Summer Wedding

I’ve been grading research papers. I know a lot more about forest restoration than I used to, and lithium mining in Afghanistan, and the likelihood that one of the ebola viruses will become airborne. I’m current as well on coral reef destruction and plastic in the ocean.  

I know my students are relieved to be finished, and I’m glad not to drive to the southern tip of Whidbey Island twice a week, but I’ll miss them.  I’m saying goodbye to them one at a time in my head. 

Our son, Victor, gets married in three weeks in Sacramento, a few miles from where I grew up. He and Chelsea, his green-eyed, sweet, patient, pretty, and very smart fiancée, graduated from the nearby University of California at Davis.

They’re in Bellingham now, resting up for the big day. Two happy people.

Victor is our second child but the first of our kids to marry. All the hard labor of wedding planning has been done by Chelsea’s mother, Dianne, for which we are extremely grateful. We want to get the few things that are our responsibility right. My husband, Warren, is Victor’s best man, so he has a speech to write.  I have to try not to make the honking and snorting noises that accompany hard crying.  The rehearsal dinner is squared away, except for a few details. Alex and Mary, Victor’s siblings, have arranged for their wedding party duds. Warren and I have to dance, at least briefly, something neither of us remotely does. We checked out some DVDs from the library, but we haven’t played them yet.  I think we’re embarrassed even to dance in front of each other. This may be a problem.

After that, summer. Vegetables and writing and feet in rivers.  It gets dark in Bellingham about 10:00 now.  We have all the time in the world.