A couple of weeks ago I sat down ready to begin blogging again, after barely blogging all summer. I felt I had to explain my absence from my blog, so I did, and I vowed to begin writing again the very next day.
Speaking of vows....
I did in fact begin writing the very next day, just not on my blog. I began writing vows. Well, a monologue that led up to vows for a wedding.
Several months ago I got the call that my sister had gotten engaged. Her boyfriend, high school sweetheart, of over ten years had proposed and she had said yes.
I was elated. I had grown to love Max like a brother and called him "Uncle Max" to my daughter from the day she was born. I was so happy for her, I congratulated her, and as the days passed, I began to wonder if I would get a maid of honor call. Breana, Breezy for short, and I have always been close, probably the closest two people in our family, but in the last few years, as she has entered her twenties, and as we have made separate lives in distinct times of our lives, we haven't spoken as much. Of course, when we did speak, when we saw each other for holidays or sporadic visits we always had fun together and had mostly like-minded conversations.
In the meantime, she and our sister Tammy had grown much closer as Breezy became an adult and the two no longer fought like kids do.
Breezy and I never fought.
Never.
Once, when she was about 13, she was acting like a brat and kept whipping me in the face with the sleeve of her shirt. I got so upset I got in my car to leave town, to go home, 300 miles away. We made up quite quickly, both in tears, and that was the end of that. Fast forward about 12 years and we had a very similar spat, with me in my car ready to leave, a quick make up, end of story.
That, in a nutshell, is why, in all of my writing, all of my blogging, all my reflecting, I do not write about Breezy.
I write about Teno often. He is a daily part of my life and a constant source of entertainment for me and my daughter. He says I misquote him in my blogs. I don't.
I write about Tammy because we really are the quintessential sisters: three years apart, constant bickering and competing, constant comparisons and challenges. She's my sister through and through. I'm ready to kill her one second and kill for her in the next. She's also a mother now, like me, and so we have much in common on that front. She gave me my niece. If our bond wasn't strong before, if there were any areas of weakness, Myah strengthened the bond to steel grade. And my nephew only strengthened it further a few years later.
But Breezy is a different story. Breezy was my baby. When my mother had Breezy I was 10 years old and my mother's right hand. We had a chaotic, turbulent, low income home, and my mother worked nights. Breezy came home from the hospital and into my arms. I rocked her to sleep while my mother worked. I changed diapers and fed her. I sung songs to her. I was there when she took her first steps. I wanted to be better for her. At 10 I already knew I wanted to be better for her.
Of course Teno came along and I loved him just as much, but in a very different way. My mother laid claim to Teno as her prized possession, her boy, her baby, in a way that she simply hadn't with her first three children, girls.
Breezy would respond to me when she wouldn't to anyone else. She did what I told her to do as a child, and as an adolescent she looked to me for guidance. She thought I was the greatest thing in the world. And I reciprocated the feeling.
At the same time, I was dealing with my own adolescence and growth, with troubles with my parents, and I ultimately ran away from home at 15. I remember crying, sobbing, unconsolably the day I left, because I was leaving Breezy and Teno. My babies.
Breezy and I stayed in constant contact, phone calls, letters, I sent stamps and stationery so she could write to me, send me colored pictures. I sent them bus tickets to come stay with me wherever I was, drove 300 miles up the coast to pick them up and bring them home with me for a week or more each summer. I was like a divorced parent. I made the decision to move to where they were the year Breezy entered high school because I thought I knew what a difficult time that would be for her.
I had no idea.
The high school years for Breezy represent the time when our relationship metamorphosed from maternal to sisterly. In a silent way, with no words ever spoken, but still in no uncertain terms, she let me know that I would have to be "sister" now, that she neither needed nor wanted me to be a maternal figure any longer.
And so, control freak though I may be, I let go. Because I had no choice. I had to take her as she was willing to be taken.
