Greetings from the Bahamas, my peoples.
So Em and I got hitched yesterday and it all went swimmingly. We are staying at a resort by the water and were all set-up to have our ceremony, just the two of us, on a pier over-looking the ocean. 1:30 p.m. was our launch time. Em went off to get her hair and make-up done just after 11:00 while I stayed in our room and finished ironing my shirt and getting myself prepped. And yo, wouldn’t you know it, but by 11:30 the skies opened-up and it started to rain like mad. And it didn’t stop.
I turned on the Weather Channel, and kept going out onto our terrace to look at the sky. Gray and raining, the palm trees rustling in the wind. Man, I was bugging thinking about Emily bugging (and she, in turn, was bugging about me bugging about her bugging). We came all the way down here to Paradise and it’s freakin’ raining, you’ve got to be kidding me. But then I thought of my cousin Eric who would have embraced the rain, the sense that Mother Nature was doing her thing, and it was all good, and that calmed me some. Then I thought, “Hey, I’m totally happy, I look great, and I’m marrying the love of my life, screw the weather.”
The rain tapered off some by a quarter to one when Em called. She sounded calm. I asked if we were going to change the location to inside and she said “No, not yet.” I went off to meet the minister, A. Dewitt Hutcherson, a tall-strapping man who looked vaguely like Michael Irvin. We were going to be the 9,796th wedding he’d performed in his career.
The rain had stopped and the humidity hit with the quickness. As we walked to the pier, believe it or not, the sun came out. Ten minutes later, my bride joined us, and it was completely sunny. The ceremony was short and sweet and lovely. We took pictures for a long while against the brilliant blue-green backdrop of the ocean and we were very happy.
Then, after eating the cake and drinking some champagne, we finally got back to our room. Em went to the bathroom to fix herself up and I quickly checked the ESPN ticker for the score of the game (incorrigible, I know, but come on, I had to distract myself for a minute). Yanks were down 6-2. Oh, well, I thought. No big deal.
We then consumated our love for each other while the Bombers roared back in the ninth. When we checked the scores later and saw that the Yanks had won, we couldn’t believe what we were seeing. They didn’t have any details, but when caught the highlights on Sportscenter, and…holy my god! Talk about Kismet. That was the icing on the gravy to what was already an amazing day. All those two-out, bottom of the ninth hits? Man, I was nervous just watching the clips. And our boy Alex Rodriguez hitting another huge home run? Dag, man, what a wonderful thing.
I realize that the Boston series is a thing onto itself (hopefully, the Yanks can take one out of three), but no matter what transpires this weekend, Em and I will always have the memory of A Rod coming through on the most meaningful day of our lives. It’s a small thing, but a beautiful thing.
Hope everyone is doing well. I’ll get atcha when I return next week.