Credit: Phantom Open Emoji maintainers and contributors, CC BY 3.0 <https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/3.0&gt;, via Wikimedia Commons

Consumer Warning

This post deals largely with events in my personal life and therefore may not be of much interest to most visitors, who understandably come here to read music reviews. As these events will temporarily interrupt my review output, subscribers and regular readers may want to skip to the closing section, where  I estimate my return date. I will admit that this post is completely self-indulgent, but as one of my college lit professors insisted, “Writers have to write,” and this little corner of the internet is where I do my writing.  

May 4, 2023

I will now explain the reasons for my upcoming mini-break and why I went wacko during my introduction to Morrison Hotel.

I’m on my honeymoon! My partner and I were married a couple of days ago!

I’ll spare you the details and give you a quick rundown as to how it went down:

• It all started back in February when Alicia (my partner) suggested we meet with a conseiller (financial advisor) to discuss business and personal finances. Since she’s a forensic accountant and knows more about accounting than I ever want to learn, I readily agreed to the meeting.
• After reviewing the financials from our boutique consulting business and pronouncing them satisfactory, the conversation turned to taxes. The advice was straight and to the point: “Vous êtes fou de ne pas vous marier.” Translation: “You’re nuts not to get married.” I told her we’d think about it.
• Neither of us really wanted to get married, for different reasons. I’ve always felt strongly that my choice to live with someone should be completely voluntary and uncontaminated with the sense of obligation implied by a legal document. From my partner’s perspective, she was worried that her parents would disown her if she married a woman. Not an uncommon concern in the LGBTQ community, especially when one’s parents are strict Catholics.
• We had a long talk and I consented to a wedding under the condition that we keep it small and simple. No wedding rings or wedding dresses. No l’enterrement de vie de jeune fille (bachelorette party). No big to-do: a short ceremony at l’hôtel de ville with the required two witnesses in the form of my parents. A modest celebration afterward at one of our favorite restaurants followed by all-night erotic debauchery.
• Alicia agreed to fly to Madrid to prepare her parents. Short version: her parents were absolutely delighted to hear the news, explaining that they’d been expecting it for a long time and wondered what was taking us so long. The only thing they asked was to be present at the ceremony. Okay, dinner reservations for six. No big deal.
• Thanks to our parents, we wound up with a crowd of forty-two people, not including the brides. My mother took care of all the preparations from bridal bouquets to booze and used her long-standing connections to secure a spot in one of the parks in Nice to handle the thirty-six unexpected guests. Once the guest list had spiraled out of control, we invited the guy who drops by every couple of weeks to take care of the other half of our bisexual urges, but he couldn’t make it. Probably a good thing.
• I really didn’t want a wedding dress, but my mother suggested that evening gowns might be more to my liking. We selected matching gowns in different colors that complement our complexions: I wore scarlet, Alicia chose saffron. Based on the number of “accidents” during the reception, I can say with confidence that both tit lovers and ass lovers heartily approved of our selections.

Though I didn’t get my In-and-Out Burger wedding, I have to admit things worked out pretty well and everyone had a good time. After recovering from our hangovers, we made our way to Biarritz to begin our honeymoon; we’ll spend a few days here before heading down to San Sebastian.

Here’s the part I left out of the narrative: about a week before the wedding, just before I started the Morrison Hotel review, I started to get cold feet . . . well, it was more than cold feet . . . more like a total freakout.

I’m an only child. My parents treated me as an adult from an early age. My mother is a strong, independent woman who passed on those traits to her daughter. I’ve always taken pride in my self-sufficiency and the self-confidence that comes with it.

I freaked out because I started worrying that marriage meant sacrificing my independence and losing myself in the process. For a few days, I oscillated between total cunt and babbling idiot. I shut myself in my music room for long periods of time, explaining to Alicia that I had to finish the review before the wedding, but I spent a lot of time staring at the screen, trying to come up with a good excuse for canceling the damn thing.

I finally managed to get hold of myself and went to find Alicia. “I’m scared,” I told her, then I let it all out.

We were sitting at opposite ends of the couch. During my pseudo-declaration of independence, I looked straight ahead, avoiding eye contact. My ravings were followed by what seemed like an eternity of silence, but probably only lasted a few minutes. I took a deep breath and decided to face the music, the moment of truth.

I turned toward Alicia and made eye contact. I expected tears but her eyes were clear and calm.

“If you don’t want to get married, then we won’t get married. I don’t want to force you into anything,” she responded. “But I want you to know that part of the reason I love you so much is that you are strong and independent and I never want that to change.”

She scooted over to get close to me, put her lips to my ear and sang, “I love you just the way you are.”

“Arrgh! You know I hate that fucking song.”

“I know. Tell you what. If I promise to never sing that song again, will you marry me?”

“You really want this? I mean really want this?”

“I do.”

I held her in my eyes for a few precious moments and all my fears vanished into nothingness.

“I do, too.”

I will leave what followed to your filthy imaginations.

*****

Okay, I’m signing off now. Dad will take care of reading and approving your comments but I won’t be responding until I get back to Nice. I showed him how to refresh the home page but there’s a fifty-fifty chance he’ll blow it.

We’ll be on honeymoon until the 14th and there will probably be a shitload of client requests to deal with when we get back, so I can’t commit to a return date. The best-case scenario involves a half-written jazz review that I temporarily abandoned a couple of years ago, which could mean a return as early as the 21st. We’ll see.

Right now, all I want to do is love, love and love. Cheers!