Hello Goodbye

I say hello.
I say goodbye.

It's been fun - this blogging thing.
Thanks for reading the musings of a slightly strange girl who has an ongoing love affair with diet coke.

I'm taking up writing somewhere else. And, if for any reason you'd like to read that, feel free to email me at meandmydietcoke [at] gmail [dot] com

Thanks.

One of many things.

I've almost reached the two week marriage mark. I realize it's not a huge milestone, but it's the longest I've ever been married.

There are so many moments that I remember from the past few weeks. Most, if not all, include my family and friends. The people that make up my tribe -- the people that know me best, knew me before K. It was amazing to celebrate with women that I have known since we were all girls. To dance and giggle and toast with folks that have known me since the day I was born.

It was all too much. Overwhelmingly beautiful and precious and fast.

WHAT?

Dear Target,

While I am excited that you have ventured into this, I am a little alarmed... I'm supposed to buy a vacuum cleaner, a birthday card, a bottle of wine and NOW A WEDDING DRESS?

I can't decide if I hate the idea or if I'm just jealous it didn't happen before my whole shindig.

I'm Back... (from outer space)

Or Jamaica. Whichever is closer.
I'm back. And I am a married woman. In the past week and a half, I have wondered: When the hell did this happen? I am in awe of all of it. While I realize it's difficult to be unhappy while sipping fruity concoctions on a tropical beach, I must say - this marriage stuff is really nice.

I've got a ton of stories and observations that I will, most likely, bore you with. Some of it funny and some of it revealing my incredibly mushy goober side. I really liked getting married; I never want to do it again.

However, this morning - I better get moving. I'm off to the Social Security Office, the DMV, the post office to change my passport and the bank. I am officially dropping "Stauffer." I'm procrastinating.

Here's my favorite picture from the Honeymoon (one of about five). Just so you know, it rained every single day - several of those days it rained straight through. I loved every minute.

So

This is the point when split pea soup comes up through my nose and my head spins around as if my neck is its axis. (Having never seen the movie, I'm trying my best here to paint a vivid picture of the estimated stress of this week).

I am so excited.

I'll be back. After traveling south tomorrow and playing with family and dancing with friends and wearing a veil and then spending a lovely and ridiculously long time in Negril.

And becoming a wife. Oh my gawd, a wife.

Very Possibly

the best night I have had in Tallahassee.

I jammed to "I Love Beach Music" the whole way home.
I wanted to tie a scarf or belt to a chair a la Shag and practice.

Thank you.

Oh My,

I am homesick.

Convention Weekend -- the first one in ten years I haven't been to. Heck, I remember when we didn't even have them every year! I missed that, a lot. Thanks, ALB, for filling me in. It was the next best thing to being there.

I need sparklers for the weddin'.K. wanted pyrotechnics and we compromised on sparklers. Well, duh... You can't ship firecrackers. Don't know why I didn't think about that. So, I called my aunties and asked them to bring the contraband into Pinellas County next week. I must really be homesick if firecrackers are making me weepy.

By the way, if you ever decide to get married and you think to yourself, Hmmm, I think I'll just make my own veil. Don't. Unless you're directly related to Martha or that chick on DIY with far too much confidence in her bedazzle skills, just don't.

Making memories.

Do you ever imagine things? I sort of think it as an active daydream that I direct. Positive thinking with a movie screen.
I did it when I imagined myself winning the officer of goober at Girls State or when I imagined myself opening the rejection letter sent my USC Law.

I've been doing it. I'm trying - hard - to keep focused on things at hand. Normal daily things, work things, life things. The dog does not care that I am getting married but he does want his morning kibble.

I've been picturing myself walking down the aisle.I've been picturing myself dancing my first dance with my husband. Or cutting the cake or putting the ring on his hand or signing my name for the last time on the marriage certificate.

I am so excited.

Kleenex

(I am so on a roll today! Thanks RFT!)

I have loved the Big Couch Kleenex commercials since the beginning. The one with the Katrina Survivor? The one where she says something like, tears do not compromise my strength -- it makes me tear up. I love it. I adopted it as one of my personal mantras.

