As Far As The Eye Can See

My mom’s recent package – she’s sent me about four since I moved to Juneau, which is four times the amount of packages she’s sent me ever – consisted of Trader Joe’s Trail Mix (with dried cranberries and sunflower seeds!), a red fleece vest and black blazer that were hanging out at her house that no one was using, a chapstick, a black pashmina, and a Burt’s Bees “Evening Glow” Natural Lip Gloss. The latter items are for the upcoming wedding, my upcoming wedding with Scott.

Our wedding pretty much follows the pattern of the last few years of our lives – a scant amount of planning and enough faith that it’ll just work out.

It’s interesting to look back at what events we did plan for – trips. Not all, but certain trips have required advanced planning. Not a lot of planning but more than, let’s say, two weeks, which is about how long we’ve been planning our wedding (which is happening in an even less amount of time).

Our first safari to Serengeti and Ngorongoro National Parks took many phone calls, visits to multiple travel agents, wiring money from the US; several weeks of organizing and a lot of logistics went into Scott’s Kilimanjaro climb; and the Trans-Siberian journey kicked our asses the most in terms of advanced planning and visa acquisitions. So it’s not like we’re incapable of planning ahead.

But more trips have involved very little planning – Cuba, East Africa, India, trekking in Nepal, Gombe National Park, climbing Ol Donyo Lengai, Mongolia, Laos, and Cambodia. We both left for Bhutan not knowing if Scott would actually get a visa to be there. As I got acquainted with the Kingdom of Happiness and Scott got his first dose of Thailand, more than a week passed before we heard the final verdict.

Scott just reminded me that even for really important decisions, like dog ownership, we fly by the seat of our pants. One Saturday morning in July, Scott said, “We need to start looking for a dog,” and by that evening we had already transferred money to Lota’s first parents and eagerly awaited his arrival two days later. And look how great that’s all working out.

What does this all mean?

I’d like to say I’ve thought long and hard about why the concept of a “normal” wedding doesn’t appeal to me. Why don’t I want any of the trappings of a real wedding – dress, ring, cake (okay, maybe I want the cake part, but I tend to want cake for many occasions in life)? I’ve thought about it – yes – many times, but more than actual thinking and analyzing, I’ve shrugged it off. I can give good reasons – cost and stress – but that doesn’t necessarily explain it all.

Typing these words and all the (long) pauses in between is forcing me to think about it (oh, the complication of writing – thinking!). The best answer I can give is that what I have right now with Scott is enough, more than enough. I can’t imagine a ceremony or party making it any more real or better or meaningful.

And that’s what it should come down to – meaning, right?

All of this is not to say that as a female growing up in America I didn’t have fantasies about what my wedding would be like. I wanted to get married in a grassy field, barefoot. Later I would add fireworks and a live band. In more recent years, I remember one time thinking, ‘This is where I want to get married.’ It was during our trip to the Serengeti.

At various times, we could be surrounded by wildebeests as far as the eye could see, or intently watching a leopard in a tree, or staring in awe at two cheetahs hanging out on a rock, but we also had long stretches of just driving through expanses of grassland. And it was during one particular stretch of driving when we were the only safari rig in sight and everything around us was so stunning and alive and pregnant with possibility that I thought, ‘I could get married here.’ It was just Scott and I and Scott’s cousin JJ and our guide Baraka.
 

We weren’t engaged at the time, or else, who knows.

It’s not the Serengeti, but getting in married in Wrangell is just as fitting, because it too has been the site of endless possibility. After all, it’s where Scott and I met.