photo credit: avia rosen

…every single emotion in the canon of emotions that can be felt, plus a few brand news ones that I’m sure I invented this morning around 6AM when I sprang out of bed.

And yet, I’m oddly calm and peaceful right now. It’s before the day has officially begun. I’m sitting in a gorgeous hotel room in an impeccably-restored Inn, in a town that R and I adore. I’m wearing this insanely adorable flower-print robe that my Mom bought my bridesmaids and me so we could take those insanely adorable pictures where we’re all wearing matching robes. My last set of Crest White Strips is stuck to my top and bottom teeth, nicely off-setting the cuteness of the attire. And out of the corner of my eye I can see the giant binder where I keep my 27 wedding planning Excel sheets, but somehow I feel no need to rush over and study it all again.

I’m sure that somewhere under all the excitement jitters I’m hungry and tired and terrified that it might rain, but right now I just feel great.

Today is a culmination of four years of knowing and loving R, but it’s really a culmination of 30 years of life. I wouldn’t be the woman that he is marrying (or that said yes when he proposed one year and two weeks ago) if not for the people who raised me to be this person. That includes my parents who are more overjoyed than I’ve ever seen them before, friends who have been there since I was ten years old, my sisters and my sister-cousin, relatives from all sides, friends from every stage of life, and now my new family that has welcomed me with wide open arms since the day we met. It also includes R.

Of course a part of me is scared about this next step. Marriage is this incredible life commitment passed down over generations, perhaps the most defining choice one can make. I am ready to signs that marriage contract this evening, but the moment doesn’t come without fears and pressures and statistics. And yet scary as this move is for an independent and (somewhat) controlling person who never, ever intended to share a closet, not marrying R would be the greatest mistake of my life. He is my just right person to tackle all the other scary, pressure-filled and static-laden areas of this crazy journey. I believe so wholeheartedly that we are better together than we are apart. Today a group of people that represent everyone we love and respect in life is here to support that decision.

TODAY IS MY WEDDING DAY!!! This day I’ve thought about since I understood the concept of a wedding. It is both a surprise in so many ways and yet everything I always hoped it would be, and so far it’s only 7:30AM. I’ll try to pace myself, but that’s not really my style. Something tells me that for the next 24 hours, my heart will be big enough to hold it all and then some.