little bitty girl

Me: (in a hushed whisper) Don't cry, ok.

Stefan: (in a bewildered voice) Me? I never cry at these things. I'm just weirded out that we're actually early at a wedding. I've never seen the seating part of it before.

Me: Loud sigh.Don't cry. You don't have waterproof mascara on.

Stefan: Oh, you want me to tell you not to cry. You're gonna cry anyways.

Jamie comes down the aisle with his parents. Sarah is the first of the bridesmaids to come down the aisle. I feel my heart flipping a little. Then the rest of the girls quietly stroll by. Julie, Jen, Lindsay, Erika, Ra, and Lita (with Zyga hiding against her skirts). By the time Ra walks past, my eyes are already full, threatening to spill over and when Sylvia walks down the aisle, that was it. I mentally tell myself that it wouldn't do to cry during the entire ceremony.

The pastor starts the ceremony and then it starts raining.

On June 3rd, Sylvia and her high school sweetheart, Jamie got married. As I mentioned, it had started torrentially raining but everyone took it all in stride and they got married underneath a covered bridge. It was actually quite lovely and intimate, and you could hear the rain drops pitter pattering against the rushing of the stream. The pastor was quite entertaining and un-pastorish.

It was really one of the best weddings I have been to (sorry, Syl but mine was the best in my mind) and I spent most of the time laughing, crying or dancing. It was just so them - intimate, sophisticated with a slight quirkiness, lots of joy and laughter. Their family and long time friends were absolutely lovely and fun. You could completely see how they shaped both Jamie and Sylvia to be the adults that they are today.

I remember telling some people who don't know Sylvia how excited I was about going to the wedding and often, the next question asked would be,"How long have they been dating?" I would reply,"Since Syl was in grade 10, I think" and those people would often say,"That's really weird, isn't it?"

Perhaps marrying your high school sweetheart is not as much of a norm as it used to be, but I think we're just lucky to find the love of our lives when we do find them. I must admit that I've never really hung out with both Jamie and Sylvia but they're always laughing when I do see them together. In my books, laughter is one of the most important things in a relationship.

At the wedding, I was lucky to see a tiny glimpse into what their relationship with each other is like. Sylvia, in my mind, has always been this incredibly calm and poised person. Nothing ever seems to fluster her and in the midst of chaos, she and Jen are usually the voices of reason. At some point during her speech, she faltered and needed to lean back on Jamie for a quick second. She quickly glanced at him while he rubbed her back and said something assuring and she managed to make it through the rest of her speech.

That's who Stefan is to me. He's the guy who I can be completely vulnerable and insecure with and he's always got my back. I try to calculate the probabilities of how long both of us could possibly live and I always think to myself,"40 or 50 years just doesn't seem like it's enough." Secretly, there are parts of me that wishes that I could have met Stefan sooner and yet at the same time, I know I probably wouldn't have been the person that would have wanted to be with him back then.

But I often think, how lucky Jamie and Sylvia are to have had all that time they've had together. I can't wait to celebrate their 50th wedding anniversary.