internet presence

Last week, I wrote a long post about where I've been lately.  Then I realized that said post teetered dangerously close to a line called "oversharing" or "dirty laundry."  So I deleted it, and wrote this instead.  Suffice it to say that over the summer, the stress of planning a wedding, renovating a house, working a new job, and parenting three kids just completely overwhelmed me. So, I did the only thing I could -- I withdrew, put my nose to the grindstone, and soldiered through.  Completely unhappily while complaining a lot.

Ultimately, the result was a complete lack of any internet presence. No tweets, no status updates, no pins, no blogging.  But!  In the name of keeping things positive and upbeat over here, rather than complain about how stressful the summer of wedding planning and house renovating was, how about I instead share what I learned.

(in the bathroom of a wine bar in the west village while out with my sister the week before the wedding)

the name

This is always a controversial topic, and so for a while I have avoided writing about it.  But as my wedding draws closer (less than 6 months!) it occupies increasing brain-space.  This is a topic that everyone has their own opinion about, and I think we can all agree that each woman's (person's?) decision is made for deeply personal reasons.  But.  That does not stop us from judging each other about it. 

I am talking, of course, about changing your name when you get married.

The first time I got married, I did not change my name.  At the time I thought it was because I had a firm sense of my identity, and that included my last name.  Now, I am thinking maybe it was, a bit, that I did not have a firm sense of my identity, and that hanging onto my name gave me some much-needed stability.  Or, maybe my decision not to change my name reflected some deep ambivalence about marriage, or that particular marriage, that I was not prepared to acknowledge explicitly at the time.  I don't know what the "real" reason is, I only know that changing my name was not even really an option for me.

death of a single girl

Kathy has been in London all this week.  I hate it when she's gone.  A weird thing that I think often, when she travels, is "If Kathy died, this grey, bleak, horribleness would be my life."  I can be a little morbid, I guess.  This trip, this feeling was particularly acute.  Maybe it is because I finished a really, really depressing book yesterday in which one character's onion farm fails and his wife leaves him, so he tries to kill himself but instead shoots himself in the shoulder and loses the arm, and another character drunkenly drives his car off a bridge at 8:30 in the morning after losing his business, having his house repossessed by the bank, and his lover (the wife of the onion farm guy) breaking up with him.

I don't think it's just the book, though.  As I was walking into work today, thinking about how it Kathy died, the grey, bleak, horribleness would be my life, I also thought, "Well, I didn't use to feel like this about her not being around.  I used to live semi-alone in that apartment in Hell's Kitchen, and be totally fine with being alone, or whatever.  I never used to get all sad and bored and lonely.  What's up with that?"  I feared I had become too dependent, or at least that I had lost a vital, independent part of myself. 

As an erstwhile fiercely independent thing, living in New York City, I used to find the solitude liberating.  But now, instead of feeling liberated, I just feel sort of lonely.  This made me incredibly sad.  I liked that independent young woman, living in Manhattan, struggling with her job, making it through.  Where did she go, and when did it happen? 

damask

When Kathy and I sat down to start looking at wedding invitations online, I was not fully prepared for how different our visions were.  Generally, when it comes to sylistic decisions, we agree.  We have similar clothing tastes, and we almost always easily agree on house-decorating decisions.  So I thought wedding planning would be similar.

"How about this?" Kathy said, as she pulled up an ecru rectangle with black script writing on it. 

"Um, boring."  I replied.  "I want them to be a little different.  They should reflect our style and our wedding a little.  How about that one with the adirondack chairs?"

"Too casual.  I don't want people showing up in jeans because it's on the beach and we put adirondack chairs on our invitation.  How about this?"  This one was an ecru rectangle with navy blue script writing on it.

"Boring."

"This one?"  Ecru square with black script writing.

"Square invitations require extra postage.  It sounds like it wouldn't be a big deal but it adds up.  No squares.  And it's boring.  How about that one?"

"I hate floral patterns.  What are you, 80?"  And on, and on like this, for rather an extended period of time.

Finally, I stood up and stretched.  "Why don't you just pick one you really, really like, and if I don't hate it, we'll go with it.  We're never going to agree.  You want something stuffy and boring, and I want something too casual for you.  It seems like we have fundamentally different visions of what we want this to look like, and it's way more important to you.  I guess I just don't care that much."

(a damask print)

really, actually perfect

When we last left our heroine (that's me) she was sitting on a bar stool with wet feet in "Whispers," the hotel bar of the SoMa Courtyard by Marriott, happily crying at the news that her partner was finally officially divorced, after approximately four and a half years of battles.

Once I had collected myself, Kathy again pleaded with me to go to the bathroom with her.  I was feeling all fond of her and squishy, so I agreed to go, despite the fact that (1) the bathroom was up some stairs, across a catwalk, and down a hallway, (2) I had absolutely zero desire to put my feet back into my soaking wet shoes, and (3) I think it's weird to go to the bathroom when you don't have to go, just to keep someone else company, especially considering that I do not wear lipstick so there was nothing to re-apply while I was in there.  But like I said, I was feeling particularly fond of her, and sort of wanted to be with my divorcee girlfriend for her really long walk to the bathroom.  So off we went.

patience

Last night, the New York assembly approved our state's same-sex marriage bill.  I've been following the developments with a feeling that I can only characterize as guarded optimism.  Oh, how I would love to be able to marry Kathy in our own state, rather than having to schlep off across state lines like a second-class citizen.  The ironic thing is that we may ultimately decide to get married in Connecticut or Massachusetts anyway, for other reasons.  But there is a big difference between getting married somewhere because you choose to, and getting married there because they're the only ones who will have you, don't you think?

(obligatory pic of lesbian wedding cake topper)

As if in tune with the fact that our brains have been buzzing with thoughts about marriage lately, at breakfast this morning, C said to Kathy, out of nowhere, "Come ON!  When are you going to marry her?"  Kathy laughed, and said, "Who?" although obviously, she knew exactly who he meant -- but we are trying to train the kids not to talk about someone as if they are not there, when they are actually standing right in front of you.  Anyway, he said, "ERIN!" as if Kathy were the dumbest person on the planet.

worth waiting for (?)

Kathy and I are not engaged.  This does not stop me from thinking about getting married to her all the time.  Some of my friends are rather impatient for us to get married.  One threatened to show up at our house with my sister in matching dresses if we didn't get a move on in some reasonable amount of time.  Their impatience does not even come close to matching my own.  There are a bunch of reasons, which I won't go into here, why we are not engaged yet.  They are all annoying.  However, there is one thing that I think might actually be worth waiting for.

(On wedding cake toppers.  I don't think anyone actually uses them anymore, other than as an illustration in a post or article about same sex marriage.  For real.  Also, if you google image search for wedding cake toppers, there are an appalling number where a bride is dragging a groom off.  But that is another post entirely.  I found this picture here.)