This Is Life

I am at least slightly miserable this morning, having been awake half the night with heartburn, which is most unusual for me. I suppose it was the result of the culminating effects of my lately crappy diet, my burgeoning weight gain and stress and anxiety.
Maybe.
I am trying to get things together here in order to leave tomorrow. Of course I haven't started packing and at this point am just finishing cleaning up after the pancake breakfast and doing laundry and oh yes, writing this.
I am obsessive about writing. Far more than any other thing, I am almost certain.

I have been extremely calm about the idea of leaving for Asheville this whole past week but today it seems to have come thundering down upon me- the realization that yes, I am about to leave and in less than a week there will be a wedding and I do have some part in it and there are things which must be attended to here, before I go, and that I have to pack and that once we get to North Carolina there will be a myriad of things to do.

For one thing, Jessie has asked me to write a little something to say in the wedding. Something short. "Anything," she told me. "You can write about marriage or dogs or Jesus. I don't care."
So I told her that I would say this: "Here is my marriage advice- JESUS! don't get a dog!"

Of course that will not suffice. And that is hardly the only thing I have to do but it is looming on my mind.

But it is a beautiful day here. The bees are making noisy love to the wisteria blossoms and we have discovered that we have bluebirds in the nesting boxes Mr. Moon set up a few years ago. This is always a miracle, to have those birds so close. We stay away from them as much as possible but when we see them we are thrilled. They are almost unbelievably blue, those shy birds.

I have so much to do and I should get to it. And even as my anxiety creeps up upon me, even as a million thoughts go through my mind, I am thinking of how lovely it will be to spend so much time with my darling Lis, whom I have referred to here as The Cake Baker and Sanity Maker. The last time we drove up to Asheville together Hank was with us and we listened for long stretches of time to the audio version of Keith Richards' autobiography and never finished it and Lis says she wants to hear the rest on this trip. Call me crazy but there is something incredibly soothing to me about that idea. And we'll be staying in a beautiful place and our hands will be busy, making the cake and on Wednesday the rest of the family is coming up and in a way, it will be a huge family vacation and it will all be focused around these two.

My baby is getting married. If there has been calm in my soul about these upcoming events it is entirely based on the reality of the rightness of this marriage.

There is an image I have in my head and it is so beautiful. It is of Jessie, married and happy and pregnant, playing mandolin, the ringing, singing instrument right up next to her belly, her babe, and Vergil playing music with her. I think of that and I am calm. Yes, I know. I am projecting way into the future but isn't that what a wedding is all about? It is the beginning of the family and the life and the adventure therein.

I remember when she met Vergil and she called me and she said, "I have met someone."
And as her mother, I knew this was important.
It was. It is.

Last night she and Vergil went to see Ina May Gaskin speak and a screening of the movie, Birth Story: Ina May Gaskin And The Farm Midwives.
On the one hand, this may seem like a strange thing to do for a couple a week away from their wedding but I find it perfectly fitting and good and I love Vergil for, among so many other things, going with her to see the movie, to attend such an event. I know he loves my daughter and I know he cares about her happiness and I know she feels exactly the same way about him.
And no matter what craziness or chaos occurs in the next week, what emotions arise or what tiny problems threaten to overwhelm all of us, I know that at the very bottom and the very top and all through it is the plain and simple fact that this is a celebration of love and of two people who are doing the crazy, brave, perfectly natural, wonderful thing of joining hands, joining hearts, saying the words out loud that will be the very basis for what comes next.

The devil may be in the details but the angels will be in the dancing.
Dancing hearts, dancing feet, dancing eyes, dancing joy.
The adventure begins, the adventure continues, the adventure, in many ways, never ends.

Good morning.

Love...Ms. Moon