my valentine

Small announcement: I'm skipping the last three days of the 30-letter challenge. It's my blog, & I can do what I want. I was having a hard time picking topics for those last three that weren't revisiting themes I address too frequently on this blog (how cool my parents are, how much I love my husband, how much I miss my family...). The tumblr 30-day challenge is still a go, so check that out.

We celebrated our Valentine's Day early this year, getting ourselves out on a Saturday instead of doing the usual sit-at-home-and-read-while-watching-French-television routine. Joe got a haircut, & I met him after. He gets his hair cut on Grande Rue, my favorite street in town. We walked passed the Duke's palace, the medieval homes that are now antique shops, the fancy cheese store, the cobblestones spelling "1477" to commemorate the battle of Nancy and ended up in Place Stanislas.

It was sunny, and the cobblestones were warm as we crossed the square that was once again filled with families and tourists. The aquarium is behind Place Stanislas, & they let you in for free if you have the Nancy Jeune Culture cards, which we do. These cards cost five dollars & get you into just about everything in town–& get you discounts at restaurants & cinemas. Can't beat that.

We spent an afternoon staring at frightening fish, watching children fall in love with the Amazon or swirling seahorses, checking out a tank where the aquarium is growing its own corals & looking at stuffed animals. You can check out more pictures of our afternoon here. And an afternoon out always means... a new Where's Joe's Head?

Our original Valentine's plan was to head to Excelsior, the beautiful Art Nouveau restaurant in town. While we want to have that experience sometime in the near future, we were much more in the mood for an afternoon in one of our favorite bars, so we headed back across Place Stanislas, paused to watch a group of musicians play Brittany Spears songs & offer free hugs (no joke–it was just like college in the States).

We took up residence at a pub, buying several large bottles of our preferred Belgian brewery's offerings & talked about how excited we are with how life is going–I'm finally trying to organize things & get essays published; Joe got another poem published; we're knocking down our debt each month & we're still falling in love with each other.

Couldn't ask for a better first Valentine's... except maybe less salt on the pizza we ordered on our walk home. Capers, olives & sardines should have given us a clue, but ouch. Joe was awake most of the night drinking water. I took two bites & thought my taste buds would never rehydrate themselves.

I hope you all have a happy Valentine's day or enjoy skipping the holiday–whichever you prefer. Still haven't gotten the special gift for the special someone? Check out the gift ideas post from a few days ago.

The sun is out again. Joe's first words on getting out of bed? "Sun again? Two days in a row?" We're going to soak it up with the blinds wide open & spend the day how we usually do–ticking away at the keyboard & getting organized for the coming lessons. Bonus activity this weekend: cutting my hair. I wasn't exactly excited about spending 30 or 40 euros on a haircut. When I showed up for my appointment, saw that the salon was closed, waited & saw that it stayed closed, I took it as a sign. I'm meant to cut my own hair. How hard can it be? At least its long & all the mistakes will be less noticeable. Maybe we'll find out that Joe's true calling was to be a hair dresser.

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marriage, day 7

Today is our one week anniversary. I got a call from my mom this morning: It was absolutely pouring in town. When my sister got home from tennis practice, they were wringing the rain out of her clothes. We couldn't have been luckier.

Today is also the one week mark: Next Saturday, we will be on a plane heading East. We've spent hours over the last few days mapping out that first week--the Metro stops we'll need, the restaurants we'd love to see (Laduree & Les Deux Magots in particular...). This has gotten me incredibly excited for the adventure we'll have, the love we'll feel walking Paris together & spending our first night abroad on la rue des Abbesses. It's gotten me excited about sharing culture, experimenting with photography, speaking French & blogging the experience...

It has also gotten me horribly depressed. I've been sleeping more. I've stopped writing. I've been eating anything & everything fried. I ate meat. I felt sick, slept more and didn't feel any better. I want to put my sister in my suitcase & bring her with me.

I am having separation anxiety. This is life. This is an extreme case of leaving the nest for your new life with your spouse. This is a crash course in Adult Living. This is a romantic adventure, a mark for the kind of life we hope to live & a massive turning point in my relationship with my family. We're close. Like peanut butter & jelly close--we stick. Now, we're learning to hold together across bigger distances. Some days, that's harder than I thought.

