I keep feeling the urge to sit down and organize everything wedding-related, but when I think about doing it, I’m completely overwhelmed. That “4 months” in my countdown ticker is making me nervous. That’s not very much time.

Sometimes I wish it would just get here, already. As much as I’m enjoying the planning and the excuse to drool over flowers and gowns, I hate the waiting.

And I’m starting to hate the transition in the relationship. I feel like James and I are in limbo. Every disagreement has hanging on it the unspoken thought: “Can we get through this? Is there a sign in here somewhere?”

It’s so frustrating because saying yes to James was the easiest decision I ever made in my life. I don’t ever doubt it. But I feel like I should, and that confuses me.

For so many years, it was ingrained in me by school, work, that whole big question of what are you going to do with your life? to do what I want; don’t depend on others for happiness.

But since I’ve met James, I’ve found that kind of thinking to be backwards. The lowest points in my life have been when I’ve felt bereft of human companionship, when I’ve felt alone and un-cared-for.

What schools and career paths don’t prepare you for is that time when who you love and how you love them are more important than what you do and how much you make.

There is a decided pressure on my generation, especially the female members of it, to save the world or make a million bucks. — but don’t fall into the trap of caring for your husband or children. Cause that’s a step backwards.

This time of transition is so painful, I think, because I am trying to get my head around the idea that most of what I’ve been told is wrong. I don’t plan to give up my career or my dreams when I get married, but I am realizing that I am no longer an individual.

We’re not having a unity candle at our ceremony and part of the reasoning is that we are not two becoming one. We will still be two. But together, we will be something more.

Growing is hard and painful and scary. But at least I’m not doing it alone.

Sharon’s wedding was Saturday and I’m still recovering. If I’m this exhausted just being a bridesmaid, I can’t imagine how I’ll feel after my wedding.

It was beautiful, she was beautiful and a good time was had by all. I’ll give a more extensive analysis tonight or tomorrow (or Wednesday), once I get my photos uploaded and catch up on some sleep.

In other news, I took my family to the Wake Robin to check it out, since they hadn’t seen what they’re paying for yet. Shaffin was late, but I did forget to confirm with him, so it may have been my fault. He was great and I think eased my mom’s mind about some details.

This afternoon, I get a call from our lobby saying there’s a big box of flowers for me. Shaffin sent me a bouquet of tulips to apologize for being late! They sure do know about customer service at the Wake Robin.

My countdown orb tells me it’s six months and one day to the wedding. And, for a change, I’m not going to freak out about how close it is. Honestly, I wish it would get here faster.

We’re in really good shape. All the major stuff is done and a bunch of people have booked rooms. I was stressing out about people not booking before the block is opened up, but many people have told me it’s not my problem. I have done everything I can do to get them to book rooms, and now if they have to pay more or stay at another hotel, well, there’s nothing I can do about it. It feels good to let go of that stress.

The only major thing left to decide on is flowers. I was thinking of talking to florists around now, but the idea of putting down another deposit is terrifying. My credit cards are a nightmare and I just don’t want to deal with another expense right now.

James is really set on using a local florist, but I think I’m going to order at least the flowers for the centerpieces from someplace online. I just want some gerbera daisies, and I’m going to cut all the stems off anyway and float the heads in water. Not like I need to pay a florist to do that.

In other wedding news, Sharon’s wedding is fast approaching. We had her bachelorette party last weekend, I have my dress alteration appointment on Friday, next weekend we’re putting together favors, then it’s Easter, then it’s the wedding! I’m really looking forward to it.

I was excited to update with all the progress we made this week — we booked a DJ, Music in Motion out of Seymour (their website is not the best, but they seem to be excellent DJs) and we put a deposit on a horse and carriage from Loon Meadow Farm to take us from the church to the Wake Robin — but James just walked in and said he hit a deer.

Now, he’s all calm about it. ‘Hey, I just hit a deer.’ When I slid off the road on the way to youth group Sunday night, putting a hole in my brand new bumper, I had to hold back the tears. Not to mention the tire went flat and I have to get new ones.

He’s now proudly showing off the dent to our coworkers.

So I’ll save the wedding stuff for tomorrow afternoon, after the papers go out and I’m bored.

I have been quite remiss in my blogging duties, and I can only blame the holidays and extreme holiday inertia. I think neither James nor I moved from the computer chair or couch, respectively, for the entire week the paper was shut down.

But another reason I haven’t been blogging is because, well, things have been difficult and I haven’t known quite what to say. One of the things we made it a point to do during shut-down week was to sit down and discuss the wedding, and we’ve found that we have very different approaches when it comes to interacting with our families (we knew that already, but really butt heads over it in the last week or so).

Also, issues we thought we had dealt with, like my struggle to balance my need for independence with my coming role as a married person, are cropping up again. Guess there’s more work to do there.

We made very few decisions about the wedding, but we were able to get all three bridesmaids in the same room at the same time. I think they all liked each other. I had fun, at least.

From all of this, I’ve learned that we’ve got quite a bit of work left to do, both in the practical planning and in the emotional preparation. I think we’re up for it. If not, well, I guess something will have to give. You don’t really need flowers for a wedding, do you?

I was going to do a big post about my trip to be in the studio audience of Rachael Ray’s talk show, but I may be writing that up for the paper. When that comes out, I’ll link to it. If it doesn’t, then I’ll post the story here.

A close family friend died last week and it has been very hard the last day or so.

I was caught up on my novel, but then life happened.

Maybe it’s the beginning of winter, but James and I have been doing a lot of holing up in the living room with computer games, books, TV and fires. Neither of us is motivated to do much more.

Heather, my maid of honor, seems to be the only one motivated to work on wedding stuff at the moment. But it will get better once we go to Virginia and I get to drag Carolina, James’s sister and a bridesmaid, out to look at dresses.

James gave me a lovely little widget for my work computer that counts down the days to the wedding. It’s a blue orb and I like to move it all over my desktop and think about the wedding.

But lately, it’s been worrying me.

You see, instead of telling me that I have 13 months and 29 days to wedding, it is now telling me that I have 10 months and 24 days.

10 months?!? How did that happen?

We’ve gotten a lot of the big stuff — date, place, dress — out of the way, but there are so many things we haven’t done yet and James still thinks there’s tons of time.

Remember how I wanted to get save the dates out in September? See how it’s Oct. 12? Yeah.