The wedding hiatus

I apologize for not writing for two weeks and please forgive the brief hiatus from Hullaballooing- it is due to the fact that I am ridiculously busy with wedding planning. I'm not sure if it will settle down once I'm married but at least then I'll have wireless internet in my house and be able to write any time if I wanted to.
16 days until my wedding! And not just a wedding. A life change. A name change. I'm not sure at this point if I'm nervous or excited or stressed or all three. A wedding is a horrible thing to plan; I don't recommend it unless you have a couple of years and infinite patience and only 3 relatives. Failing all those, it will be worth it if it's what's required to start life with the person you're crazy about.
I discovered there are ways that things are done and there are ways that things are JUST NOT DONE when it comes to planning weddings. For example, you have to send thank you notes for presents you receive. I didn't know about this custom and I am used to expressing my thanks verbally and in person, but I have been educated about thank you notes now and will most likely send them out asap.
I went into a florist's the other day to choose flowers for my wedding. AFter being told that I needed to order the flowers I wanted weeks in advance in the right quantities, colours, etc., and get them made professionally, I decided to just go on the morning of my wedding, pick out what looked pretty, tie it together with a bow and go with that.
It apparently takes a minimum of 6 months to get a wedding dress- it must be shopped for, ordered, sized, and altered. Of course, that doesn't count if you have a friend like Yvette Smith, who looked at a picture I tore out of a magazine, made up a pattern, and sewed the dress of my dreams in four days. That including a sewing machine breakdown and a simultaneous packing for family camp.
Of course planning a wedding in 8 weeks is not everyone's cup of tea, but from what I've seen in other friends, no matter what the length of time before their wedding, they get majorly stressed out. I was told, by the time your wedding comes, Heather, you won't care about anything except marrying Robin. It is true. At this point I just want to marry him. Perhaps the elaborate social construct of weddings and wedding planning and brides and all that fluffy lacy fancy crap just serves the purpose of making two people see that all they really care about in the world is being together, and if they can survive wedding planning they can survive anything.
So, yes, everything is coming together for my wedding and it's going to be a good time, I think. I told Bob (who's going to marry us) that if it rains during the ceremony our plan B is to hold umbrellas. And if he mixes up our names or nothing goes right during the ceremony or reception I don't really mind. It's just a wedding. I have the rest of my life ahead of me to be a family with Robin Mercer and that's what I care about most.
So anyway, I can't guarantee that in the next three weeks there will be any blog postings, but please do keep reading after that because I'll still be happy and I'll still be in a hullaballoo and I'll still need to write to get it out.

Of boats and weddings

Can you believe I'm getting married in less than a month? We contemplated taking our time and planning a wedding properly, but Robin described a wedding to me as a door to a house. Why would you spend years and countless stressful hours and so much money just building a fancy door and forgetting about the house?
But the reality is that I am going to have a fancy wedding. I squirm at the thought of it. Of course like every girl I like to dress up, and I used to dream of a fairytale day when all the littlest details would be perfect.
But when it comes down to it I just want to marry Robin Mercer and move into his apartment and be a family with him. And I'm much more comfortable in flipflops and a sundress. And I'm scared that the waitresses at my reception will be better dressed than me.
I suggested to Yvette that I was a classy girl and she laughed her head off. So maybe I'm not classy.... but maybe I can pretend that I am for a day and have a proper wedding.
We seriously considered eloping on our boat trip last week with my whole family. In the end I'm glad we didn't because after 8 days with 18 family members on a 30-foot boat, I just about went crazy. Add a honeymoon to that mixture and I'm sure I would've jumped ship.
We sailed around the gulf islands and fished and crabbed and shopped and slept and threw up (I did most of that on the boat) and explored and played games (including a 4 hour croquet game) and fought and laughed. (I'm pleased to announce that my fiance came out on top in the fight).
And I love my family a lot. They are not all easy (and you wonder why I get accused of being difficult! At least I come by it honestly). Yet they are my family, which is something you don't choose but get stuck with, unless it is your fiance, which in this case I think God chose us for each other and made it impossible for us not to get together. At any rate, they are my family, and I love how diverse we all are. I love that my brother Sam has the creativity to design a croquet game involving jumping your ball off a tire ramp through a hoop. I love that Alpha brought enough clothes for a month, which came in handy when I didn't bring enough; and somehow she seems stylish even when camping. I love that Will sat on the front of the boat with Robin and Alpha for 3 hours, getting soaked by waves and chilled by a bitter wind, while only wearing shorts and bare feet. I love that Kiara and Betsy are both so beautiful and cute but in different ways. One dark and exhuberant and the other blond and sweet. I love that my Mom can be suffering from a concussion and a detached retina and seasickness and mothering woes and the loss of her own mother and yet, hardly ever complain. She is a soldier in the truest sense.
I love that my Dad can pilot a huge boat that he's never had proper training for and he can catch pots of crab and do all sorts of things by the seat of his pants, and that he loves us all enough to do it for us. And that he loves me enough to plan me a beautiful wedding.
But I am a Davies first of all which is why I won't be surprised if a fight breaks out on the dance floor and the rings don't show up and our get-away car is an '87 Volvo and my siblings put money on who will be the first to cry during the ceremony. It's my last month to be a Davies. I am happy and sad all at the same time.

