Magnified

Yesterday after work, my bus was late, and as I stood at the bus stop for upwards of fifteen minutes, I noticed that traffic outside my office building was unusually bad. Then I started paying closer attention and noticed that 95% of the cars backed up in the two righthand lanes were cabs, which is not normal. Then I started paying even closer attention and noticed that almost every cab was carrying one or more black women, most of them middle-aged. Then I paid the closest possible attention and noticed that almost every single one of those women was wearing pink, green, or both.

The mystery was solved when I got home and got a look at the day's Washington Post. It was, apparently, the 100th anniversary of Alpha Kappa Alpha, a black sorority. Nearly 25,000 members were in DC to celebrate it. And it seemed like each one of them had her own taxi. It must have been like Christmas in July for DC cabdrivers.

It was, really and truly, adorable. So many women--and they weren't ALL middle-aged. Some were very young and some were very old. I can only imagine how much fun they must have had at their celebration. Except, 25,000 people? How did they all FIT? I mean, you need a baseball stadium to hold that kind of crowd. I have to say that the prospect of organizing such an event makes me very glad about our plans for a humble, 75-person wedding.

Speaking of which? With my surgery and our trip to North Carolina and all, wedding planning kind of wound up taking a back burner for a few weeks there. And I know that thanks to all of our organized advance planning, we had the luxury of allowing that to happen. But there's only three and a half months left until the wedding, so the slow period has to end. Invitations have to be finished, tuxes have to be selected, favors have to be ordered, a purple guestbook has to be found.

And then it's down to the little details, the stuff that requires less gruntwork and more actual thought. Like writing our ceremony and vows. And picking songs for important moments, like when I walk down the aisle, the first dance, and the father-daughter dance. And finalizing the menu with the caterer. And making a list of photos that we absolutely want the photographer to capture.

I've been using a to-do list from The Knot that updates automatically based on the amount of time left until the wedding, and it's been very useful--but the amount of things listed for this month is starting to get a tad overwhelming. All I can say is, by the time the wedding rolls around, I think we're really going to need that two-week honeymoon.