The Aftermath

So no one lets you know how you’ll feel after the wedding is over.

The realization suddenly hits you that you’ll never wear a white dress (or white vest in Matt’s case) and you are sad, devastated, and distraught by this fact. You’ll never be the center of the head table, have people tell you how gorgeous you are, have people wish you well, plan their day to spend with you, you’ll never be the one that people want to see kiss….it will never be your day again. SAD.

Here’s what I’ve decided…
1. Dickinson State U’s Foundation has a Charity Ball that requires formal wear to attend…Matt’s going to rent a tux and I’ll wear my wedding dress.
2. Next wedding we go to, we have our outfit picked out. They say it’s rude to wear white to another woman’s wedding, but I also have a white purse after Labor Day…to heck with standard social conventions.
3. We are going to put our fancy attire on every once in awhile and go crash weddings…we’ll call it impromptu vow renewal.
4. We’ll occasionally put out dress attire on and stay in and watch tv and eat fancy meals.

Yes, I’m mourning the loss of our beautiful day. I’m mourning that it’s over…done…and I’m trying to keep anything possible since the day. I’ve looked over the pictures that we have a million times. I wore my wedding hair and makeup two days in a row. I still have my wedding nails and am trying to keep those as long as possible. We’ve unpacked the suitcases, I’ve rehashed as much as I can on the blog, we’ve been using the gifts, we got 99% of the thank you’s complete. We have the dress at the dry cleaners and have even picked it up. The tux is long gone back to the rental place. But my feelings of post-partum wedding blues are there. What’s going to happen after the honeymoon? When I’m officially no longer a bride? When I can’t think of us as “just married”? We haven’t gotten pics back from the photographer yet…and I think I’m okay with that because that will be my last wedding bliss. Reliving the memories for a final time. Even thinking about that makes me want to go get into the dress and defrost the cake. Matt even rolled his eyes when I made an attempt to prolong the wedding by clanging the glass at dinner. Obviously, he’s made peace with this end. I haven’t.

Okay…so while you’ve been reading on the deconstructed wedding…Matt and I have been going about living our boring nonwedding lives. (SIGH). We go to work. We come home. We eat dinner. We go to bed. BORING.

We have had a few weekends of settling. We had his parents visit us for a weekend and we were able to do some running around town including a trip to Fluffy Fields Vineyard and the Pride of Dakota Show. Was good to visit with them a bit as we really hadn't had them alone since our birthday camping trip before the wedding. And they brough fish for us. They can come anytime they want if they want to bring me...I mean, us, fish. Mom also gave us fish to us too!! Can't wait to see them smoked!

Best meal: I came home and Matt had prepared smoked ribs for me. I added cornmeal to the mix. We ate on the patio. The scary part was how dark it got so soon. I’m not ready to put the patio furniture away. I’m not ready to be done being a patio person. I liked our breakfast and suppers through the patio door. I liked the shelter of the tree and how peaceful it was with the greens. And now I’ve added my lights (am planning on adding more).

ALR: WHY DOES IT HAVE TO BE OVER?
MJR: You aren’t happy?
ALR: I’M SO SAD…IT’S DONE AND I’VE GOT NOTHING TO SHOW FOR IT!
MJR: You have a Husband!
ALR: You know what I mean!

Twenty-five days since our wedding....