...fail proof...

I woke up Saturday morning around 7:00 AM because my body just wouldn’t let me sleep any longer than that. Never mind the fact that I’d been on my feet for two 15-hour days of wedding set-up. Never mind the fact that I’d only been asleep for a handful of hours. I was awake. All my girls were there at the hotel with me, and they were still faking sleep, so I turned on the light in the bathroom and cracked the door, made a cup of coffee, and sat down to write what I would say to DG in the ceremony that afternoon. It wasn’t more than half an hour before all the girls were awake and we just sort of leisurely sat in our PJ’s in the dimly-lit room trying to mentally prepare for the day ahead. Only a few minutes passed before my MOH’s husband showed up with fruit and bagels and cream cheese and GOOD coffee. (He was a God-send that day!) Once we had some breakfast in our bellies, we drew the curtains back to reveal the rain…the very heavy rain. I knew it was coming, so by that time, I had just accepted it. Our church was beautiful and there were tons of cool little nooks and crannies to take pictures in, so not much was lost. We turned on the weather and my MOH said, “Let’s just look at it this way: There’s a 20% chance of no rain!” Whatever. I wasn’t worried about it anymore. It wasn’t like we were trying to get married outside.

We proceeded to plug in the iPod and sing along to a bunch of ridiculous pop tunes while we were getting ready. We had four hours before we had to leave, so we were able to have fun and take our time. It was wonderful. There was hair and make-up flying everywhere. Licks being sung into curling irons and hairbrushes. People running around in their underwear. It was like the best slumber party ever….only at 8:00 AM. I plopped down in front of the window armed with my little mirror and my giant case of cosmetics to do my own makeup while all the others were taking turns in the shower. Occasionally, someone would ask for my opinion on this eyeliner or that bobby pin or whatever. I moved on to finish my hair and then curled and styled my mom’s and DG’s older sister’s hair. People said I was crazy for wanting to do things myself, much less for offering to help with my bridesmaids, but I had fun and it was good for me to have something to do.

We were only a few minutes behind leaving for the church. I ended up in the Yukon with my mom and dad and brother, two bridesmaids, a flower girl, and a dear friend. We somehow found ourselves bursting into song. “Going to the chapel and we’re…” We were feeling a little silly, so we started out singing really badly and out of tune, but somehow by the end of the chorus we had accidentally started singing in three party harmony. It happens. We singers can’t help it. Anyway, our trip to the church was really the first time we noticed the severity of the weather. We were on the interstate trying to make our way downtown and got stuck behind a pretty nasty wreck. My navigational-mastermind of a MOH directed my dad off the interstate and through the streets of downtown Nashville to our church. I’m pretty sure we made it there about five minutes after we’d planned, so I was feeling good. The rain was annoying, but we had big golf umbrellas and everything was fine.

Before I got dressed, I did a few minutes of final touch-up in the sanctuary to clean everything up. I think I even made some comment about how the lighting in the church looked even cooler because it was so gray outside. The silver lining, I guess. Our photographer friend had scouted out some pretty cool places within the church to take photos, so after I was in my dress, I was obliviously having my picture taken while the chaos was going on. My friend who’d coordinated all the musicians for the ceremony and was singing a solo himself had called to leave a panicked voicemail about how his car had flooded and he couldn’t get out of his neighborhood and he didn’t know what to do. Luckily, I had not answered my phone. My MOH got in touch with him and took care of it, I think. I think he ended up borrowing a neighbor’s SUV or something to get through the water. Another friend who was acting as our day-of coordinator for the ceremony called later to say they’d been trying to get to the church for almost two hours and weren’t sure they were going to make it in time. We found a quick replacement and pressed on to start the ceremony on time.

I knew things were bad when guests were still arriving just as I was about to walk down the aisle. There were obviously a number of people who didn’t make it at all. Once we got started the ceremony went off without a hitch. It was exactly what I’d hoped it would be and so much more…and gratefully, I felt really present and awake for all of it. I’ll write more about all that later on. There are a lot of things we did in the ceremony that most people don’t do, and all of them were REALLY meaningful to me. Anyway, once we arrived at the reception and saw how many of our guests were unable to come, we were a little disappointed. By that time, we’d learned about the flooding and the interstates being shut down. Don’t get me wrong, the reception was still wonderful….but there was this sort of scary, melancholy tone to it…simply because our guests had gone through a lot to be there at all. I still had a lot of fun, but the room felt pretty empty. We started making the rounds to talk to our guests and realized there were so many who had to turn around and go back home. One friend who lost their car. Others who had tried five or six routes before getting through. And everyone knew it was getting worse, and that getting home would be a challenge for most of them. About two hours later DG and I were headed out the door.

The next morning, our 8:00 AM flight was delayed a few hours due to more storms. We finally made it out of Nashville around 11:30 AM, and arrived at our resort in Mexico only a few hours later than we’d planned. Not a huge deal. We were still in shock that all of this had happened on our wedding day, but it wasn’t until Wednesday when we checked our email that we realized just how devastating the weather had been for our city. We opened an email from a friend to discover the following images…

(Source)

How? HOW did this happen on our wedding day? CRAZINESS! It was just insane. After having been back from our honeymoon for the better part of a week, we are still hearing stories of the absolute nonsense our friends and family went through trying to be at our wedding. I secretly wonder if I’m partly to blame. Back in February when DG and I tattooed our wedding date on our arms in roman numerals…I was slightly nervous that some natural disaster might come along and stop our wedding from happening. I even remember saying, “What happens if there’s a tornado, or a hurricane, or an earthquake, or a flood or something?!? We HAVE to get married on May 1^st now.” DG assured me that nothing was going to stop us from getting married that day….no matter what. And obviously, it didn’t. We are married….but IT SURE TRIED.

How?!?

People say rain on your wedding day is a sign of good luck. I usually don’t put any stock in adages like that, but if there’s any truth to that at all, I’m pretty sure the Great Flood of 2010 has ensured that our marriage is FAIL. PROOF. We are going to be married forever.

Note: DG and I and our families and close friends were fortunate enough to survive this crazy disaster without any real damage to our homes. I am immensely grateful and hope that you fellow Nashvillians were kept safe through the flood! Let’s get our hands dirty helping those who were not so lucky.