Manic Monday

Ken and I are finally going to get married, officially, legally, on April 25. We've been meaning to get around to it for around 4 years now. Last year, after our wedding bands had been sitting in the sock drawer for many months, we decided to just go ahead and start wearing them. And started calling each other "my husband" and "my wife". But it's not the same as being actually married.

Ken and I have never had an anniversary. We segued very gradually into our relationship. I've always regretted that, because we have a lot to celebrate - we just didn't have a date.

So now we're planning the world's smallest wedding: just the two of us, our pastor, and my mum and my sister as our witnesses. I'll get myself a new dress and a pretty bouquet. We'll have a professional photographer do some portraits. We'll probably go for a fancy dinner that evening, and a little day-trip honeymoon on the Sunday. And that's really all that either of us want.

My first wedding was more traditional: 50 guests, white gown and veil, etc. But it was a flop. The rabbi was drunk when he performed the ceremony, offending many of the guests and causing my maid of honour to flee the room with a massive attack of giggles. Various branches of fractured families (both mine and his) could not relax and enjoy the day together. In fact, more than half of my family members made excuses to leave early. There were so few people left by the time we got around to cutting the cake that the dancing part didn't even happen. I went home and cried.

My family members who left early last time won't even be informed of this wedding until after the fact. So far as they'll know, we eloped. They'll probably be righteously offended by the situation, but I don't care. They'll have plenty of chances to be snarky and divisive at many other family gatherings. Never again at a wedding of mine.

On Monday Ken and I went to pick up a marriage license. We live within a 15-minute walk of our municipal city hall, so we figured it would be a snap. I had all my papers prepared the night before, checked and double-checked against the requirements listed on the government's Service Ontario website.

I was NOT impressed to discover that the website was wrong. The clerk asked to see a divorce certificate. I showed him a Final Judgement of divorce, which was supposedly allowable. But, not so. I had everything else. My birth certificate, two change of name certificates... I thought I had gotten a divorce certificate back in 2003, but there were no odd-shaped pieces of fancy paper, covered in squiggles and watermarks like my other certificates. Just some random 81/2 x 11 papers floating around in my "Divorce Stuff" envelope.

Suddenly this pleasant task that should have taken 30 minutes on my way to work had turned into a red tape nightmare. The clerk told me I had to go downtown to the Family Law Courts to get a divorce certificate, and then I could come back uptown to get the marriage license. Ugh. Fine.

So, Ken and I got on a train and went down to the courthouse, which took us close to an hour. We rode a crowded elevator to the 10th floor, at which point I started having some seriously stressful flashbacks of being there for my divorce proceedings many years ago. Sweating and stressed out, I waited for my turn to speak to a clerk. Finally I was called up to the counter. I pulled out my envelope and started yanking everything out in search of the Final Judgement, while I told the clerk I needed a divorce certificate.

One long, pink, manicured nail came down on one of the other papers that had drifted out of my envelope.

"This," she said, "is a divorce certificate."

I looked. On this otherwise non-descript sheet of white copy paper, there was a heading in Times Roman stating "Divorce Certificate".

"You're kidding me," I said.

"No. You don't want another one, do you?"

I smacked my right hand over my eyes and took a moment to process this information. Indeed, I had had the stupid certificate all along. What fooled me was that it looked nothing like the other certificates. Birth, Marriage, Change of Name - they're all as fancy and impossible to forge as banknotes. But the Divorce Certificate... anyone could mock one of those up with a black and white inkjet printer. The only "official" bit was a red stamp that left a raised impression on the paper. I had completely overlooked it.

I gathered up my papers and shuffled back to where Ken was waiting. I said:

"I don't think you're going to want to marry me anymore."

I explained that I had had the paper the whole time, and that our trip downtown had been a wild goose chase. I apologized profusely for wasting his time. Of course he forgave me, and said many soothing things.

At that point we took a break for lunch, which helped get me back to a more normal state of mind. Then we took the train back uptown and FINALLY got the freaking marriage license.

Well, something had to go wrong. That's just how things go. Now hopefully we've gotten it out of the way, and we'll have a perfect wedding.

That evening, after work, Ken was home waiting for me with a homecooked meal and two vases filled with beautiful flowers. My favourites are the pale pink roses with baby's breath. I'm looking forward to our wedding. He's already the best husband I could ask for.