Crash

I asked Jeff a few hours before he proposed what he thought about May 16 for our wedding date.

We knew where this whole thing was going, even though he hadn’t asked me yet to marry him, and I had an idea: have the wedding on May 16 (5/16) because the date uses a combination of our birthdays (October 5 and November 16). The date would be exactly half a year away from my birthday, so we’d always be close to one thing or the other to celebrate something.

Before that, we had talked about where we would want to marry. He had always wanted to have a ceremony in a dramatic location, such as a beach or a mountaintop, and I wanted a gathering close to home. So we combined the two wishes and chose the longest covered bridge in the county, which is just a few miles from the farm, to host our ceremony.

So when he proposed, we already had a date and place picked out.

We began researching and planning right away, carefully choosing our photographer, caterer, rental company, and baker. We wrote out schedules, drew plans for seating, and considered decorations and music. We spent two hours editing the 32 paragraphs of our story for our wedding website, as well as several hours choosing the invitation design. We chose specific stamps to go along with our wedding theme of evergreens and the farm. We considered colors and tuxes. We carefully mapped out the schedule for the day.

Plans were going well. After all, we are both experienced event planners and communicators, so things like this are right up our alley. We made everything special to us, and even the details had a deeper meaning.

Our next steps were to design the ceremony program, meet with the minister, and pick out rings.

 

 

 

And then.

 

 

And then.

 

 

And then.

 

 

 

Everything shuddered.

 

 

 

Everything shattered.

 

 

 

 

 

Everything stopped.

 

Continued.