The Wedding

Greetings, dear readers!

Today was a very long, but happy day. One of our dear family friends was getting married and asked hubby and I to be the witnesses to the happy event! They decided to have a civil ceremony at the new courthouse for legal reasons because while they wanted to marry in the Church, they couldn't get in contact with a priest to set up a meeting where he could do the necessary pre-marriage counseling and set the date. Their advanced ages and shaky health also meant that waiting for a priest to set a date might not be in their best interests at this time. At least with this civil ceremony, they would be legally bound for the purposes of wills and other legal matters.

My outfit for the wedding. Since it wasn't the church wedding, I didn't wear anything fancy-just a nice top and pants

We arrived at the county courthouse around 4PM. Once in, however, my husband nearly got us thrown out of the building because the security guard wouldn't let him bring in his giant sippy cup and it made my husband curse up a blue streak for which the guard threatened to evict us all. Fortunately, once we all calmed down, the security guard allowed my hubby to go and put his cup back in the car while our friend's fiancee, the baby, and I remained behind, taking off our jewelry so as not to set off the metal detectors. Once we regrouped and passed through the metal detectors, we got our things and got dressed while the couple to wed got their place number from the employee handing them out. By 4:30, we were up on the 4th floor which is where the weddings are held.

View from the top.

Being goofy with daddy

After waiting for what seemed like an hour, our friends finally got in line to get their courtroom number assigned for the wedding. As they stood in line, our friends also decided to volunteer to be witnesses for the couple in front of them. This couple was a man with his 9-months pregnant fiancee, and they apparently got stood up by their witnesses. The lobby and hallway were very crowded with couples of all ages and backgrounds waiting to have a judge seal their unions. It was not like our civil wedding in 2012, where there wasn't much of a crowd and was held in the historic old Pima County courthouse. As I observed the couples, their witnesses and guests in their various wedding attires, I suddenly felt bare because I realized that I was one of only a handful of people who did not have a tattoo. My husband noted this observation as well, and thanked his father for pounding into his head the no tattoo rule because it was something that could be utilized by the police for identification purposes.

Tying the knot

Finally, it was our friends' turn to get married. Since they were the witnesses for the couple in front, the judge decided to officiate both couples at once. It was a very pleasant ceremony and I was touched to see our friend put a ring on his wife's finger, especially since at our civil wedding, we weren't able to do that. Once the judge pronounced the couples as husband and wife, hubby and I signed the marriage certificate as witnesses to our friend's marriage. Since our friends did not tell their respective families or friends about the civil marriage, I will respect their privacy and not post any pictures where they are identifiable. Also, my husband's decision to turn off the flash on my camera and his atrocious photography skills rendered the courtroom pix blurry and the subjects semi unidentifiable anyway.

A shoe is a magnet for children

After the ceremony, we went back to his wife's old apartment at the assisted living complex where she lives for a small celebration. We picked up some fried chicken at our favorite chicken restaurant and some ice for the drinks, and had a delicious dinner of fried chicken, baked beans, cole slaw, potato salad, and biscuits. The baby ate her fill of the feast, as did the rest of us. Before our friend came to get us, I kept telling hubby to go to the store and get a fruit tart as a wedding cake, since our friend can't eat gluten and his wife isn't crazy about cake. But, we didn't get the chance to go because it was horrendously hot outside and my husband didn't want to wreck something in the car by making the trip. Fortunately, his wife bought a pack of eclairs from the store bakery. They would have something nicer for their church wedding, since that was the more important one. While we sat around and digested the food, the baby explored and played around on the carpet. She had once crawled on that very carpet several months ago when our friend's wife moved into that unit and the living room was still empty. But, eventually, little batteries ran out and she fell asleep on the way home.

One last zoot (note: I have no idea what those white colored blobs are in this picture. I saw them after I'd taken the picture, but I didn't notice any dust or bugs floating around at the time and they did not appear in subsequent pix. But since this is a senior living facility, there's no telling what it could be)

I'm very happy for our friend. I wish him and his wife the best for their new life together.

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What My Husband Taught Me About Love

Good evening, dear readers!

Despite its many delays due to both my health and my many technological mishaps (my number pad and function keys on the keyboard aren't working...again. My hubby swears he didn't do anything to bugger them when he worked on it earlier...), the 21 day blogging challenge is nearing its end! Day 17's prompt is a rather personal one, but also appropriate in light of the upcoming Valentine's Day holiday.

