Wednesday, June 9, 2010

Wedding series: Breaking even Pays off

Reunion after long separation is even better than one's wedding night.
Chinese Proverb

I was searching for family reunion quotes to introduce my blog on my recent family reunion and I had to smile when I saw this quote on a website dedicated to family reunions since my family reunion happened to be at my wedding. I'm not sure which was more pleasurable(/awkward)--the family reunion after thirteen years or the wedding night watching Clint vomit in the sink while this massive moose head stared at me whilst cleaning tomato chunks out of the drain.

Anyways, to the discussion at hand! While Clint and I were tallying up the costs of our wedding a few months ago, I started to wonder if it was all worth it... all the stress over guest lists, lodging, planning. The average U.S. wedding costs $25,000. While we didn't quite hit the average cost, we went well over budget. I couldn't help but wonder, is this one day all worth it?


A few days after the wedding, Clint and I started reading all the cards. They were so filled with love. Amazingly, I managed not to cry during the wedding but when I read my sister's card, the tears were rollin'! She's the most inexpressive person in the family I think... in our family, that is a feat. We're not great with communicating our feelers. Her card was so sweet though. As I continued to read the cards and let her sentiments sink in, I became incredibly grateful for all the hard work we did the last year to make this one day happen. We had not seen my brother Andrew in over 13 years. The rest of us see each other once a year at most. To have a series of days together during which my brothers were helping my mom cook 10 pounds of chow mein and my sister was giggling in a photobooth made everything worth it.

This one day was more than sangria, calla lilies, and table arrangements. This day was an opportunity for my family to act like a family which hadn't happened in years. To have that again was priceless...

Andrew, Ben, Charles, Clint, me, Mama, Louise, Albert 05.29.10

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