Lilac Colored Glasses

It’s funny sometimes, the closer we get to the wedding, when CB and I realize we don’t necessarily know about each other.

I don’t mean little factoids, but rather moods or behaviors. I also can tell you that these discoveries are fairly one sided (with a few exceptions, of course, like the first time I ever saw CB really drunk, which wasn’t until earlier this month).

For example, let me first introduce you to two of my friends, Blingy and Strong Mama (formerly referred to as my Dutch and Romanian colleagues):

Blingy

Strong Mama

Blingy and Strong Mama are probably my first real real friends here in Belgium (there’s also La Capitana and Chica, who I’m sure will end up in another post at some point). By real friends I mean that I met them on my own, we got along wonderfully from day one and we hang out outside of work.
I know those are things that sound simple, but for me, it’s actually a big thing to make friends. I have many acquaintances, but only a few real friends. Up until recently I met most people either directly through CB or through his prodding me to socialize. My coworkers from the call center in Antwerp were all very nice people but I never felt motivated to ever spend time with them outside of work and my two coworkers from Brussels were a. primarily French speaking and b. not people I could really relate to whatsoever.

So anyway, the three of us went out on Thursday afternoon, just to hang out a bit before I’d be gone for almost 2 weeks and we had a blast, like we usually do. It’s not that we did much…mostly walked around Gent in search of an open restaurant with a terrace because Strong Mama is pregnant and craving meat and fresh air a lot of the time. We eventually found a nice Turkish place with an open kitchen and terrace and fake palms trees.

Afterwards we went on a long ambling walk in search of the best gelato in Gent. I know where to find this amazing ice cream (a little place called Nonno on the Korte Dagsteeg), but not a short way to get there from where we were. On the way, CB called and said he was finished working so I asked him to come meet us. We all sat with our ice cream and chatted before I finally said goodbye to my friends who headed back the train station and CB and I came home.

Once we got back, CB looked at me strangely and asked me if I’d had much to drink at the Turkish place.
Because he’s never seen me acting like I was with Blingy and Strong Mama with the exception of when I was under the influence. Because I was acting carefree and silly and giggly. Because I was with my friends.

And he’s never actually seen that before.

As of last night, I’ve had two bachelorette parties here in Belgium. The first was arranged by my colleagues at work and the second by the wife of CB’s best man.
It is amazing how different those 2 parties were. The party with my colleagues was a joint party as my Dutch coworker got married on April 30th, so it was really for both of us. It started out with the two of us having to try to hawk thongs and chocolate willies in the most crowded part of Gent. My poor coworker ended up doing most of the talking because I kept freezing up when faced with the challenge of selling thongs to strangers in Dutch.

After we’d been tortured enough, we all went to the Drupelkot for a jenever (gin) and then to my Mexican coworker’s house where we all had some tequila and quite a bit of amaretto as well as a few appetizers before heading back to the center for dinner and lots of wine at a Turkish restaurant. We ended up in a salsa bar where my manager talked me into trying a caipirinha (she didn’t have to try very hard to talk me into anything at that point) and I rounded it all off with two Westmalle triples. Needless to say logical thought was no longer an option.

Apparently I had a lot to say about ninjas and bazookas while my Romanian colleague was driving us home/to our respective crash pads.

Last night I was treated to a nice vegetarian dinner by the wives/partners of CB’s friends and CB’s sister while CB was off being drowned in booze by his friends. After dinner we went for a long gondola ride through Gent, stopping for an apperitief under a large willow tree.

All I was told was I had to dress like the 1940′s, with a flower in my hair, so I made my best attempt, although I wore jeans for the part I have pictures from and changed into my skirt later when we reunited with the menfolk. Half of them had to leave early because they were no longer able to behave themselves in public. If I can convince CB to let me post any of it you’ll be hearing more about it later. I will just say I’ve never seen him drunk before, especially not dressed up as Rene Artois from ‘Allo ‘Allo!, so from what I can tell his night was pretty interesting. Anyway, it ended up being the anniversary of when Belgium was liberated from the Germans in WWII so we finally ended up at a ’40′s themed party in a club in town where we did a little dancing, encouraged our respective menfolk to drink extra water, and finally headed for home.

So, like I said, two veeeery different parties, but both very enjoyable.
Makes me wonder what my Pittsburgh bachelorette party will be like…

Which means that Poetry Month is over and I’m finished with the daily poem. I would, however, like to submit my 5 best poems for consideration to Robert Lee Brewer’s blog, so I’m asking for feedback. If you were willing to stick with my poems this month, would you mind listing your 5 favorites in the comment section? I’m not a great judge of my own work so I’m asking for some objectivity from you, my devoted readers.

Also, May, the month of my long awaited, much anticipated wedding to CB. Yes, I will be getting married in 29 days. Going home to Pittsburgh in 3 weeks. Seeing friends and family and a real, juicy 100% beef hamburger for the first time in 6 months. There are no words for how much I’m anticipating this trip. And how much I’m anticipating the moment CB and I put the rings on each others’ fingers and become husband and wife.

So yeah.

Flowers are blooming, the sun is shining and there are a lot of good things just up ahead.
Time to take a deep breath and enjoy life a little bit more.

Today we’ll be out all day visiting with CB’s family. But it seems it’s becoming a tradition for me to post pictures of our New Years Eve meals so I wrote this out last night and scheduled it to post today. On our first New Years together we made Tandoori chicken, Buddha’s delight, an impromptu Chinese soup and ginormous margaritas that resulted in sleeping through the actual countdown to midnight. Last New Years we made seafood gumbo with rice (photo lost to the hacking in June) and I believe we had Pecheresse to drink with it.

Our menu this year is as follows:

We Wish You All A Happy, Healthy 2010!!