Utah, again

Quick trip this time around. Just enough time to see my little sis get hitched, then it's back to Alaska tomorrow. The wedding activities were actually a lot of fun. I always thought I'd be much happier getting married on a mountain top or even the Luv Chapel in Vegas, but Lisa's wedding actually made me rethink the whole traditional reception thing. I don't think my mom feels the same way. She actually sewed every dress in the above picture (my dad called them the most expensive bridesmaid dresses ever made. It makes sense. How can you put a price on four weeks of nonstop sewing? You can't.) In fact, watching my Mom try to decompress after the gifts were packed up and the cake was stuffed in movable containers was frighteningly reminiscent of my emotional state after my first 24-hour mountain bike race. When I think about it, weddings and endurance races are actually somewhat similar - you plan, you organize, you work and sweat through months of build-up. Then, when the event actually arrives, you lose control early on and have to spend the rest of the time groping your way through the darkness, running on little more than adrenaline fumes. I really admire my mom.

And I'm happy for my sis, who was really a great bride (how can brides continue to look stunning after 12 hours of nonstop social hurricane? I don't know. But they always do). Before the wedding breakfast, Lisa was idling her car in a parking garage when an old woman whipped around the corner and smacked her head-on, putting a huge gouge in the bumper and causing my baby sister to spill an entire vase of water all over her dress. A lot of brides would let something like that ruin their entire wedding day, but Lisa took it really well. I admire that.

And me, well, while I was pedaling around Alaska, I missed out on all of the months of planning and agony that actually went into the wedding. All I did was show up on the red-eyed flight, dizzy and dazed from two Dramamine and exactly zero hours of sleep, and march through the motions. I am a total wedding slacker. But I did get a lot of comments for the fact that I was wearing a dress and stumbling around in high heels. I didn't think I was too fargone to pull off those kinds of formalities, but I guess in many of my relatives' eyes, I am.

And you know what? That's OK. Maybe someday I'll get that mountain top wedding after all.