Strength. Even when things aren’t perfect

I’ll be honest and say that my husband Marco is not one of the easiest of people to get along with. I’ll be even more honest and say, maybe I’m not the easiest either.

If it were up to our horoscopes we would not be an ideal couple, and indeed we’ve had our fair share of intense moments. Somehow after 7 years together including; a long distance relationship, language barriers, communication differences, an unexpected pregnancy, a few earthquakes and many a heated discussion about EVERYTHING imaginable, we are still together.

I would never describe him as my “best friend”, indeed he reminds me often that we are not just “friends” we are lovers and spouses. We are much more than friends.

Marco has never been a “yes man”, actually he says No to almost every suggestion I make. He forces me to fight for the things that I want, pull myself together even when I don’t want to and ask for forgiveness when I’ve been wrong. As difficult as he is, I think being with him makes me a better person. No, I KNOW being with him makes me a better person.

Our relationship isn’t one that comes easy to us. I think any normal couple would have thrown in the towel a long time ago and yet day after day, and year after year we’re still together, creating our little life and finding compromises all the time.

Exactly 3 years Ago

I was 5 months pregnant and not yet on 100% bed rest. We were enjoying ourselves out with friends at an aperitivo and chatting about the laws in Italy when it comes to marriage. In Canada there exists “Common Law” relationships, where if you live together as a couple for a year you are considered “married” to some degree by the government and you have all of the legal rights as a married couple.

That does not exist in Italy. Here, unless you are actually, legally married you only have a certain amount of rights as a couple. Being a very practical (and not a very romantic) man he asked me to marry him while we were having an aperitivo. His exact words “Ah è vero, forse anche noi dobbiamo sposarci”, translation “Ah it’s true (talking about legal rights) maybe you and I should get married too”.

That was enough for me. Proposal accepted. I said “I’m considering that a proposal, let’s do it. Don’t forget it was your idea!”. He HATES weddings, hates being the centre of attention, hates formal situations and HATES getting in contact with people or even hanging out in big groups!!! FUN FUN FUN!

The only rules to our wedding were that I would have to do it myself and he didn’t want to hear about the planning, budgeting, decorations, or anything that had to do with the wedding in general. Actually, he even had the nerve to want to do a wedding in January (I would have been 7 months pregnant), in city hall and not invite anyone.

Ummmm. No.

I could just hear my entire family reaming me out for not giving them notice or the chance to plan to come over for our wedding. We were having none of that.

Budgets

Marco insisted that we not ask for help from anyone. He didn’t want to put his parents in a tight financial situation and he didn’t want to do anything that we couldn’t afford paying for it ourselves.

So I started to save. BIG TIME. A difficult task when you are also expecting a baby and have no friends with kids or relatives around to pass you hand me downs. We bought almost everything for our son and paid for our wedding alone.

To this day, our wedding remains one of the most incredibly beautiful experiences of my life. We were married August 30, 2012, exactly 5 months after our baby Zeno was born.

Giving Thanks

Marco said that we were not allowed to do any long winded thank you speeches at our wedding! He said that he thought they made people uncomfortable and that everyone hated listening to them anyway.

Now that I think about it, I don’t think I really can thank enough all of the friends that came to be with us on that day enough. My parents, sister Chrissy (who was also my Maid of Honor!), sister Suzie along with her family and my brother Fonzie along with my niece all came from Canada!

My dear friend Adrienne and her man Paul (you’ve seen her here) also came all the way from Canada to be with us. And my other dear friend Gillian (you’ve seen her here) came from Rome with her husband Nicola, while she was pregnant!

I went to the Albinelli Market in Modena’s centre a few months before the wedding and ordered fresh tiger lilies, broad leaves and mini hot peppers. The day before the wedding I was sure that I would be alone making centerpieces with the discounted glass vases I found at IKEA, but instead the doorbell kept ringing.

EVERYONE CAME TO HELP. Nicola, Gillian’s husband was on the balcony spraying shine stuff on the leaves (he also cleaned our bikes for us in his good wedding attire), my sister made my bouquet, my mom helped with the corsages….everyone helped me.

They didn’t just come to our wedding, they helped us create it.

The Day

When I originally wrote this, I describd the day in detail. But I don’t think it needs a description. Imagine an Italian folk song playing in the background while you look at these pictures with a lot of laughing and some very surreal moments thrown in.

As difficult as it can be to live with a perfectionist Virgo who never lets me do what I want, I am so grateful and happy to celebrate 2 years of marriage and 7 years together. Being with Marco has taught me that true romance is really finding the strength to go on even when things aren’t perfect.