Today, I tried not to have one of those days. While Joe's mom prepared food for an extra wedding reception for his family tomorrow, we got booted from the house & sent over to New Harmony for a day. The town is a failed Utopian community and, I can't lie, felt a bit like The Village.

Walking between the preserved cabins, I thought of my father. Each time we pass a one-room building that is in semi-isolation, he's quick to decide if he could live there or not. He usually could. Without electricity or running water. And he would love every minute of it. Today, standing in from of a one-room cabin with muslin curtains & a polished wooden floor, I found myself thinking, "I could live in that."

I was more surprised when I said the phrase to my husband. They say that you turn into your mother and marry your father. Over the past week, we've learned that each of us is more like both of our parents than we'd every imagined.

It was hot. The air was humid. My face was sticky. We were thirsty. We headed into a small restaurant, the Red Geranium, and skipped the menu. We headed straight for the bar. Joe got his usual, the coolest whiskey we could see on the shelf. Today, that was Buffalo Trace, a bourbon that was new to the bar. I settled in with a large bottle of Ayinger's Bavarian dark lager & let it warm my insides until everything the divorced, child-spoiling, easy-going, Ohio-born-and-raised, knowledgeable bartender said made me smile and let out a small giggle.

Conversation drifted to & away from spirits & breweries. When we settled back on the topic of whiskey, I said that I was trying my hardest to like it. I admitted that it was in large part due to the old-fashioned-sipping Don of AMC's Mad Men. Without realizing it, we'd convinced ourselves to order an old fashioned. I was nervous: There's a sweetness to bourbon that I can't wrap my stomach around. I try to be amiable, but it insists on being contrary.

We sipped; it was smooth; my nerves were calmed; my husband was smiling. The roof over our heads was covered in a hand-painted mural of trees. Light was streaming through to canvas-covered windows. I was in the moment, completely content, listening to a man give us an old fashioned as a wedding present and using the experience to look forward to all of the shared moments Joe and I will have in the days & years to come.

We're almost done counting down. Soon, we'll be adding up. Days are already passing like cars on these country roads we're driving. We're afraid to sneeze & swerve too far.

one hundred fifty-two days

An epic day of wedding adventures.

So here’s the breakdown. A total of $228.36 got us:

• flowers and supplies for 4 bouquets, 9 corsages and 7 boutonnieres
• an aisle runner
• a garter (which Chloe was a bit shocked to find that she would be slipping onto my leg)
• a plume pen for the guest book
• fabric for the ring bearer’s pillow
• ribbon for pew markers
• a bottle of French wine to celebrate our successful planning, possibly saved for Joe but possibly had on a late night with my mom while still in Ohio
• a caramel latte after a nice lunch with mom and Connie, a family friend with access to a floral supply store (hence the massive savings)
• a new pair of flats, since mine were splitting through the bottoms and filling with water
• fresh copy of The Bell Jar that I can write in to my heart’s content (Mom likes this, since that means I’m not writing in hers)

So, taking out all of my distraction spending, that means I spent less than a third of what we had budgeted for flowers… and that spending included a million random purchases. Thanks, Hobby Lobby and flower supply store!

Taking distractions into account, I’m really excited about this wine. A new wine shop opened up next to Hobby Lobby. Of course we went in. Not even a question. The owner said that after a few years in “Corporate America” and was ready to do something he really enjoyed. Kudos to you, sir, especially since your interests serve my own.

He said he was glad to meet another lover of French wines. I smiled, letting him think I knew about wine and wasn’t just obsessed with the country as a whole. I snagged a bottle from the Rhône region, where I spent that summer. I found out that they had wine tastings twice a week, and knew how I’d be spending my Thursday and Saturday afternoons (and disposable income).

I laughed even typing that, as the idea of a free afternoon–let alone disposable income–seem abstract and impossible, no longer a part of my life.

The savings today though, spending a quarter of what was estimated on flowers even after deciding to make a small spread around the unity candle, made me feel like I’m giving Joe back a little of what we lost.

I know that tonight, when I tell him I switched from delphinium to hydrangea with freesia and baby’s breath accents he’ll sound interested. When I say that they are all deep purples, maybe leaning toward blues, he’ll be able to picture a purple blog on a green stem.

“I don’t know flowers,” he’s said on several occasions when I stressed about picking the right arrangements. Well, me either, but the strategy of walking in and finding the color I liked best worked out really well. Here’s a preview of the hydrangea that will give most of the color to the day.