“We’re not leaving for another week,” I told her on a three-way call with Amy. “It won’t still be snowing by then.”
“What if it’s snowing in Chicago? It’s colder up there.”
“They know how to deal with snow in Chicago. Remember when Obama called us snow wimps? You’re giving him more material.”
My mother harrumphed at that. “It’ll be fine, Mom,” Amy said soothingly. “And worst-case scenario, at least it won’t snow next month when we go to the actual wedding.”
“It would be just our luck to get stranded in Chicago, when we have so much to do,” she said. “Maybe we shouldn’t go.”
I rolled my eyes. “Mom, we booked the tickets. We’re going.”
“Well of course we’re going,” she said, as if she hadn’t just suggested not going. “I’m just saying, is all.”
“Okay, I’m going to go pack.”
“Wait,” Amy said. “Are you bringing your flat iron? If you’re bringing yours, I won’t bother bringing mine.”
“Oh, good, I need one too,” my mother said. “That’s perfect. Lily, you’ll bring yours.”
“Want me to bring a communal hairbrush too?”
My sarcasm was lost on them. “Do you have a good one?” Amy asked.
“I’m hanging up now.”
Dearest blog readers, I have made some terrible decisions in my day. Sleeping with that groomsman. Agreeing to be in Bride A’s wedding. Not running for the hills when I met Bride B’s mom a dozen years ago. Overplucking my eyebrows in the early 2000s （seriously, when do those hairs grow back???）。
But this? Oh, this is a whole new circle of hell that I have descended into. I am sharing a hotel room for two nights with my mother and baby sister.
I’m fully aware that that doesn’t sound so bad. I’m sure there are people out there who would LOVE to spend a weekend in Chicago with the two of them. Would they feel the same way after the two days were over? Sure—if they belong in Azkaban. Remember Helena Bonham Carter’s wanted poster? That’s me, right now. Hair and all. Because my little sister left my flat iron on and now it’s dead.
Note: She has a better flat iron than I do, but she didn’t want to bring hers, so I was instructed to bring mine. Now I have none.
Of course, I’ve traveled with her before, albeit not in several years, so I planned ahead. I packed twice as many outfits as I needed, knowing she would take at least one. （My first choice for future sister-in-law’s bridal shower? Little sis looked lovely in it. Almost as lovely as the clothes’ owner would have looked. But by the time I got out of the shower, she was already in my outfit and “It would take too long to change, so couldn’t I just wear something else?”）
And to add insult to injury, my mother didn’t pack any makeup because “Yours always looks so nice. You can just do mine.” You may have birthed me, but that doesn’t mean I want to share a mascara wand with you. That’s how you get pinkeye.
Blah blah blah, the shower was lovely and all, even if I looked like someone pieced me together from Goodwill.
And even bigger shocker—you know how my future sister-in-law doesn’t speak? I may have solved the mystery because her mother NEVER STOPS. Oh my. I felt like she was taking a medical history and worried that I was going to have to provide a urine sample. Maybe future sister-in-law never got a chance to speak growing up and doesn’t know how?
Gotta go, though—I’m extremely worried that if I take my eyes off my toothbrush, one of them will use that next.
To be fair, my mother had forgotten her makeup and was in hysterics, so I offered my services. And Amy had always stolen my clothes, so I was entirely prepared with an equally cute backup outfit, knowing she would take one of mine rather than wear her own clothes.
Madison was really happy that we made the effort to come to the shower—granted, we heard that through Jake, who wrapped me in a bear hug before giving me shit about taking time out of my busy schedule to do something for my family, and through her mother, who knew a shocking amount about me before I opened my mouth in an attempt to get a word in edgewise. Apparently Jake talked about me with some frequency, which made me feel like a jerk—I wasn’t sure some of my friends even knew his name.
But the whole truth didn’t play as well, and I felt like taking some creative license.
The blog was slowly picking up steam, thanks to my efforts at networking. I was up to fifty-eight followers and usually added one or two with each post now. But more importantly, I was excited about writing for the first time since college, when I was on the campus newspaper staff. The only writing I had done since then was for the foundation, and it was refreshing to write something that I so thoroughly enjoyed. And strangers on the internet were appreciating what I was writing, too, which was quite the ego boost.