I woke up in my three quarter antique Jenny Lind bed down the hall from my Mom in the bedroom where my Grandma had slept for twenty five years. It was my wedding day and although E and I had been living together for two years, superstition more than virtue mandated that E and I couldn’t see each other until the ceremony. So I spent the night with Mom in the house where I grew up.

The wedding was outside at sunset at Cecil Green Park. We paid for it ourselves and couldn’t afford the weekend rental rate so we got married on a Wednesday. My dress was $100.00, and our rings were passed down from my Grandma. We had an open bar and served sandwiches that my family had made in Mom’s kitchen that morning. We couldn’t afford the photographer and the wedding photos so we hired him and then saved up another year before we ordered the album.

We saved the top layer from the traditional wedding cake in our freezer and had a piece every year on our anniversary for ten years. I had heard that it was good luck.

My brother walked me down the aisle, and we were piped in as a tribute to my Grandma. My sister was my maid of honor, my niece, my flower girl. My uncle, the officiant and my mother my greatest fan.

The next day we sailed into the cove on this island where we now keep our boat. E’s father had lent us his 27 foot Catalina sailboat for a two week honeymoon through the gulf islands. As we sat with our coffee on the deck of the boat the next morning watching the sun rise, we swore that one day we would live in this paradise.

Thirty eight years later, whether due to my wedding day deference to superstition or just plain dumb

luck, we do