But still, many of the decisions I made in my life I made because I was conscious of her eyes watching. The last few years of high school for Breezy I knew were leading up to a decision about college. I couldn't very well push her to go to school when I hadn't done so myself. So, there I was, a 27 year old freshman, pushing my way through community college, and ultimately graduating and going on to graduate school.
This is not to say that I have been perfect. I have made horrible decisions. I have done stupid things. I also have not been solely driven by my love for or hopes for my sister to do what I have done that is good. It is to say that Breezy holds such a profound place in my heart, in my soul, that I simply haven't been able to find the words to write about her. Even now, these words fall flat for me. The depth is just ungraspable.
Flash forward to earlier this year, and I get the call. Well, a visit, really, from Breezy with a wine bottle, asking me to be her bridesmaid. The moment was bittersweet. I had hoped to be her maid of honor because of how close I felt we were, had been, for all those years. But I was relieved that I didn't have to figure out what the hell a maid of honor was supposed to do. Meanwhile, Tammy was the perfect choice, anxious to fulfill all the duties of which I was unaware. Breezy made a good choice.
A week later, I get an actual call. "Max and I were just talking about it over dinner, and decided there's nobody we'd rather have marry us than you. Will you marry us?"
What!!???!
I think I might have actually said, "what?!"
"Well, we know that you'll say the perfect thing, that you'll come up with just the right words."
Right. No pressure. Talk about duties to fulfill. Here I thought I was off the hook!
And yet, it was an even bigger honor than it would have been, for me, to be a maid of honor. I'm a writer. I'm an observer. I've watched these two kids grow together, rip at each other, fall back into each other. Laughter, light, tears, obscurity. I've seen it, I've taken mental pictures of it, and, because of my love for Breezy, I've always accepted Max, even when I might have thought, "really? This guy?" I trusted her. I believed in her. So I had to trust and believe in him.
As the wedding raced forward all I could do was think about what I wanted to say, but I couldn't get words down. This process is essentially how I write. I think. I think. I think. I do some dishes. I think. Something hits me. I write a few words. I walk away. I think. Finally, after I force an arbitrary deadline on myself, I sit down and write. I walk away. I come back and revise.
So while I haven't been blogging, or even actually writing my monologue, I have been "writing."
The wedding was beautiful. It was perfect. I really don't think I have ever seen two people more made for each other than these two, or more in love. Friends and family came out in full support. The sun shaded everything in gold, the branches of trees bent toward them, the leaves reached for them, the grass softened under their feet, the crickets sang for them and the flowers bloomed for them. It was perfect. A perfect moment in time. I have never been a part of anything so beautiful, so profound, and yet so simple.
Beer, wine, a taco bar, a patch of grass under a tree, and a deck with some tables and chairs.
But their love colored everything. Tiny lights twinkled and the laughter of loved ones twinkled as well. Everyone had a drink in his or her hand but seemed simply drunk on love. The music filled the dance floor but left the outside seating area with enough quiet to have a conversation. The kids ran and laughed and twirled. Even my own kid, who is extra shy in large crowds and extra anxious around groups of kids, who fell twice, got extremely overwhelmed once, and hadn't slept well in two days. Even my two year old ultimately handled the night with grace.
I look at my toddler now and I think back to Breezy's toddler days. Celaya wraps herself around me, parrots my speech, follows my directions in such earnest, and I think, "ah, I have been here before, more than twenty years ago, there was another little girl just like you. Her name was Breezy."
I look at my sister now, I watched her walking down the aisle, I watched her dance with her husband, lean up for a kiss, wrap herself around him, and I think, "oh, this is what it will be like, more than twenty years from now, there will be another woman just like you, my eyes will fill with tears, my heart will fill to bursting. Her name will be Celaya."
For those of you who are interested, who wanted to be there but couldn't, or who are interested in reading my writing, I am including below the monologue I wrote, I spoke, that took me away from blogging for so long. Note that Breezy and Max had a heavy hand in the writing of the actual vows that they exchanged with only a few tweaks from me.
