(Yeah, I didn't blog for a few weeks, and now all the bloggable items in my head are stacked up in overflowing piles like the contents of a hoarder's house. I have some composition-related news stuff, but I'll save that for another day.)
I have been married to my incredible, amazing husband Matt for nearly ten years. Ten yeeeeears. Good god. He ought to get a medal. Recent planning of our anniversary celebration has reminded me just how unusual our situation is among our peers, many of whom are only getting married now, a decade behind us. We, on the other hand, were more or less children; when I hear about people in their early twenties getting engaged, my first reaction is always, "That's so young!" before I realize that we were only 23 when we took the plunge. ["You Know What Turns an Unstable Relationship into a Stable One? Not a Wedding Ring."] It was different for us, though. We had to get married just to give our relationship a chance because we lived on different continents. Before I met Matt, acquiring a husband was never a priority. I was even slightly averse to marriage as an unnecessary institution. Matt and I still laugh to remember our attitude when we got engaged: Honey, I love you so much, I will even marry you if that's what it takes. But against all the odds and no doubt many expectations, our relationship, sealed by wedding vows, has been and still is the most wonderful thing ever, and the most important thing in my life; together we have gone on the coolest adventures, worked on insane projects, weathered disastrous emotional crises, grown closer and grown up (and we continue to grow), and never stopped being best friends. It sounds wretched cheesy when I type it out, but it's true.
We also haven't had kids, and neither of us are really looking to have any in the near future, which is another thing that sets us apart from most people we know. This has been on my mind lately too — ten years ago, when I similarly felt no maternal urges, I figured that if I were ever to change my mind, it would be around now. I check myself ever other week, wondering if the desire to procreate is down there somewhere, hiding under my guilt for avoiding the cat litter perhaps, but I can see no sign of it. I'm happy with my life. I'm working through an annoying depression that has hung around for a few years, but my external life is terrific. I feel no need to change it by introducing a child into it, and I don't think a child would improve it. And I like kids. I really do. What can I say? Jesus suffered the little children, and he didn't have kids either.
Anyway, for our tin anniversary in September, we're throwing a big party and playing some live music as Up Your Cherry for our friends and family. There will be some guest stars too — Jess Lennick and I are possibly pairing up to present an Ayn-themed duo, Inverse Phase might be spinning some tracks, Jordan Smith of Tears for Agnes might be flying in from Japan, and Matt's been jamming with a few of his friends from work who may or may not be ready to play out by then. So far we've decided to hold it at PhilaMOCA, which is right down the road from our house, and we're thinking of asking our favorite neighborhood restaurant Honey's Sit 'n Eat if they'll provide catering (so local! hipsters++!). I also need to find a good cake source. Can't have an anniversary party without cake. For our wedding, we did multiple cheesecakes: plain, white chocolate, strawberry, and Snickers. It may have been the best part of the day.
I'm really excited about all this because planning fun things with Matt is, well, fun, and it gives us (me, mostly) a reason to devote a bunch of time to writing and rehearsing Up Your Cherry songs too. It's difficult right now for me to set aside time for UYC because I have the pressure and weight of an unfinished dissertation opera forcing itself downward on my mind and forming some pretty gnarly guilt diamonds.
Another handy spousal nice-time distraction from the opera is the redesign of my website(s), which I'm pushing forward from later this summer because some horrid evil scripty nonsense has somehow been injected into various pages of my current site(s), and it's easier to nuke it all from orbit now than clean it up knowing that I'd soon be changing everything anyway. I bounced some ideas off Matt this past weekend, and I'm excited about the new format I want. This week I'm going to do some freeform design brainstorming on my own (it's actually more like scrapbooking) and hopefully come up with some mockups in Photoshop for Matt to begin to implement. I'm so grateful he's not only very able, but apparently willing, even though this is technically work for him. Every time I come back to website coding after a hiatus, I am a cross-eyed idiot, and it takes forever to get my bearings. I used to make a point of relearning everything I'd forgotten and being extremely hands-on in the implementation process, but I've realized that's just me being a stupid control freak and having a chip on my shoulder about needing to know how to do everything for myself. If I never delegate, NOBODY CAN BE BETTER THAN ME AT ANYTHING EVER!!111! LETTING OTHER PEOPLE DO THINGS FOR ME IS EVIDENCE OF INCOMPETENCE!!11!!!!!11!!!! Thanks for that value, Mum, real helpful.
