The things they kept from me

My esteemed 86 year old MIL has often said to me, "Always tell me, don't ever keep things from me." It is her way of holding off old age, and letting me know she needs to be kept in the loop. She is a marriage counselor by trade, still seeing clients. When I married her son, she took me aside and let me know that if anything goes wrong, she'll always be on my side. Nice. Of course, there have been little things we kept from her over the years, things that could wait until a crisis was resolved, so that she wouldn't worry needlessly. But isn't all worrying needless? Well, not if you're in the business of listening to neurotics all day long; in her case, worry equals a living. Anyway, I guess my MIL and her son, my dear husband, didn't want to worry me about a few things over wedding weekend.

Oh and Bob's best friend Al, a member of the Big Chill group, was keeping a secret from all of us. The day before the wedding, his mother died in an assisted living facility in FL. This 85 year old woman was a dear friend of my MIL, and like a surrogate mom to my husband from grammar school on into college. Al attended our wedding with his wife and two of his adult children and their dates, and never breathed a word of his loss until calling us on his way home. Now I look at some of the candids rolling in, and I can see the pain in his eyes. But he didn't want to "spoil" the Big Day. What a blessing he is. Amidst middle of the night ER visits, and a dog being bit by a copperhead (oh, it wasn't a bee bite, we found the dead snake in the garden), he thought we had drama enough and kept his secret. His mother was to be cremated, and the memorial service would be in a few weeks. The last time I saw his dear mother, last summer at a grandson's wedding, she pulled me aside, looked me straight in the eyes, and said "Honey, you're the best thing to happen to that family." And you knew she meant every word she said; I loved that lady.

When I called my MIL to tell her the news about her friend, it was very tough. She ended up in her cardiologist's office and came out with some changes in her meds. Then she told me that she'd been feeling bad for weeks.... She didn't want to worry me, otoh, she also didn't want to drop dead at the wedding! Ah life. I was once told that a classic anxiety situation is standing on stage to sing, but you also really have to pee. What do you do? This is not a dilemma in my book. I would just go pee. I guess I'm too pragmatic to get myself a prescription for anti-anxiety meds! Although, I have to admit I was thinking of asking my doc for some sleeping pills leading up to the Big Day; and in retrospect, maybe I should have.

Once, a long time ago, my husband wallpapered our kitchen. He waited a few days, and then showed me where he had hung the tiny pattern upside down in one spot. This falls under the heading of, "Things I wish he'd never told me." A few days after our daughter's wedding, he said to me, "Should I tell you about a small glitch?" And of course I looked at him like I was about to murder him, but how could I say "No?" He didn't know what happened, but we were four napkins short. I started going over the ER visit/rehearsal dinner day, hadn't I brought up all the blue napkins from the basement for a final hand-off with the rosemary and twine to the wedding planner after arranging for my brother's hospital discharge and my dog's pet sitter emergency vet back-up plan? How could 4, out of 130 napkins disappear? And we only had 108 guests, which equals only 104 blue napkins, which means we were missing 26 napkins!? He told me the caterer just used some white napkins they happened to have with them, nobody noticed. Don't you just love it when guys say things like that? Nobody noticed! I went over this in my mind for a few minutes, and then I just let it go. Just like that. It was over and done and I'm not here on this earth to impress anyone.

My daughter was in her bride/zen mode on the Big Day. She was the opposite of a bridezilla. After trying to battle a spider, she had her priorities straight. And she taught me a lesson that day - to stay in the moment. I'm trying to stay here, in the moment, now that the hoopla is done, and the chuppah is down. And a funny thing happened. A lovely woman who writes a MOB blog, asked if I'd like to guest write sometimes for her. And I said, "Yes." I'm not sure if I'll continue on here, but you may want to watch for me there, writing about all the small moments on this journey. http://notmymotherswedding.com/blog/
Thanks for reading!