Pain

I always said I would never become one of those mean grumpy nurses. But now I understand them a bit better, I think. Not that I am becoming one, but at least I understand.
Because people lie and cheat and steal. And they hurt and call names and defraud and all that stuff. So nurses (and other people of course!) get hardened to it and become insensitive.
This week at work I had to be tough with a few people, and that's hard for me. I like to be compassionate and kind all the time, but sometimes that isn't the right approach.
Take, for example, my patient Robert. He went to take a bath with some epsom salts to ease the discomfort of heroin withdrawals. He'd been in the bath room for some time and I got this funny feeling about it. Maybe he was in there too long.
I went to the door and called his name. On the other side of the door I heard snoring.
I unlocked it with my master key and there he was, completely naked, sprawled out in the tub sawing logs.
"Robert! Wake up!" I said to him.
I threw a towel over him and shook him and he gradually came too.
"What are you doing?" I asked him. "You were fast asleep in the tub! You could've drowned!"
"Oh, it's not very deep." He said groggily. "And it feels really nice on my sore back."
"Get out of the tub." I told him. "I don't want you drowning in here."
"Aw come on, I'll be okay!"
"Get out!" I told him. "If you're sleepy enough to fall asleep in here, you can go to bed."
He got out. Later that day I had to kick someone out. And I had to tell him that there was nothing left I could do to help him unless he wanted to be helped. It was a hard thing to say. I wanted to put my arms around him and comfort his pain but I thought about something I learned in a nursing conference last week.
The number one factor that influences a person staying off drugs or alcohol permamently is whether or not they feel enough pain. Pain they've caused those they love; pain in themselves from their choices. And if health care professionals (and christians, and counsellors!) work too hard to eliminate people's pain and suffering, we may actually be short-circuiting the process that will set them free.
I'm sorry that you are hurting, I say to him. But it is that hurt that will continue to worsen, that will eventually make you change.
So maybe on the surface I will appear to be a mean grumpy nurse. But inside, I'm really kind and compassionate.

