It's not easy being Gretna Green

Just got back from a whirlwind tour of the future home. I managed to stave off panic attacks for the most part, mostly thanks to M walking me through. She was pretty giddy about the mountains and the QSU campus is really a gorgeous place. It all reminded me how big the steps are that I'm taking. From Nowhere College to a fairly big State Research University, from the Midwest that has been my home, happily or not, since the age of nine to a 4500-foot-high, bilingual tourist city. It's a lot to take in, and on top of all that, I'm buying a home, so I have to learn what words like "escrow" and "easement" mean. Again, I'm grateful to have a partner studying law.

M's fairly horrific mother is taking over the midsummer wedding with her frijol-smelling Mexican restaurant reception, fake flowers, inviting all of her friends whom we don't know, and insisting that there will be a polka. It's gone from being a classy, intimate, family affair to a well-populated, well-besausaged Wisconsin vulgarfest. So M and I decided to preserve some dignity and psychic clarity by eloping this week. A courthouse, a justice of the peace, smiles and tears, fifty bucks and a single daisy. I feel like the bad sister in an Austen novel, but it's very freeing to be able to do these things on our own terms. So we're still doing the big wedding dress thing in July (and not telling anyone in the family about the ladder-at-the-window-at-midnight escapade), but it'll feel a lot more relaxed and easier to stay sane.

As serious as...

My Mom had a heart attack last night. I was out buying congratulatory margaritas for my graduating senior seminar class, and when I got home there were four messages on my phone and two e-mails. She's in the hospital in Denver, but only because Dad happened to call her and catch her at a moment of infarction, so he convinced her (finally) to call 911, and she was in the hospital by the time she was critical. They've got a stint in her coronary and she's moving out of the ICU today. I talked to her this morning and she was very apologetic about troubling all of us with this and not being able to get as much done as she'd like. She'd been helping her sister pack and move, and was diligently scrubbing the carpets when it hit her.

I talked to Dad last night and he seemed his normal level-headed self. I'm sure he was anxious, but he sure wasn't as broken up as I was. Possibly because he'd had more time to work through it, possibly because he has Jesus instead of emotion. Kind of like the Vulcans had the teachings of Surak.

I'm going to finish up this finals week and try to get down to see her when she's at home.