This Is Not Part 3

I'm sure all my regular readers are waiting in breathless anticipation for part three of the story of how I got married. But I just haven't really had the heart to write to it. I know I should be excited to tell of our adventurous drive out to Nevada and the wonderful heady time we had getting married and just being in love in that crazy desert city. It should be one of the easiest stories to tell, full of happiness and fulfillment.

But real life doesn't work out that way, right? We were married on Tuesday. On Saturday, after returning to my house, my new husband drove out to pick up some of his stuff from his now-former home at the crazy communal house in the nearby college town. I decided to stay at home, avoid the possible drama. Just like me, before we were married, he was not monogamous, had a "friends with benefits" relationship. And he had not really ended the relationship before we ran off to Vegas. Before he returned to the house, he called me. "Well, I have bad news and just kinda bad news. The kinda bad news is that you might have to come get my stuff without me, while I'm away in training, because they don't know if they want the liability of having my stuff here." "Ok. No problem. My dad and I can do that if we need to. What's the really bad news?" "K says she's pregnant."

It's not anyone's fault really. As my mom is fond of saying about unintended pregnancies, shit happens. All it takes is one time without birth control or a missed pill or a broken condom and *poof* pregnancy. There was no unfaithfulness. There was no lying. Though he hasn't said it, I know that he is just as scared as any other guy who finds out that he is about to become a dad, even if he wants children. As for her.... how can I be angry at another young woman who is scared and alone carrying the child of someone who is not only married to someone else, but who is leaving the country in a few months and, Goddess forbid, might not come back?

But this is no way to start a marriage. It was crazy enough to run off to marry a man who would be leaving to train to fight out of country for a year less than a week after the wedding. But knowing that while he is out of country, less than an hour away his child is gestating in the body of another woman, to be born without him there to see it....it sometimes feels like too much. Definately too much to handle and write a celebratory post about my nuptials.