Lately, I've been thinking constantly about the future I have, and I realize that everything is coming in even more quickly than I thought. It may seem like a forever away now, but time is going to pass in a blink of an eye. Considering I'm the girl that waits for her legal age to be independent, for her promised (and utterly astounding) future, and for her visits to her boyfriend, I can vouch properly when I say that even though waiting takes forever, when you look back at the time spent waiting it passes quicker than anyone realized, including me. For example, three weeks ago I was counting down that final week to until Graham got here for our five-day visit, two weeks ago I was waking up to get ready to pick up Graham at the airport, and then we assumed that because time passed so slowly for us to be together, time would be as slow for when we were together. We were half right: time passed at the same pace, but it all went faster than either of us expected. We started counting down to this past visit at about sixty or so days, and looking back now all I did was blink and he was with me.
I guess you all might wonder where I'm going with this, and when I get there it'll all make sense, to a degree (depending on how well you know me). Graham and I are coming up to two years together, though it feels like yesterday I met him, and they have been two very tough and frustrating years, but I wouldn't trade it in for anything else. As we approach this milestone, so to speak, I'm beginning to get that the next three years are going to go by just as quickly as the past two did. I mean, it feels like yesterday that we were up all night texting about our future and how we wanted to get me pregnant by winter break or spring break in our eighth grade year (yes we were very stupid and unknowing to the world then), and then that way we could get married on the day that marked our one year together; obviously, none of that happened. So last night I was watching Bride Wars for probably the third time on HBO, and something woke me up from the typical thinking of teenagers: I don't have forever to plan the future. By this, you could infer that I was mentioning my academics and how I don't have three years to build them up for college so I need to care now, or that even I have to start looking for colleges now because how else will I know what way to steer myself in the ways of grades? They seem like good answers, but not what I was thinking. I'm referring to wedding plans.
I don't care what you all say about the fact that I'm engaged, and even a few of you have had the audacity to say that being engaged at my age is illegal and I, along with Graham, should be turned in. But regardless, we are engaged, and whenever I get around to writing and posting the Graham posts you'll understand in greater detail, but a snippet is that when you're in a committed, long distance relationship, the heart does grow fonder, and you grow up in the process. I've never felt this close to anyone emotionally and mentally, and I even say Graham's my best friend. With the physical element essentially missing from our relationship, we had the pleasure and privilege of a relationship where we were *gasp* forced to talk to each other about each other, in every aspect of our lives. We learned to care about one another, love them for who they are instead of have lust muddy up our feelings like more than a handful of couples I know at my age. Between the time we met in the summer of 2008 and that winter, there was five months of waiting, and for awhile we didn't know if we'd ever see each other outside of TIP because our parents seemed less than enthused about our relationship. But yes, five months of us just using AIM and texting or calling when he could get a minute card for his phone, because neither of us had free long distance calls. During all this, however, it never occurred to either of us that maybe that physical pull we felt in the summer could have disappeared with the heat, and so a week before the winter visit I basically had a miniature panic attack on seeing Graham again, because I loved him so much that I didn't want my body to reject him. Those worries were thrown out the bus window the second our arms were around each other, and they never came back.
So after that digression, back to this wedding thing. I noticed that our current planned wedding date, 7/14/2013, is barely a month after my eighteenth birthday, and that isn't enough time to plan a whole wedding, let alone finance it. So awhile ago, Graham and I made an agreement that when he turned eighteen the fall before, he would start locating essentials in the area that would provide catering, flowers, photography, and those sort of things while I would, of course, be the one deciding everything else, especially to do with color schemes and designs and such. Well, when I watched Bride Wars last night, I was hit with the understanding that planning a wedding was much more complex that I had thought until that point; I realized I needed some type of third-party planner, because there would be no way I'd be able to balance planning my wedding and IB exams. I found a couple of free online wedding planners, with all sorts of checklists and helpful hints on where to get invites and "Save the Dates" for the best prices. To set up an account, you have to be eighteen, duh, and so the current plan for this is to set it up on Graham's birthday so that at least one of us is legit to start setting things up for our wedding there (yes, we already found a venue, but it was a little by accident). Between now and then, all I can really do is look at different colors for design, look at styles and prices for bridal gowns and bridesmaid dresses, start putting together a rough guest list for my side of the family (which is, again, starting to become much larger than I thought because of the whole Italian thing and "everyone must be there" subconscious obligation), and I hope I can remember that the venue can hold no more than 99 people, so I'm shooting for a grand total of 80 people, 78 invited people.
There is a small part of me that says thinking about all of this now is a little early and maybe I'm overdoing it, but then I think about the people that plan weddings three or four years in advance, regardless of age. Yes, we're young. Yes, we probably are crazy. And perhaps we don't know what we're doing just yet, but then think about how we'll be in a long distance relationship for five years, how we'll know by then (actually we already do know this) that what we have is real and honest and true, and how we've already done anything we can to screw us up. We understand that the younger you are when you marry the higher the chance of divorce, but I imagine this goes for the high school couples that get together senior year, are so obsessed with lust that they mistake it for love (which also happens to adult couples, believe it or not), and then they marry without really knowing anything about the other person, and maybe six months to a year later they divorce, and they can't even drink yet.
For those of you that will think that regardless of what I've said, he and I are too young to be together and only our hormones are attracted to each other, there are studies showing that, yes, the time where a couple is most attracted to each other is in the first year and a half because the hormones of the relationship are fresh. Two things I can say to that: one, how could Graham and I be hormones if we are barely together throughout the year, and two, we're at two years. I think we would've broken up (and stayed that way) by now if we weren't serious, and if we were taken over by those "early relationship" hormones.
Love,
Caitlyn
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