Quite the Character
I missed writing about Quite the Character because I have already written about our biggest characters here, and here. But there is one character in my life today, who is quite the character in his own right. See scary stuff.
Scary Stuff
Our family and ancestors appear, from most accounts, to be happy, honorable, loving people. These people were either fearless or too practical to have any scary experiences. Even our rule-breakers weren’t scary characters despite their proclivity for being “bad boys”. But here’s a scary story…
Eleven years ago, my boyfriend had just been laid off of work. He’d had a good run, but the industry he worked in was becoming volatile from an employment perspective. It’s one of those industries that contribute to the decline of needing people to perform tasks through technology. Yay technology.
Anyway, we lived together for many years and just never saw the need to get married. Neither of us had or wanted children. We both had good jobs with benefits. Two of the biggest reasons to get married did not apply to us. We were together, owned a home jointly, and were happy. And, well, if it ain’t broke, don’t fix it, right?
We weren’t sweating his lay-off and were driving around the countryside one day chatting about all the opportunities ahead of him. He could change careers and do something he enjoyed more (he’s very outgoing and quite the extrovert – 180 degrees opposite me). And somehow, the topic of marriage came up again, and we affirmed that there really was no legal need to get married. Except…wait…he no longer has medical benefits! We had a reason to get married! And it was a financially practical reason, not for love or anything (I do love him).
My ideals of marriage ceremonies fall more on the practical and conservative (I’m weird that way), and I was just happy to be with him no matter what, so I left it to him to decide when, where, and how big or small we would make our wedding. Meanwhile, since we were out and about, we stopped at the courthouse to apply for our license. We (he) decided on a small wedding, and I mean S M A L L.
Our closest 8-10 friends were invited to our house to act as our witnesses, and the Mayor officiated (it’s a small town of 1700, not hard to know the Mayor who’s actually quite a character, himself). Our next-door neighbors found out about it and arranged for a teeny tiny reception up the street at the local coffee shop. It all happened so fast (within a week or two, I think) that my groom placed a shotgun on the dining room table as a conversation starter for fun.
Now that I write about it, I realize we had a good ole’ fashioned historic country wedding, not unlike many of my ancestors – probably.
And the date? Well, it was 11 years ago today that we were married. Anyone who asks why we were married on Halloween, and my husband grins like the Cheshire cat and proclaims – “Because I get to say my wedding was the scariest day of the year!” What a ham.
Our Many Pasts 