Mem Day Wknd

DIARY

On Friday.

I left work at 2:30, rode back north, and packed and worked around the apartment for about an hour before Jess picked me up. We spent the next two hours getting out of Chicago. The back door, alas, failed. Everyone was trying to escape to I-90 through the backdoor along Indianapolis Blvd. The Skyway, by comparison, was free. Jess continued to drive through Indiana and onto Ohio, and we were about to switch off just outside Dayton when the unfortunate (and inevitable, though we didn't know it) happened: as we sat in the drive-thru of a Steak N' Shake, Jess shifted into Park and a rapture of steam ruptured out from somewhere under the hood and white steam billowed out. With some help, I pushed the car into a parking spot, and after an hour of calls to Mr. J, my dad, and my grandma (of all people), we figured out what happened: a radiator tube had split. We pumped in a gallon of water and drove to Budget 8, and crashed for the night after devouring a bag of Doritos and some beef jerky.

On Saturday.

I got up early to take advantage of the continental breakfast (coffee and muffins!) and Jess and I checked out by 11, and my parents arrived just minutes later. My dad and I bought a new tube from AutoExpress, added antifreeze, drove on to Dayton, stopped for Arbies, and drove on to Zanesville. From this point on, the weekend was nonstop business. We met with Mr. J, Jeff, and Chelsea at Wade's to pick out and be measured for our tuxes. From there, to Armco (pardon, AC Steel) Park, where we surveyed the reception site and talked about bathrooms and distances and electricity and the space is this enormous square flanked by trees. Very very green. And then onto St. Nick's. We waited for the Mass to let out (there was a procession at the end, for Corpus Christi), then went upstairs to look at the space. My mom counted pews and we figured out flowers and dimensions. At this point, my parents needed to head out, so we said goodbye. Jess and I rode out to New Concord for pizza with Jess' mom (we met her at the Highway Patrol, after mistakenly waiting at the house for about twenty minutes) and visited with her for awhile. Finally, we rode back to Zanesville, where I abruptly fell asleep after just a couple minutes of SNL's Best of Alec Baldwin. That night I had a bizarre and vivid dream, but not too memorable, because my brain was blank in the morning.

On Sunday.

I woke around ten, and had fallen into and come out of sleep so abruptly that I spent a moment wondering where I was. I spent about a half-hour watching a pathetic Indiana Jones knockoff (that somehow had roped in poor Bob Newhart), then we hurried off to St. Nick's for the morning Mass. It was one of those mornings where I felt very religious, but in a way that involved taking everything in through osmosis, languidly, rather than sharp concentration upon the words said or the sequence of things. Afterwards, we stopped back at the house briefly, than hurried onto Adornetto's for lunch. Afterwards, Jess, Julie, and I went to Jess' Aunt Sue's to look at cakes. Her aunt Sandy offered to give us the cake as our wedding gift if we'd cover ingredients, which is a very, very generous offer. The cake is a surprise, though. Then, it was measurements for alterations, which meant I had to leave. I stopped briefly back at the house, then went for a drive in Zanesville and the countryside thereabouts. When Jess called, I picked her and Julie up at Sue's (while I waited I had a nice conversation with Sue's husband John about his life and experiences in the Navy and as an engineer) and then we went to another cousin Jessica's hig school graduation open house. After that, we dropped Julie off at the house and went on to meet with the photographer, Robyn Cooper, in South Zanesville. We agreed upon a package and were very excited by her projects and portfolio. Finally, we rolled around the countryside a little while before going back to the house for the night. We took the puppy, Brooklyn, for a walk in the fairgrounds with Mr. J, then sat up and talked quite a bit, but I still fell into sleep like a rock when I finally laid down.

On Monday.

The sky had clouded over and it was dense and gray and rainy when we got up. Mr. J and I checked the car over again, and stopped out to see Jess' aunt Polly on our way out of town. We made decent time back to Chicago, with the sky alternating between gray rain and clarity, but it was finally sunny when we rolled up in front of Scholars Corner. For dinner we ate homemade corn dogs, went for a walk around the Kenwood Historic District, and picked up up a coke at Village Foods. Then, UE saved the day. We watched three-and-a-half episodes of My So-Called Life.

And that was my weekend.