Before I met my husband, I was a sheltered and isolated young woman. I had been forcefully denied the privileges of dating and navigating my way around the pitfalls that come with it lest I be distracted from my rigidly enforced educational goals. In spite of this suppression, I did experience crushes on fellow students, though I knew they were in vain. As someone who was naturally emotional, it was hard to suffer these feelings in secret because my environment was not conducive to such an expression. I had to force myself to become asexual, lest I run afoul of my family's rules.

His birthday, before we were married. 2012

Meeting my husband was in many ways a godsend. Here was a man who in spite of his substantial baggage, was more of a parent to me than my biological progenitors! He gave me the space I needed to mature emotionally and establish confidence in myself by helping guide me through the more difficult moments of life. I had not intended to fall in love with him, but the more time I spent with him learning about computers and playing with his cats, the more attached I became to him.

It was the cats who really helped me come out of my shell. Before I met my husband, I was terrified of animals and the germs they carried. After I met him, he would invite me over to his tent in the hoarded private junkyard he called home to play with the kittens his mommy cats were always having since they were still young and impressionable. He would teach me about the different breeds, how to pet the kittens, how to hold, feed and play with them. From the kittens, I would gradually work my way up to the adult cats. Most of them never cared for me, with the exception of two of the mommy cats. But playing with the cats was my first lesson on the unconditional love that animals give their humans, and the emotional cues I learned from the cats would eventually spread towards their human caretaker and he returned the feeling. At last, I was free from the oppression I had been subjected to and could acknowledge that love was a healthy emotion conducive to living a healthy life.

At our church wedding in 2013, we had selected St. Paul's letter to the Corinthians as our second reading (note: "charity" has also been rendered into the more familiar "love" that we know lines 4-7 to be). I wanted this particular reading because it illustrated that true love comes from God. It we do not love God, then we cannot love each other because it is only from God that love and the life that stems from it comes. This lesson was continually reinforced by my husband living his Catholic faith all the time because that life gave him the graces he needed to love me as his wife and his animals as God's creatures. This love also helped our marriage stay together in the face of some pretty stiff odds. It will also solidify the foundation on which we will raise our children.

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Schadenfreude and Scandal

Since my return to blogging last month, I've made it a point not to immediately comment on a major news story until later on when all the initial rabbling is passed and the frothing at the mouth has been reduced to a drool.

And the raging carpet chewing has subsided as well

But, I can't help but tune into my inner schadenfreude at the Ashley Madison hack that's been going on. How ironic is it that a website meant for cheaters to anonymously hook up got busted and now has their shit out all over the internet for everyone to see!

I figured that government officials would have profiles on Ashley Madison cuz, well, they're government officials! What else completes them like having a piece of ass on the side? But I was just rolling over with laughter when I heard the infamous Josh Duggar had some profiles on the sight too.

To understand why I was so amused to see that a purported "family values" and "pro-traditional marriage" man like Josh Duggar had an account on Ashley Madison, it's because I have very little tolerance for sanctimonious, bah-bul thumping assholes like his sort. Those kinds of people might well have "hypocrite" tattooed on their forehead. And when their hypocrisy is exposed, I just grab my beer and popcorn and watch the fall from grace commence.

You gonna share that popcorn, Mikey?

There are two big lessons to be gained from watching the Ashley Madison scandal:

1. Do not cheat on your spouse (goes without saying, but it's amazing how many people don't get this)
2. If you're gonna cheat, don't be dumb enough to PAY for a profile on a cheating website. You WILL get caught, one way or another. 

Even the most diligently-covered adulterer can never completely hide their tracks; someone sees a credit card statement or gets a notice bounced to the wrong email, a website hack happens, the adulterer slips up and tells the spouse outright, or the spouse finds out the truth on their own. And if you've been spending your hard-earned money on this shit instead of putting it towards covering the needs of your family, well, you deserve whatever bad shit's coming. The infidelity is bad enough, but putting your family finances at stake to support that vice is inexcusable.

Before he was called to take over teaching a class at the Mt. Angel Benedictine Abbey in Oregon, my favorite priest from the other church my husband and I split time at warned us about schadenfreude. The Catholic Church teaches that to take pleasure in another's misfortune is a form of pride, one of the Seven Deadly Sins.

I know I shouldn't laugh at Josh Duggar's fall from grace. But when you know something about how bah-bul thumpers operate and the mindset they carry, when one of them slips and causes a scandal, one can't help but feel vindicated. We saw that trainwreck coming a mile before it happened.