Two weeks ago my house was filling up with people of all ages from all over the world. They came to enjoy Vermont summertime,travel, food, and Sonja and Nuno’s wedding. Though the days were hectic I tried very hard to immerse myself in the laughter and buzz of activity around me. At one point my living room was full of engineers, linguists, computer nerds, financiers, artists, musicians, educators, lawyers, and assorted other “older people” playing board games. I went to bed that night with the pleasant rhythm of laughter and conversation rumbling in the background. The wedding day itself, June 4th, was a perfect day: 75F, sunny, breezy. The ceremony and reception went beautifully and everything was over in about a minute. Late that night I looked out from a second-story window onto the moonlit roof of the large white tent still standing in the yard. “My beautiful tent,” I said to myself (although it isn’t really my tent at all and was gone the next day) and I felt a little sad.
Now the weather has turned cold and rainy and my house is empty. Sonja’s lovely bouquet of Baccarat roses and white lisianthus is faded and droopy. The leftovers are all gone. We’ve made the last trip to the airport for a while and now it’s time to return to “normal life.” As each hour carries me farther and farther away from the wedding, I try harder and harder to keep a bit of it alive in my memory.
You see, I’m starting to understand that these Big Events really ARE big and that there are so few true milestones in life. I realize there are many people I saw on that day I will probably never see again. I met people whose lives, the next time we meet, will have drastically changed. I most likely will never have a beautiful white tent in my yard again. Little details: Nuno’s tie arriving at the last minute, Sonja’s old red shoes under her fancy gown, the way Paulo slept so peacefully through the whole ceremony, the flowers in the yard–seem precious already.
I’m caught up in a whirlwind of happiness, regret, exhaustion, pride, relief, and–suspense. I hadn’t realized how much mental energy I’d devoted to this project until it ended. Now there’s a wide open space in my brain, a big intimidating blue sky of possibility. My first inclination when faced with such openness is to fill it as quickly as I can. I hate this feeling of wistfulness, these shadows and ashes of emotions. I’m trying, though, to let the aftermath take its course, to watch the tide ebb until it’s finally gone. For, I realize, these quiet moments of reflection are big events as well. I don’t need to rush.
