NOT Going to the Chapel….

...in California, that is. [Oh, yes, I am so clever, starting a sentence in the title and finishing it in the body of this post.]

However, in lieu of the go-go West Coast, we are heading up to staid and charming New England. In an amazing development, Massachusetts has just made it legal for Our Kind to marry in said state without actually being residents of said state. I am sure many of you know this already. And if you don’t, let me be the first to tell you: That thunderous sound you hear is the gays heading for hills of Massachusetts in droves, playing show tunes and the Indigo Girls in their fabulous and crunchy/localvore wake. (Yes, I just stereotyped.)

This is huge. Human rights and equality aside, now we don't have to plan packing up me and two babies and bringing a Helper Person and heading to California in September for a week while Nicole is there for work. The downside is we won't be packing up me and the babies and bringing a Helper Person and heading to California for a week (I was looking forward to it. I love San Francisco.) And the OTHER downside is I will be playing the role of single-mom-of-two for a week while Nicole is living it up—or working, as she calls it—in San Francisco. On a side note, the last time she was there she called me from the tub in her super luxurious hotel room, where she was about to read a book, and order in dinner and sleep a full night’s sleep all the while ensconced in a tower surrounded by San Francisco fog. And me? I was solo-flying for the first time in stained pajamas and an empty stomach with two babies. But who’s bitter? Actually, I am not bitter but couldn’t resist the split screen image of her night vs. mine.

So off to Massachusetts we’ll go. This is a double win for us because we have much fondness for that state and spend a lot of time in the lovely hamlet of Northampton and its surroundings. Talks of a vacation home in that region have been bantered about again. I have emailed a Justice of the Peace and asked her to officiate the ceremony. She has not yet emailed me back, which has stirred up impatient rage, I mean feelings, in me, but I will give her 24 hours and then I am moving on to the next J of the P on the list. We will write our own vows (a task that Nicole doesn’t relish perhaps as much as I do. Mine will be so long, I know this already) and we will most likely keep it small. In other words, just us and the girls and maybe our friends who just moved to Northampton.

I ask Nicole what she is going to wear and she didn’t even try to pretend that this has crossed her mind. Her wardrobe falls into two distinct categories: Work clothes (suits and jackets and French cuff shirts and the like) and her not-working clothes (pants and shorts with critters on them). Neither seem very appropriate for THE MOST IMPORTANT DAY OF HER LIFE. (Emphasis for Nicole, should she be reading this, to prod her into thinking more about her wardrobe. She should also start writing her vows because that is going to take her a long time and I require at least one page, one-and-a-half-line-spaced, and two pages if she chooses to use bullet lists, which she probably will). I haven’t thought too much about it what I will wear but I am thinking, just off the top of my head, maybe something with a strapless silhouette, a fitted bodice with a full skirt and all-over box pleats. Oh, and a back zip, not pesky side zip.

If I hold flowers (which I doubt) they will be hydrangeas. I will put much thought in the something old/something new/borrowed/blue requirement. There will be no Wedding March or walking down of aisles.

We have selected a date in the end of October because fall is our favorite season and October is our favorite month and the foliage will be spectacular. I can see it all now, those reds and yellows and oranges. And me in some clashing color. Hmm. I may need to rethink my wedding attire.

And while I won’t be wearing a gown by any stretch, I will be booking my appointment to try them on some time n September. And I can’t wait. I hope that we can take pictures because I will try on the puffiest dress and the most expensive dress and the tackiest dress and ones I like as well, and then create an album of me in these dresses, but I still think I have time on my hands to do such things.

But one step at a time. First the justice of the peace and the date will be set in stone. Then, in mid September, we need to travel to Massachusetts to apply for or intention to marry certificate. And then, staring in October, it will be very hard for Nicole to get rid of me.

If you are a justice of the peace and reside in Massachusetts and are looking to make a little $$ and don’t mind long-winded vows, please email me. And if you live in the area and know of some special little place that would be perfect for the exchanging of vows, I am all ears as well.

Pictured above, how ca you resist those colors? Nothing beats fall in New England. Also pictured, our first four-of-us family portrait. You could stick your fingers in my eyeballs and roll my head down a bowling lane. My head really looks like a bowling ball! Also pictured, Miss Avery playing. Was she perhaps foreshadowing with that bride-like veil/ fitted crib sheet n her head?