The End of the Wedding Season

Home sweet home! By some miraculous happenstance the cats have not destroyed the plants, the laundry or each other, and I missed no important emails from school. No new organisms are growing in the fridge, and the apartment needs just a minimal clean-up to de-cat it. The kitten has developed a new taste for human flesh--mine, specifically--but I'm willing to roll with the punches. A few nips are well worth the fact that the little beasts finally managed not to barf all over the bedroom while we were gone.

Kate's wedding was wonderful. There were no hitches (the 5am thunderstorm simply added drama), the food was great, the bride looked beautiful, my toast went well, and the big band music got everyone dancing. Kate and Phil's ceremony was also very touching and personal; several members of the wedding party read poems, prayers and sang songs to supplement the couple's vows. I stood there trying hard not to cry, but I failed miserably. I also cried during my toast. I'm such a girl.

The best part was getting to meet so many of Kate's friends from graduate school, whom I've heard so much about. What a fun and interesting group of women! We had an unabashedly girly time, complete with a pajama dance party (well, by "dance" I mean "last minute seating chart session") and champagne by the pool (and champagne with breakfast, as an afternoon snack, late in the night...) and a bridal lingerie photo shoot. Plus, there was so much love for Kate! It made me really happy. It also made me wish that my best friends lived in Portland, as opposed to being scattered across the country. How do I live without them?

So now I'm back, and life has to resume its normal course. It's hard to gear myself up for what is going to be a hellacious fall of 80-hour work weeks and the opening of the theatre season, but I'm starting today, with an apartment clean-up and my last class of the summer term with what must be the world's most apathetic group of students. (I'm actually tempted to toss their final essays down the stairs, the essays are going to be so revolting.) But it won't be all bad: the autumn is my favorite season, and my birthday's only a couple of months away. And the wedding season, as glorious as it is, is over for another year. We can rest content that there is now more love in the world, and we no longer have to look at people's registries.