Well, it's here. I have been thinking and dreading the arrival of this for sometime. What is it? It is September. September used to be the month that Genie and I looked forward to more than any. It was OUR month. Both of our birthdays as well as our wedding anniversary are all in September.
It is not like we celebrated them with huge blowouts or anything like that, but it was more of a month to recognize each other with the love we shared. To look back on our lives and make our plans for the future.
So when three years ago, on Genie's birthday, she was diagnosed with breast cancer, September changed. We now had something in OUR month that we did not want to celebrate. It was a very sobering occurrence that I hope and pray no one else will have to deal with. But I will tell you, she and I looked at each other and made a commitment to each other to fight this damn thing till the end. In that deal was another side agreement. In joking fashion I remember telling her she "had to make it to our 20th anniversary." The month that the cancer was detected, we had celebrated our 17th year as husband and wife. So you can do the math...we won't be celebrating year 20 together. It was a joke three years ago. Never in my wildest fear did I think there was a chance that she wouldn't be here. She was going to beat this damn disease and we were going to celebrate September 5th for a very, very long time.
When I think about what we went through on our wedding day, sometimes I wonder if we should have made it as long as we did. We got tested. I am not sure how many people actually know all the things that went wrong on our day, but I will tell you now.
My ONLY job as the groom, for the wedding was to find and hire the photographer. I met with many and finally decided on a guy who was probably almost 60 years old. His work was wonderful and he had all the experience in the world. So I tell Genie this and she seemed a bit skeptical, but she trusted me. So on our wedding day, the photographer goes to be with Genie and the bridesmaids as they get ready to take pictures of them getting ready. Genie was a bit perplexed when she met the photographer. I will explain in a bit. So pictures are taken and off into the limo go the girls. In the meantime, myself and the groomsman climb in our limo and off the the Hakone Japanese Gardens for the celebration. The Gardens are atop a winding and fairly steep hill. We arrive and so as we are getting prepared, the photographer comes up to me and my guys to take our pictures and he comes to me and says "Hi, I am you photographer." My response..."No you are not!" Turns out, the guy I hired had to have an emergence root canal that morning. How about a phone call? Okay, I guess you are my camera guy. So I remember him taking a bunch of pictures throughout the ceremony and all seemed okay. So the ceremony ends and we climb back in our limos, Genie & I as well as Robby and Luanne and head to the reception. I begin to look around in the limo and it is different. We were to be riding in the limo that brought me and the groomsmen to the wedding. This was not the same car. Turns out, that the brakes were going out in the original car that brought us there, so during the ceremony the company changed out limos. Are you keeping track? You know how Genie was with signs. That is 2, photographer and car. So on to the reception. The hard part is over, what else could happen? Well, not sure if we missed something in the agreement with the place of our reception, but before we were ready to go, we were told that we need to shut down the party. Say what? So before we were ready for it to end, we had to end it. So, Genie goes to collect her purse and belongings and we realize that her purse is missing. It wasn't at the reception and it wasn't in the limo. Her purse had been stolen. Are you kidding me? That's 4!!! So off to the hotel we go.
As most of you who have been married can attest to, you really don't eat much at your reception and since our wedding was at 5:00 pm, neither of us had eaten very much that day and we were starving!! So off to Der Weinerschizel for chili dogs and fries. We pull up to the drive-thru window and before you know it all the employees are looking at us. We were both still in full wedding garb, tux and wedding dress. So back to the room and I will now skip to the morning. About 6:00 I wake up and I feel like crap. Mind you, this does not have anything with the amount I drank, I know a hangover and this was not one. Genie got here first bout with "in sickness and in health". I needed some Pepto Bismal and I needed it soon. So she gets dressed and goes and gets me some. It seemed to do the trick, but I was not feeling well. We had scheduled a celebration in a park the next day for many others who we could not invite to the wedding, and since we were not leaving for our honeymoon till Monday. While we were there, I still was not doing to well. As people begin to show up we hear that several other people were not feeling good either. I was blaming the chili dogs, but as it turns out, about 12 people got food poisoning from our reception.
About a week passes and it is time to view our pictures. When seeing the photos something occurs to me. Our substitute photographer sucked!!! Pictures were blurry and not well done. Also, there are a bunch of pictures missing that we knew were taken. I had individual pictures taken with each groomsman and I only saw one. There was not even the normal wedding party photo. You know the one, bride and groom in the middle and so forth. It was taken!!! You have got to be kidding me...right?
So that's 6 signs that maybe we weren't supposed to be doing this. As it turns out it was signs that we could make it through anything due to our love for one another. So when breast cancer came along...another bump in the road. Well, it was a challenge that proved too great.
So when Wednesday, September 5th comes, I am not sure where my head will be at, but I will be celebrating with her in spirit because I know that what we shared can't be measured in years, but only in a lifetime!!!
Love you Genie...Now and forever!! Happy 20th!!!
John