Last thing: a couple of weeks ago, Matt and I headed west to our old stomping region, Central PA, to attend the premiere of No Sanctuary, a fun film project I acted in back in 2005. Jake Stetler, the film's director, has been editing together the film whenever he's had the opportunity over the past eight years, and he was proud to be able to show it to an audience of friends and family at Ephrata's Main Theater. Our friend Kendall Whitehouse showed up as paparazzo:
at the Main Theater in Ephrata, PA on May 24, 2013.
 |
| Last year, to celebrate the tenth anniversary of falling in love, Matt and I went back to New Orleans and recreated a bunch of our goofy snapshots from 2002. |
We also haven't had kids, and neither of us are really looking to have any in the near future, which is another thing that sets us apart from most people we know. This has been on my mind lately too — ten years ago, when I similarly felt no maternal urges, I figured that if I were ever to change my mind, it would be around now. I check myself ever other week, wondering if the desire to procreate is down there somewhere, hiding under my guilt for avoiding the cat litter perhaps, but I can see no sign of it. I'm happy with my life. I'm working through an annoying depression that has hung around for a few years, but my external life is terrific. I feel no need to change it by introducing a child into it, and I don't think a child would improve it. And I like kids. I really do. What can I say? Jesus suffered the little children, and he didn't have kids either.
 |
| Mmmmmm. Cake. |
I'm really excited about all this because planning fun things with Matt is, well, fun, and it gives us (me, mostly) a reason to devote a bunch of time to writing and rehearsing Up Your Cherry songs too. It's difficult right now for me to set aside time for UYC because I have the pressure and weight of an unfinished dissertation opera forcing itself downward on my mind and forming some pretty gnarly guilt diamonds.
Another handy spousal nice-time distraction from the opera is the redesign of my website(s), which I'm pushing forward from later this summer because some horrid evil scripty nonsense has somehow been injected into various pages of my current site(s), and it's easier to nuke it all from orbit now than clean it up knowing that I'd soon be changing everything anyway. I bounced some ideas off Matt this past weekend, and I'm excited about the new format I want. This week I'm going to do some freeform design brainstorming on my own (it's actually more like scrapbooking) and hopefully come up with some mockups in Photoshop for Matt to begin to implement. I'm so grateful he's not only very able, but apparently willing, even though this is technically work for him. Every time I come back to website coding after a hiatus, I am a cross-eyed idiot, and it takes forever to get my bearings. I used to make a point of relearning everything I'd forgotten and being extremely hands-on in the implementation process, but I've realized that's just me being a stupid control freak and having a chip on my shoulder about needing to know how to do everything for myself. If I never delegate, NOBODY CAN BE BETTER THAN ME AT ANYTHING EVER!!111! LETTING OTHER PEOPLE DO THINGS FOR ME IS EVIDENCE OF INCOMPETENCE!!11!!!!!11!!!! Thanks for that value, Mum, real helpful.
Last thing: a couple of weeks ago, Matt and I headed west to our old stomping region, Central PA, to attend the premiere of No Sanctuary, a fun film project I acted in back in 2005. Jake Stetler, the film's director, has been editing together the film whenever he's had the opportunity over the past eight years, and he was proud to be able to show it to an audience of friends and family at Ephrata's Main Theater. Our friend Kendall Whitehouse showed up as paparazzo:
No Sanctuary Premiere, a set by Kendall Whitehouse on Flickr.
Via Flickr: Cast, crew, and investors attend the premiere screening of Jake Stetler’s No Sanctuary at the Main Theater in Ephrata, PA on May 24, 2013.
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