Beds of daisies

I had detailed plans for today. I had promised my sister Hannah that I would take her shopping and we both like schedules, so I helped her write a list of everything we were going to do. I got up early, read my bible, went for a run, showered, had some breakfast. Got everything ready to go and then headed out to the car.
Instead of 'old dependable' (my giant silver volvo), I was driving Robin's little green tercel for the weekend. I got Hannah into her seat and buckled and then tried to fit her wheelchair in the trunk. It wouldn't fit. It was simply too big for the space. I sweated and pushed and tried to turn it around and take it apart and I finally wrestled the whole thing in and managed to slam it shut. I got into the driver's seat, turned my key in the ignition, and nothing happened.
I remembered suddenly that a friend had told me the night before that my lights were on. Obviously I had drained the battery. There were no other available cars to jump-start it. The only live vehicle on the street was Mindy, Will's little blue car with only three wheels. But it was across the street. I got out of the car. Got Hannah out. Wrestled the wheelchair out of the trunk and reassembled it. I told her we would walk to the mall. It was already getting hot and I envisioned myself pushing her the kilometer and a half uphill.
I was starting towards the house to get my flip-flops when my Mom came out.
"Heather, there's a battery charger in the garage that might work."
Sure enough, there was a car starter kit with cables and everything. I hauled it out to the street and popped the hood. My neighbor Albert was out watering the lawn and he came over and helped me hook it up. After a few minutes the car started.
I wrestled the wheelchair back into the trunk and got Hannah re-buckled in and we drove off.
We went shopping and sat and had milkshakes together and talked and then I brought her back home and went off to meet my friend Anna. I had to pick something up in the mall and we walked around quickly and then she had a lab appointment and I sat in the waiting room. I had planned on meeting Miriam at a certain time but I watched the clock on the wall tick and felt I was wasting my time, I should be doing something. I had nothing to read, nothing to knit, nothing to do. Nothing but wait.
Sometimes life is like that; you rush and rush and then there is nothing to do but wait.
When I finally left I fought through afternoon traffic to get to Miriam's and suddenly there was no more rushing, no more wrestling with things that didn't fit. We went for a walk and bought popsicles and lay on the grass in the park and strung daisies together into chains. It was wonderful.
Sometimes life is like that. I have rushed and rushed for many years. I will be married by 16. Okay, 18. Okay, 21. I will be a doctor by 23. Okay, 25. Okay, 28. I will try to fit myself into something that doesn't fit, like the wheelchair in the trunk. I have tried to start things that wouldn't start, like the car. I have struggled through traffic and fretted while waiting in labs. I've had to let go of 'doing'. I'm afraid there is more of that lesson to be learned, unfortunately.
But why? All I really want deep inside is to lie in a bed of daisies, to talk about interesting things, to enjoy friendship, to listen to children playing in the background and know that everything is all right.
Today I thought about becoming Heather Mercer, sometime very soon. I'm hardly getting used to being Heather Davies, it seems. Perhaps it takes a lifetime to get acquainted with oneself, to figure out what you really want.
I heard Hannah crying in bed just now and I went up to see her and I asked her why she was crying. After a long while I finally understood what she was trying to say between tears.
"You're going."
Yes, I am. But it's okay. I'm still me, and I'll be back to visit. I gave her a kleenex and as she fell asleep I thought about the adventures I've been on and the ones still to come and how sometimes the adventure is just seeing for the first time what has been in front of me all along.

New things

I recently did several things I haven't done before that had not quite the outcomes I was expecting.
1. Robin and I bought a red truck for a pretty good deal. Plus it comes with winter tires and a canopy, so we can go winter camping in it, or if times get tight, we can live in it year around. Unfortunately the red truck broke down. Fortunately Robin and his friend Rick fixed it today.
2. I bought a rocking chair at a garage sale and Marlene gave me an old stool and I decided to sand them down and paint them red and white. Unfortunately the paint cost me double what the chair cost. Fortunately I have lots left over to paint other things.
3. I decided to make a type of strawberry trifle/pudding the other day. Unfortunately it looked like baby puke. Fortunately it still tasted very delicious.
4. I spent an afternoon and evening with my future in-laws. There is nothing unfortunate to say here: despite all the stupid movies about the in-laws from hell, all of mine are wonderful people and they like me and are happy I'm marrying their son.
5. In an effort to have our girl's bible study in a more interesting location, I led us all to the beach on thursday night, and straight into clouds of mosquitoes. We quickly relocated to a grassy hill which turned out to be some kind of ant-hill. Fortunately the ant hill did not stop us from having a good bible study.
6. Someone called me on my cellphone in the middle of the night this week. I tried to answer the phone but the display light wouldn't come on. Finally I got tired of trying to punch the buttons in the dark and I sat up and turned on my light. Unfortunately I wasn't holding anything in my hand; I had dreamt the whole thing.
7. I didn't have any work scheduled this week or next week. Perhaps something will turn up; I don't know. But it's okay. I have lots of interesting things to do, like work in my garden and paint my furniture and cook.