Monologue for Breezy and Max's Wedding, 9/20/14, written by Shanna Mendez-Mathews
Who gives Max to Breezy?
Who gives Breezy to Max?
<Exchange of Bride Price>
Max is placing necklaces over the necks of Breezy’s parents,
Melanie and Serge, to represent the bride price that is tradition in Max’s
Yurok heritage.
This exchange recognizes that Breezy is an equal in this
marriage, that she brings value to her marriage, these necklaces represent what
once stood for Yurok money.
The coins represent the non-Indian heritages of both
families. They show respect for
the fact that their future children will be raised according to both
traditions, the Indian, and the non-Indian.
This exchange establishes the position of this new family
society.
What is marriage?
Historically it has been a way to continue a male line,
through children, a way for women to move out of their parent’s homes and into
their own home, the home of their husbands, a bargain, a negotiation, an
exchange. Only recently have we
begun to talk about love as a factor in marriage. Sure, in the past, couples have grown to love each other
over the years, long after the initial exchange of vows, but today, most people
wouldn’t dream of marrying someone purely for practical reasons. Another fairly new concept is that of
marrying across cultures. Again,
historically, there has been a foundation of marrying only within one’s own
culture, and often with good reason.
Cultures across the world vary greatly with regard to marital
expectations. Some cultures expect
a woman to be entirely subservient to her husband. Others require a man to be the only financial provider for
the household. Some cultures call
upon a man and wife to have as many children as their bodies will allow. Others look down upon families with
more than two kids. And marrying
across religions only adds further to the complexities and inevitable difficulties
for a couple that agrees to be bonded for life. So, yes, you can see why it would be very difficult to
navigate the decades of an already obstacle filled journey with any added
complexities.
It seems that the most successful couples who come together
from different places, culturally, or otherwise, find their success, their
longevity, through embracing their differences instead of hiding from or
ignoring them, by building on what similarities they find and strengthening
their bonds through an appreciation of difference. In fact, for generations, the couples that come to each other
across vast expanses are the ones that catch our attention in literature. That is what we do here today, with a
couple that, while they do have much in common, does have stark
differences. One way people in
general have found common ground is through music. Which is what we do here today. Breezy walked before us to the tune of a classical American
song, My Girl. The song not only
represents one culture our bride and groom come from, the American culture; it
also speaks so well to how these two see each other, and themselves. He really does see her as his sunshine
on a cloudy day, and she really wants to be that for him. But if the song falls short of just how
much she loves him, if, perhaps, it is a bit too sweet for the Max and Breezy we
all now, I’ll read you a poem that I think completes this circle nicely:
You Bring Out the
Mexican in Me
By Mexican American Poet Sandra Cisneros
“You bring out the Mexican in me.
The hunkered thick dark spiral.
The core of a heart howl.
The bitter bile.
The tequila lágrimas on Saturday all
Through next weekend Sunday.
You are the one I let go the other loves for,
Surrender my one-woman house.
Allow you red wine in bed,
Even with my vintage linens.
Maybe. Maybe.
For you.
Sweet twin. My
wicked other,
I am the memory that circles your bed nights,
That tugs you taut as moon tugs ocean.
I claim you all mine,
Arrogant as Manifest Destiny.
I want to rattle and rent you in two.
I want to defile you and raise hell.
I want to pull out the kitchen knives,
Dull and sharp, and whisk the air with crosses.
Me sacas lo Mexican en mí,
Like it or not, honey.
Quiero ser tuya.
Only yours. Only you.
Quiero amarte.
Atarte. Amarrarte.
Love the way a Mexican woman loves. Let
Me show you.
Love the only way I know how.”
