August 20th. Feeling dull today.
THE day. Four years on.
Saw it coming. Should be purposeful in some deliberate direction. Should be laying my Ebenezer here or there, or going back to visit one. No real inclination. Knackered.
For nervous earlier weeks and frantic days, I’d ridden the joyful rising emotional currents of Allie’s much anticipated marriage to Kenneth. A happy distraction whose preparations unleashed an ant colony-like pre-nuptial industrial machine. Addressing, licking, sealing, stamping, sewing, arranging (think flowers), cooking, counting, cleaning, driving, shopping, picking up, dropping off, confirming, double-checking, reconfirming, et cetera, et cetera, et cetera.
The occasion brought back to Oxwell Lane a seeming flotilla of far and near flung family — like notes in bottles to their writers’ home — to stay, make preparations and celebrate, and to add another line or two to the story. Joined by flotsam friends and jetsam strangers-made-friends, more bottles were pushed ashore by converging streams and currents, whose notes are now scribed, stories made richer, rolled, replaced, and safely corked.
Sadly, all these bobbing glass note-bearers have been pulled back out to sea on an ebb tide, and the pre-nuptial factories have closed down.
On this fourth accidentiversary, work beckons. Nagged me for most of the three days I’d planned to be on a pre-wedding vacation. Seemed reasonable at the time. I managed to be mostly “off” post-marriage Monday, as Emily and Jonatan packed and flew back to Swede-land. But my hopes of taking off all of August 20 — THE day — on some special day-long excursion were usurped. Shoved off the calendar by a mob of meetings and calls. I did selectively speak of the anniversary with two or three colleagues that day, one of whom is four years on following her breast cancer diagnosis.
We later ordered-in sushi to compliment our typical “Taiwan Tuesday” evening repast of fried rice and dumplings. And before ending the day, I keyed in a Facebook shout out to as many names and groups as I could recall, whose support and encouragement had served in various ways to get us to this point. A feeble attempt. Hoping they’ll be skimming their Newsfeeds later and catch my Hail Mary thanks. I’ll catch up with others as our paths cross. (“Likes” and Comments later suggested some had been News-grazing” in the right spot.)
Be It Resolved and Deo volente, five years on is to be more deliberately celebrated.
Onward.
WheeledWords 