Okay, well - now there are commercials -- still with the big couch -- with folks talking about their moms. Ugh. "My mom is my best friend." "My mom is my inspiration." "My mom is the most amazing woman I know."

Dude, where's the person on the couch with the three thousand dollar therapy bill that says, "I am finally over my mother." Or maybe, "I no longer blame my mother." Let's have some reality. Not all mothers deserve a hallmark card on Mother's Day. Some deserve a restraining order.

I have not had good experiences with Mother's Days in general. I never could find the right card - even if I bought one or three. Don't even get me started on a present. There were many, in a row no less, where we weren't even speaking on the second weekend of May.

I would like, just once perhaps, for some truth in advertising. I personally like the one about no longer blaming the mom. I am almost, almost there. Almost.

The Yellow Bowl

My mom has a large yellow bowl. As a kid, we used it to make cookies or mac'n'cheese or some other recipe. It seems so simple - that innocent memory of a kitchen item.

I received a yellow bowl from a dear friend. And this past weekend I used that big yellow bowl to make dinner and it brought back so many dear, sweet memories. Dude, it's a bowl. Weddings make you emotional.

Shamed into Writing

Okay, okay... I felt like all I was writing were boring wedding details. Do you really care if I tell you about my family frame project or perhaps the moss pomanders I've created? No. No, you don't. Honestly, at this point - I barely do.

It's twenty days. Wait, nineteen. Ask K., he keeps a better count than I do. And I know that those days will go by in a snap. And then... Then I will be MARRIED.

I'm humbled by all of it -- folks coming together, making plans and traveling. It's a huge celebration and I'm amazed that it's coming together. It floors me.

How many dresses?

I've been taking inventory of my closet recently. There's so much stuff in there -- the gorgeous aqua silk dress with tiny light blue embroidered palm trees? Yup, I love it. But will I ever really fit into a size 8 again? And, more importantly - do I even want to?

I pulled out stuff that I haven't worn in a year... You know, the clothes you keep because there's that one day when you haven't done laundry in sooooo long and there must be something that fits that you can squeeze into and pair with a cardigan or jacket so it's somewhat presentable. (And yes, that was a long sentence. I hope you could follow it).

Goodwill will soon be receiving a large, random assortment of party dresses and jeans. My personal collection of clothing from the last three years --- gorgeous things with labels and then my favorites from Target.

Meanwhile, I realize I need to procure additional summer dresses. A) Summer has already started in Tally. B) This wedding stuff? It requires a bunch of cute dresses: showers, luncheon, rehearsal dinner - hello! Honeymoon. C) I am fat.

So, I've been looking. I thought I had time. Where did the time go? I have no time! I thought the white dress was the one I needed to worry about the most. Yeah, perhaps the most -- but not the only.

Another Wedding-Related Post.

While the Greenville News has disappointed me once again -- can't you spell people? It's K. with a "p." Get a new copy editor - whatever it takes. It's spelled correctly in the announcement (the part that I wrote). But in the photo caption -- they got it alllllll wrong.

We made it into the St. Pete Times. While K. can't stand the St. Petersburg Times, it might just be my favorite Florida news source. It's not owned by a big conglomerate and yet, it still manages to be the tenth largest paper in the country.

Anyway, the thing about being down south in the other south -- newspapers don't take the whole wedding announcement page that seriously. How many engagements were in the Greenville News? At least twenty. SPT -- probably three.

Six weeks from today I'll be a married woman.
wow.

And the other part of going to a wedding...

We've been to some weddings lately -- we're of the age, our friends are starting to pair off. We went to a beautiful wedding in Chattanooga the weekend before we were engaged -- we knew what was coming, and the romance of the evening swept us off of our feet. But, I had no idea the intensity and beauty of what it would feel like to know (really know) that I was getting married.

In 47 days.

I think we should probably practice our vows or something. They're good ole Methodist vows -- but the way I goober, I'm not sure I'll be able to actually say anything.

It's the real countdown now -- we're in the home stretch. Wow.