The love between these two transcends tradition. It pulls tradition up by the roots,
roughly, haphazardly, reforms it, and plants it back nicely, neatly, yet
unrecognizable. The love between
Max and Breezy began sweetly, innocently, and it evolved into the chaos that is
young love, it pushed its way into adulthood, maturity, with bits of darkness
and loads of depth while still maintaining its elements of sweetness.
This love pulls My Girl into Sandra Cisneros into a chant from
the depths of a Yurok song.
<Rachel and Nick Sing>
This is Max and Breezy’s love. It is a low chant in a quiet room. A ferocious roar heard over a noisy crowd. A twinkling laugh bubbling up from a
comfortable embrace.
Their love began with a push, a giggle, and some tears. Child’s play. It bloomed through adolescence, through misunderstanding,
through petulant mistakes and anger, through longing and desperation, through
breaks and through healing.
Breezy stood by Max, ready to defend him against even the
mightiest naysayers while he figured out which road he would choose in life,
stumbling at times, as we all often do.
Max encouraged and supported Breezy as she pushed through
years of college, truly at times acting as the wind beneath her wings.
Breezy sees a Max that many people in the world would look
right over, look right past, and she sees him so well, in his best light, that
she enables the rest of us who do not have the view, the clarity, she has, to
see him as well. She loves him so
much that those of us who love her love him in the most natural, unexpected way.
Max takes Breezy in all of her rush and bustle, all of her
chaos and complexity, he provides a home for her when she feels lost and he is
the light that guides her way. His
strength proves unbreachable, unbreakable, each time she crashes against him in
her fury and frustration, eager to change the world and hide from it all at the
same time. He claimed her as his
own one true love so profoundly and so completely at such an early age that she
is simply, matter of factly, “sister” to his brothers and sisters, “daughter,”
to his parents, and “auntie,” to his niece and nephew.
This love will endure because it already has. Their love is true because it is.
Today, now, in a time of “nothing last forever,” the bond
between Max and Breezy will.
Unquestioningly, undoubtingly, with no rush, no fuss, no fear.
When I asked Max what I should say here today, what did he
think was most important, he thought for a moment, evaded me, changed the
subject, and ultimately, quietly, he told me this:
“We’re friends.
She’s my friend. We accept
each other. That’s it.”
That’s it.
Simple, yet immense. Not
many people remember that when life is difficult, when pain is at its greatest,
when the world crashes down around you, your husband, your wife, is your best
friend, your ally.
They understand this.
And so they will endure.
In the past, when I have asked Breezy what it was about Max
that made him so great that she would spend the rest of her life with him, she
said this:
“He is the man I fantasize about. He is the man of my dreams. Really. While
other girls love their boyfriends or husbands but dream about a man in a
romance novel, or from the big screen, I love my boyfriend, and I dream about
him. He is my dream.”
And yet, so real.
Here we are today to bond the simple to the complex, the dream to the
reality, the hard to the soft, knowingly all the while that both of these young
lovers have elements of it all. So
really, we are witnessing the full completion of a puzzle, the fitting together
of two pieces that really were created as a match long before any of our times.
Now, this is the point of the ceremony where tradition
obliges me to say that if there is anyone present who has any objections to the
union of this couple, please speak now, or forever hold your peace.
Max, please repeat after me:
“I Max, take you Breana, to be my wife.
I promise to always be your closest, truest friend.
I am what I am because of you.
I will fight every day to be in every reason,
Every hope, every dream you ever have,
Every day we are together is the greatest day of my life.
With this ring, I promise, I will always be your one true
love.”
You may now place the ring on her finger.
Breezy, please repeat after me:
“I Breana, take you Max, to be my husband.
I promise to always be your closest, truest friend.
I am what I am because of you.
I will fight every day to be in every reason,
Every hope, every dream you ever have,
Every day we are together is the greatest day of my life.
With this ring, I promise, I will always be your one true
love.”
You may now place the ring on his finger.
By the power vested in me
I now pronounce you husband and wife.
And now, husband and wife, please seal this marriage pact
with a kiss.
