A Wedding at the Royal Park
Last Friday, I was lucky enough to fly home for an evening,
to celebrate with my family the wedding of my cousin littleholly,
and her beloved, Peter.
I will let their own wedding program begin this happy story. :-)
HOW THEY MET
littleholly and Peter shared a class at Kalamazoo College.
He thought she was cute.
She invited him over to play Super Smash Brothers.
FIRST DATE
Peter asked littleholly to go see the movie Big Fish in May of 2004.
Holly moved to Ann Arbor for grad school
in August of 2005...
... and Peter followed [for med school]
in June of 2005.
PROPOSAL
While on a cruise ship in May of 2009, Peter insisted on taking Holly outside to "look at the stars".
Instead, he went down on one knee and pulled out a ring.
ENGAGEMENT
He proposed.
She said yes.
They both cried.
And so we all came to the Royal Park Hotel this past Friday evening, seven years after it all began. :-)
The sky, blanketed with grey most of the day up to that point, suddenly cleared just as the wedding parties began to assemble. The sun, hiding most of the day up to that point, filled the conservatory with sunset gold. And there, for the third time in twelve months, and the seventh time in four years, our family celebrated a wedding among the nine of us American-born grandchildren.
The nine of us grandchildren of my father's parents have always been close, having grown up together over twenty years along the same stretch of Michigan's Interstate 94. But spunky, geeky, brilliant and beautiful littleholly has always been special.
A highly accomplished scholar and scientist. A passionate musician, who makes magic on ivory. A warm, generous and kind heart. And a proud, proud, Warcraft-raiding, game-console jockeying, cutthroat-Catan-playing Lady Geek.
I've always had a soft spot for brilliant, beautiful, passionate, geeky women. And I have been incredibly, incredibly, *incredibly* fortunate, to have been surrounded in friendship, all these years, with an ever-expanding cast of lady friends of *precisely* that description. But before my lady friends in the SCA and Markland; before my lady friends in the Wolves Glen Pub and rasfwr-j; before culfinriel and other lady geeks from medical activism days; before willowisp and dawntreader42 and the other Lindgrenite Geek House women; I grew up with littleholly, proud geek like her brother the X-box Hacker. I have been extraordinarily fortunate to have been gifted with the dear friendship of so many passionate lady geeks amongst my very closest friends. And an especial fortune, to have grown up and spent graduate school together, with a Lady geek for a cousin. :-)
And so I didn't even blink when, in the end, I ended up having to trade five full extra weekend work days just to get coverage for the one Friday afternoon off I needed to make littleholly's wedding. I would have gone to ridiculous extremes for any member of my family before I missed a family event because of work. The wedding day of my Lord of the Rings celebrating lady cousin was *especially* not one I was going to miss. Even if I ended driving myself so hard my own Hopkins program director called me in out of concern I was putting in too many extra work hours. The most important things in life, like family: the moment littleholly first walked down the aisle, it was all well worth the price paid. :-)
Gauss' wedding in July. Pat's wedding in September. And now, littleholly's wedding in May. The fifth, sixth, and seventh wedding among the nine of us Michigan-born grandchildren. The eight doctoratates awarded among us. Even just the simple fact each of the nine of us born grew up to become adults with lives of our own. And every one of the six of our parents, lived to see it happen.
Some families are more fortunate than others. Our family has been about as fortunate as any family can possibly be. And so, while there are unfulfilled dreams of my own I still hope might yet come to pass; in truth, I know our family -- that I -- has already had more fortune and blessing than any family could ever have right to ask for. I still hope very much my own turn will come. But I am wholeheartedly joyful at the fortune Gauss, littleholly, and my other cousins, have already found. And very, very glad, that I have been there, for each and every one.
Congratulations, dear littleholly and Peter. May the days be blessed. :-)