Looking for your face

I know I have blogged about this poem before, but it seemed like a good time to post it again. It’s one of my favorites, and it was read at my wedding.

Looking for Your Face

From the beginning of my life
I have been looking for your face
but today I have seen it.

Today I have seen
the charm, the beauty, the unfathomable grace
of the face
that I was looking for

Today I have found you
and those who laughed
and scorned me yesterday
are sorry that they were not looking
as I did

I am bewildered by the magnificence
of your beauty
and wish to see you
with a hundred eyes

My heart has burned with passion
and has searched forever
for this wondrous beauty
that I now behold

I am ashamed
to call this love human
and afraid of G-d
to call it divine

Your fragrant breath
like the morning breeze
has come to the stillness of the garden
You have breathed new life into me
I have become your sunshine
and also your shadow

My soul is screaming in ecstacy
Every fiber of my being
is in love with you

Your effulgence
has lit a fire in my heart
and you have made radiant for me
the earth and sky

My arrow of love
has arrived at the target
I am in the house of mercy
and my heart
is a place of prayer

by Rumi

Rumi was a Sufi poet who lived from 1207-1273. His “love” poems are really about God, but I see them as celebrating human love as an expression of the divine.

Wedding Wednesday

The plans are chugging along, so there’s really not much for me to talk about there. The reception is booked, and the deposit has been paid. My dress has been ordered. I ordered these shoes yesterday. (I figure that gives me plenty of time to make sure they’re what I want…plus, I know that I love the shoes, so chances are I’ll wear them regardless.)

Things I haven’t really thought about yet…colors. We’re not doing the full-on “wedding party” thing, instead involving our friends and family in other ways. I love them dearly, but I really don’t see any need to ask them to buy matching dresses. We are going to involve my goddaughter and Rand’s nephews…so Brandy will need a dress, and I need a coordinating color anyway. I’ve considered going with red…or maybe a mauve-y or rose-y color. I dunno…I just want it to look good with the dress. And then there’s flowers. Lots to think about, of course, but I’m not really freaking out. I’m just kind of taking it as it comes.

I got to thinking about this post, written way back in February 2006, prompting many people to ask if there was news they didn’t know about. No, no news. Just the random meanderings of my brain…recalling the past and musing about the future. I ended that post with this:

I couldn’t care less about being a princess for a day. What I do care about is being his wife…his love…his partner…for a lifetime.

I’m glad to know that now, with the ring on my finger and the plans steadily moving forward, that this hasn’t changed. There was a small amount of freaking out while we were trying to find a place and set a date…but once that was done, I calmed down considerably. And now, every now and then, I look at Rand and think to myself, “We’re getting married.” (Sometimes I even say it out loud…I’m such a dork.)

And I smile.

hugs

Photos

When Debbie came to visit at the beginning of September, she took some amazing photos of me and Rand. She also gave us a CD with all the photos she had taken on it. I just got around to uploading some of them to my flickr account.Some of you may have already seen them on hers, but here they are!

erinrandkiss

This one is probably my favorite photo ever.

walking down main street

erinrand2

You can see the rest in this set.

A thank you to Ron Hawkins

Just a little more than three years ago, I came across a profile in Yahoo! personals. Before I even read the whole thing, I could see that this profile was different from the others. He could spell, for one. 😉 Upon closer examination, I saw that this man and I had a couple of important things in common…among them, a love of music and a love of books.

What really grabbed my attention, though, was the mention of one of my very favorite musicians: Toronto’s Ron Hawkins, frontman for Lowest of the Low. I’m pretty sure that’s what took me from “hey, this guy looks interesting” to “hey, I’ve got to meet this guy.”

That guy, of course, was Rand. In one of our very first email exchanges, he asked me about the last concert I’d gone to. My last concert happened to be Lowest of the Low, and we began exchanging stories about seeing Ron/the Low in concert. Rand started using Ron’s lyrics as the subjects of our emails, and we’d go back and forth, searching for a lyric that seemed appropriate to the topic of our conversation. After a few dates, he sent a message with the subject “you nearly kissed me blind,” and I nearly swooned. 😉 I go back and read those early messages now and then, and they still make me smile.

When he took me out a couple of days before my birthday, he played his guitar and sang for me. Among other things, he played both Subversives and Black Monday. If there had been any doubt in my mind up to this point, it was gone. 😉

Now, I’m not saying that we wouldn’t have gotten together if it hadn’t been for Ron, but it sure didn’t hurt! Thanks, Ron!

And I’m still every bit as smitten now as I was three years ago. (look for a list of things I love about Rand, ala Debbie Ohi, in the near future!)

My horoscope for todaaaaaaay…

I subscribe to a daily horoscope in Bloglines. It’s fairly unreliable, in the sense that I don’t actually get it every day. This one is technically for tomorrow, which makes it more than a little bit late…

Something big happens in your love life and you can hardly think about anything else. It could be someone new, or maybe a milestone of sorts with your current partner. Whatever it is, keep smiling!

😉

Happy, happy, happy!!!

My 33rd birthday. Just when you thought it couldn’t get any better…

Well, I didn’t, anyway!

Happy news to follow. This gets a little bit long, so I’m going to cut…

*updated w/new photo!* Continue reading