The Road to "I DO"

Don’t let anyone tell you that a wedding is about the couple.
It is not.
It is all about the family. What they want, what they need, what they wish you would do.

Our first hurdle was the date.
We chose May 28th, 2008. Yes, it is a weekday. Yes, it may inconvenience those who have jobs. However, it was our day. Sadly, we learned on in this part of the journey, that is “their” day too. However, we held on not wanting to make changes.
“So, why the 28th?”
The 28th day mirror’s Andy’s birth date in October. It is also the same date in January that we expressed our feelings to each other. It came naturally to us.
Bottom line, we both felt that those wanted to share our special day with us would make the effort if they could.

Our second hurdle was the church service… or lack thereof.
Neither Andrew nor I are religious. We are spiritual people, with love for our maker, but we have no love for any church at this time. For us marrying in a church to please either parent would have been hypocritical and inauthentic. This did not go over well with either parent, but we held firm and compromised with a blessing from a pastor.

The third hurdle was whether to have our nuptials open to family and friends. We liked the idea of only having our witnesses at the Attorney General’s office. We wanted to celebrate with family and friends, but yearned for a private “I DO”. Again, I believe both parents would have preferred to be present, but they were kind enough to honor our wishes.

Well, other than the above, the only other hurdle was the number of guests at the reception. Boy, did we lose this battle! We started with a guest list of forty. Then it climbed to fifty within a fortnight. By the day of, I was wondering if one hundred and sixty chairs would be enough!

I remember my friend Liza saying that her sister seemed so glad to be married. Unfortunately, what I think Liza’s sister was excited about it was that there was no more “wedding planning” after the wedding date. Believe me, Andy and I KNOW the feeling!
~ With peace, love and joy,
Tindi & Andy Amadi