every day moments too – in the car at a stoplight. When you’re cooking dinner. Sometimes I think nice things when I’m brushing my teeth, but no one can understand what I’m saying through the globs of toothpaste. (Mrph toodee, schlobbr!)

Don’t forget the big moments too, especially at a wedding. Saying your vows. Whispering to your spouse just after you recess back down the aisle. Toasting your parents.

The next time you hear or think something nice about someone, just go on and say it. Out loud.

And now, to end this post on a less sentimental note, here’s my favorite photo from the engagement party. Pop. Being . . . Pop. Love it.

Luck 'O the Irish

The day began with serious bodily injury. I slammed my left thumb in the car door, and it bled all over my clothes and swelled up to the size of a kielbasa. I cried my little eyes out as the Mister ran cool water over the offending wound and bandaged me up. In the midst of this tragedy, I realized, “I can marry this man! He would know what to do when our kids skin their knees!” But that thought was quickly replaced by something along the lines of “OOOWWWWCHHH!” He left for work; I pulled myself together, put on a silly green felt newsboy hat in honor of St. Patrick’s day, and went to my office too.

I was especially sad that I slammed my LEFT thumb in the car door, because I was not-so-secretly hoping that the Mister was going to propose later that week. He asked me to my favorite restaurant several days in advance, and I suspected that he would pop the question there. (I can usually tell what the Mister is thinking – it’s as if he has one of those scrolling lighted message boards strapped to his forehead that puts out a running commentary of his thoughts.) If he proposed later that week, he would have to put the ring he designed onto the same hand as the kielbasa thumb. Ick.

But I was still excited; I had no idea what the ring looked like, and I was dying to see it. That’s assuming he even had the ring. I was also thrilled at the thought that I could be engaged to the man ‘o my dreams. So with a heart full of hope and a thumb full of OOOWWWWCHHH, I started planning what I would wear on Friday that would distract from the kielbasa thumb. I contemplated implementing the Miss Piggy plan – if you’re having a bad hair day (or a thumb that looks like a sausage), just put some broccoli in your teeth, and no one will notice your hair/thumb. Note to self: Go to grocery; pick up broccoli.

The Mister and I decided to go to a cool German pub for St. Patrick’s Day. It sounds weird, but this place has the best Irish parties outside of County Cork, and on St. Pat’s Day the place is packed to the rafters with corned beef, cabbage, Irish beer, and green-clad lads and lassies. It’s also the place we had our first kiss (on the very first day we met– sorry Mama!). As we were leaving home for the festivities, the Mister asked me if I needed my cell phone. Doesn’t he know that the less you carry at a drunken Irish party, the less you can lose? So I left the phone at home.

We dragged ole’ sausage thumb over to the pub, and we ate a hearty meal of all things Irish. It was super duper hot inside, so we went outside. By the place we first kissed. It was sprinkling rain as we sat at a pickinic table (yes, I used the Yogi bear spelling). The Mister said, “Hey, look at the guy in the kilt!”

I must stop the story here to tell you that I loooove guys in kilts. The Mister has one too, because he competes in the Scottish Highland Games, which involves throwing really heavy things, like actual rocks and telephone poles, into the air for height or across a field for distance and technique. I go to these games because: (1) I like to show my support for my Mister, and (2) there are guys in kilts.

The Mister is thinking about wearing a kilt to the wedding. I think it’s a great idea. I got to pick out my dress all by myself, so why shouldn’t he pick out what he wants to wear? (I do hope they make Garanimals in formal wear, however.)

His parents think that a kilt is insane. I’m not exactly sure why – his brother picked something pretty nontraditional for his wedding – modern brown tuxedos with gold vests and pink ties. What’s the big deal with the kilt? But it’s not my battle. The Mister will look amazing in whatever he chooses (provided it matches), so I’ll let him make the decision (and engage in whatever negotiation is required to implement it). I’m concerned about the kilt for one other reason: our officiant/friend (who is a very cute young woman) said that, if the Mister wears a kilt, she might just shove me out of the way and marry him herself. I couldn’t blame her, really. Because, if guys in kilts are hot, then my guy in a kilt is absolutely irresistible.

So, you can see why, “Hey, look at the guy in the kilt!” would distract me. As I scanned the crowd for tartan, the Mister got down on one knee. I looked back, and he asked me to marry him, using my full name. Yesyesyesyesyes. And I looked at the ring. HOLY MOLEY! It was perfect. Sparkly and classic, it looks like a family heirloom.

Tears. Joy. Wonder at why anyone would want to propose to a snausage thumb wearing a silly green felt hat. And an overwhelming urge to . . . call my mother. (Why did I leave the danged cell phone at home?!) I commandeered a phone and called Mama. She thought something terrible had happened, because I was screaming unintelligibly into the receiver. When I finally explained, we were on our way to her house, calling best friends and several other parents along the way.

The moral of this story is this: Don’t wear a green felt hat. No, actually, it’s that a silly sausage thumb can’t sour the sweetest moment of your life. So stop worrying and just enjoy yourself, for heaven’s sake.