In honor of Valentine's Day, when we are all supposed to be magically transformed into romantic couples professing our love for each other, I am reflecting on my relationship with my (mostly) wonderful husband. More specifically, how we become legally bound in a very unconventional way. Let me explain, to me, family is defined by the intimate relationships we have with people who have somehow made a dent in our lives and managed to stick around long enough despite the flaws of the relationship. Biologic ties are important because you can't chose who you are related to so you just find a way to enjoy them for all their quirks and good qualities. But just as important to me are the relationships I have with those who I have chosen to become my family -- they fill a space in my soul like no one else can.
When Jason & I met, we were both working in the same department which happened to be fairly small. Shortly after he was hired, he informed our boss that he was "something like a job whore" while wearing flip flops and shorts to his first day on the job. One of our initial conversations went something like this: "You know, I'm genius. Really I am." At this point, I didn't know he was trying to impress me. I thought he was just a random weirdo making conversation. Despite the oddity of this conversation, I found myself laughing (Rule # 1 to be in my family -- you must make me laugh & allow me to fill your world with humor). He eventually convinced me that we should hang out and watch tv because he was tired of sitting in his mom's basement at night watching tv by himself. Just to tell you how clueless I was about his interest in me, I wasn't even phased by "I live in my mom's basement" because I wasn't thinking of him as a future partner. He arrived at my house that evening with flowers for me and a gallon of chocolate milk for the boys. To this day I never let him forget that he slammed Nic's fingers in the hinges as he came in the door, something which he adamantly denies.
Fast forward a few years -- we had moved our family to Indianapolis for better jobs and schools. I was making a transition to a new job which did not offer group health insurance. After looking for a few weeks into private health insurance, we realized we couldn't afford the coverage. So what does any rational couple decide? To get married of course. Because we don't believe politicians and antiquated laws should define family, we were not in a rush to make our relationship legally binding before this point. But this changed things -- we had to figure out a way to get married in less than two weeks before my insurance ran out. I was in charge of the arrangements -- something simple with a few family members. Now, here is where things get very interesting. I am horrible with details -- I can write things down and never find them again. And I LOVE shopping the day after Thanksgiving, which happened to be the day we picked to get married. So on the morning of our wedding, I was up at the crack of dawn and out shopping. By the time I came home, I had not allowed enough time to properly prepare for the wedding and was in a rush. We pull ourselves together and bolted out the door to where I thought the wedding was to be held in a local government building. Nope. I was wrong, dead wrong with our parents following along behind us. We drove, and we drove, we yelled and I cried. Finally, we return home to try to figure out what to do. After all, I NEEDED insurance no later than Monday. Mr. Resourceful decided to go to the internet to ordain my mother and his mother to perform the ceremony in our tiny apartment so we could get our marriage on paper. As they prepared for their impromptu role of officiating a wedding, I come out of the bathroom with my dress tucked into my panty hose, marching around the living room ranting & raving about my mistake. My father-in-law was trying very hard to tell me about this faux-pas but I ignored him for a good 3-4 minutes while showing way more than any girl should to their father-in-law. Finally, the phone rings. If we can meet the pastor at the RIGHT building in 30 minutes, he can perform the ceremony. Once we rushed to the court house, my mother-in-law decided she wanted to sit in the judge's chair like Judge Judy to take pictures. Unfortunately, she had purchased a new pair of 4 inch wedge shoes to wear to the wedding and took a flying face-plant onto the stairs as she made her way up to the chair. We are all laughing at this point at the absurdity of this whole event. We go on to say our vows and I somehow forget to add an "s" to the word "arm." Jason still teases me that I only promised to hold him in my "arm." (hey, I may needed to keep my options open and use that arm for someone else later). As we arrive at the part of the ceremony where we kiss, Nicolas becomes enraged (after all, I was HIS, not anyone else's. This was also the stage of budding mental illness for him, and his emotions were on overdrive). He begins pushing and flipping over chairs while yelling like the Hulk. My mom intervenes and crisis is averted while the pastor looks on in horror. I'm sure he was thinking this was a marriage destined for doom. However, in our eyes, this whole crazy event only confirmed we were perfect for each other and as a family.
From this point forward, our lives have been filled with unbelievably crazy moments. There was the time Jason tied our king-size mattress to the top of our mini-van so we didn't have to rent a moving truck; a trip to the middle of Ohio to pick up a vehicle we purchased off eBay (that's another story altogether) only to arrive and see several of the features of the vehicle were mysteriously "stolen" the night before. Then there are the tours of timeshares I always manage to talk Jason into in Vegas, just to score free stuff. We play this game of good cop-bad cop just to toy with the salesman's emotions. During one of our "performances" the only way I could break Jason's insistence that we were most definitely buying the timeshare was to blurt out "I'm pregnant." He knew I had won this round of good cop-bad cop. The look on the salesman's face was priceless because he was caught in this make-believe awkward moment that he didn't know was make-believe (he was also missing his front tooth which he claimed had fallen out of his dentures only earlier that morning). We spent the entire bus ride back to the Strip laughing uncontrollably, while the rest of the bus watched as if we were a tragic train wreck they couldn't look away from.
So there you have it. That is how Jason became my family. Maybe, just maybe, I will finally commit and give him my other arm this year. No promises though, I heard Donnie Wahlberg may be calling.
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