An Extraordinary Saturday: End of the Line

Thank you all for the nice comments about the details.  I really thought that no one would care or notice… so thank you!  It’s a thrill to have my fidgety habits appreciated.  So here we are, this is the last of the wedding series.  Unless I realize later I’ve forgotten something wonderful.

The dance floor was doing this.  I am not a very good dancer; neither is DJ.  We opted not to have video.  At one point a friend encouraged my mom onto the dance floor by saying “Don’t worry!  There’s no video!”  So this is the only full-floor shot I’m sharing, because that is a lot of trust.  I’m only sharing this one because you have to see my dance.  You can see what’s happening, right?  Oh, shame.

Shame aside, I loved dancing in my wedding dress.  The swishy skirt was really fun.  It was warm, though.  I went outside several times to twirl for some cool air. 

Kid B was enjoying the totally decent beer selection.  He’s recently of legal age, so the novelty of drinking in front of Mom hasn’t quite worn off yet. 

I was convinced that everyone wanted to dance with me.  I menaced Kid B, who did not want to dance.  I pointed out that he was drinking my beer. 

So he danced with me. 

Kid A did too.   (Kid A is somewhat healthier, for those of you who’ve asked.  Nothing much has changed, but there’s more hope.  Plus he now outweighs me by four pounds, which is awesome for both of us.)

DJ and his dad really like tequila toasts, so we stashed a bottle behind the bar.  Apparently DJ’s mom wasn’t in on the plan…

But, oh, okay!  I’m told that even my cookie-baking friend Jules had a sip or two, and she doesn’t drink.  She hates the taste of alcohol.  How are we friends, again?

Katie and I are about the same height, and she’s thinner.  This photo is a trick of perspective, but look at that twirl!  Swish. 

I always wanted friends like these.  Thank you for being my friends, Lady Squad. 

I’d asked our DJ to play a last slow-ish song at the end of the night, Wilco’s California Stars.   It was a narrow miss for our first dance – we belt out the odd lyric at home all the time – but the lagging beat is irresistible for a tipsy stagger around the dance floor.  So DJ and I did just that.  Our lastlast dance was the Traveling Wilburys’ End of the Line. 

Our friends gathered into a circle, swaying a few steps left and back a few right.  It wasn’t very coordinated, there was a lot of near-falling.   Kim did her best to capture it, but there was a whole lot of movement that was nowhere close to on beat.  I couldn’t have scripted that moment, belting out slightly cynical lyrics arm in arm with our friends, married to the football player I met in the library.  It’s one of the many I’ve tried to fasten tightly in my memory against age or distance.  Then it was over.  The party, that is.  The marriage is the shine on my apple every day.

So that’s how DJ and Julia met, fell in love, got engaged, broke up, lost track of each other for five years, found each other by chance, talked on the phone for five hours, tried to be friends, fell in love again, told their unsurprised parents, negotiated bookshelf space, got a dog, parented Julia’s brother, got engaged (again), planned a wedding, and lived happily ever after.

Kim from Bow Tie Photography knows about the good angles.