(Oh, and thank goodness... Even though the Greenville News had screwed it up at first, we were finally announced yesterday. For the girl who reads the announcements every Sunday, it blew me away to read -- in my hometown paper -- that I am engaged to be married. Weird, how those little things work. We're also in the St. Pete Times & the Tampa Trib, but those folks don't realize the importance of posting online!)

Most Incredible.

It was a most incredible weekend. My fiance and I traveled to see my aunt get hitched. It was gorgeous.

When I arrived at the mountain lodge and went to see her before the ceremony - I was breathless. My beautiful aunt: the wise, challenging, supportive, enlightening woman I knew... She was a bride. She wore flowers in her hair and I swear, she looked nineteen. And twenty-five, and thirty-two and forty-nine -- and all that she had ever been. She was completely herself. It was unbelievably beautiful. She was in every detail.

She walked down the aisle with my grandmother - to my grandmother's favorite hymn. And I cried. Sitting next to me, Chris held my hand - we looked across the lake and listened to my aunt and her now husband saying vows that bound them together.

Whew -- and what a party! When your seventy-five year old great aunt kicks off her shoes to do the Charleston you know you're having a good time. Everyone was happy - beamingly happy. Watching Chris talk, share stories and laugh with my family -- it was a joy to behold.

Thanks McCormicks, it was an honor to be present at your wedding. And it was a joy to see such love.

This? This is the most fabulous woman I know.

I owe her big.
(and yes, that's a six-pack bracelet on her arm)

Go n-eírí an bóthar leat.

May the road rise with you.

I had intended to join my best friend in Jackson this weekend. As much as I wanted to see the SBQ (and have a fabulous reason to use my egg plate), I'm staying home this weekend. I wanted nothing more than to see K-Cali, wear my Vagina Monologues tiara and play. I wanted to climb a tree; I was looking forward to a road trip in my new car.

Things happen. I swear it seems like things are always happening to me. Since I've removed the weirdo genetic material from my life, that feeling has dissipated. However, the recent blitzkrieg shook me just a bit. I am so glad - so indescribably happy - that I have the grace, understanding and support to take the ugliness I receive and turn it into something beautiful.

I am fine. I am going to be fine. And my life - it's something beautiful.

My former Vet's son... (stolen from FITS)

Dude. Love the new FITSNews -- and love the highlight of Dr. Verdin's son.
Verdin's district is next to the district where I grew up. I pride myself on saying I'm from Greenville, but let's be honest - the city line does not protect me from the Rams from Simpsonville or the Blue Flames from Pickens. And, I don't really want to be protected --

That's just the beauty of South Carolina.

SHUT UP!

Seriously, if they (meaning the gods & goddesses at Coke) can figure out a way to make my Diet Coke Habit healthier -- I don't even have words.

While Kramps likes to joke in the grocery store line about my addiction to coke, I realize that drinking a Diet Coke in the morning - and the late afternoon - is something I am not willing to give up. However, having a sparkling beverage might just make it easier for him to stomach.

I remember this warning/article from the Charlotte Observer years back. I'm not quite at her level, but I do share her hierarchy for fast food drive-thrus. Sometimes, a draft is all I need to turn a bad day into a good day.

Here's hoping the Diet Coke Plus tastes good....

I can't find it, but I believe her.

I talked a friend this weekend who giggled (who am I kidding, she cackled) when I told her I was nervous. She claims there's a quote - somewhere in this blog - that claims that I won't get stressed about this whole wedding thing that's happening in what - 68 or 67 days. Who was I kidding?

Dude. I am nervous. Not for one second about actually being married -- I would go to the courthouse this morning. I cannot wait to be married. But, all the details - all the tasks - all the projects ----- it's going to rot my brain.

And, just as a hint - and this could totally just be me, but if you (as a supportive person on the street or SPOTS, as it were) could just not tell me to relax, that would be greeeeeeeaaaaaat. You telling me, in your supportive way - or perhaps to just shut me up, to relax, only makes me more nervous. The pressure! What, I'm not supposed to be nervous? Really? Oh, okay - no prob. Snap!

Oh, and if I did this again -- as romantic as it is (and rather easy to remember) to plan a wedding on the day you met, the week after Session might not be the very best time.