The other day, my parents interrupted my video game playing to tell the whole family some “important news.” My first impression was, “Uh-oh, what did we do wrong this time?” Such family gatherings on such short notice worried my brothers and I. Fortunately the news was to the contrary, and quite positive. “We have some big news to tell you, anyone want to take a guess at what it is?” my mother asked us.
“You’re having a baby?” I inquired. About ten minutes later (after my parents had finally suppressed their laughter), they announced to my brothers and I that our sister would be getting married. Responses were mixed, varying from: “cool,” to “it’s about time, they’ve been dating long enough!” Nonetheless we were all rather pleased, and not really all that surprised. We had all anticipated the engagement long enough, almost to the point where we were becoming anxious. My parents told us the rest of the details of the engagement, and then we went back to playing video games. I didn’t think much of the marriage announcement after that. In fact, I’d completely forgotten all about the big news until later that night. It was then that in all dawned on me.
The whole thing just feels really weird. Don’t get me wrong, I’m totally happy for my sister, and the guy she’s engaged to is one in a million, we’re all very fond of him. But I mean, this is my sister. This is the sibling I grew up with and looked up to. This is the sibling who watched cartoons with me on Saturday mornings. This is the sibling who when I was born, wanted to name me “Flagoona-lagoona-baboona.” This is the sibling who threw-up on me when I was two. And now, she was getting married? Now, she was going to start a family of her own? Now she’s going to have her own kids, who will watch cartoons and throw-up on each other? But how could this be? I mean it seems like only yesterday I was fighting with her because I had to go with Mommy to pick her up from school at the same time that Scooby-Doo was on. (Of course, given the right circumstances, I suppose it could have been yesterday.) I thought about this long and hard into the night, pondering how time could possibly have moved so quickly, and realized that I was only four years younger then my sister. (Actually three and a half to be exact.) In such a period of time, I could be the one getting engaged. “No.” I thought, “This is ludicrous! I’m not at all prepared to be getting married. Besides, I don’t need to be thinking about this now, four years is a long-way-off.” And so I put such thoughts behind me…that is…until I remembered that as a Freshman…my high school graduation, seemed a long-way-off…
Now I can’t help but wonder; How long will it be before I meet my future wife? Where will I meet her? And most importantly, what kind of a crazy woman is going to be able to put up with me? In all seriousness, one of my greatest fears is not being able to find “the one.” And so now, in hopes of putting some of my fears to rest, I have created this handy-dandy checklist, so that when I do meet my future wife, I’ll know that it’s her, and I can cherish her forever.
1. My future wife will undoubtedly be very clean, and well-kept. She will be modest, but very beautiful just the same. She will have very small feet, and have no problem with wearing the color orange.
2. She will be very bright, and enjoyable to converse with. She will have millions of little things to say that will utterly fascinate me. She will also know how to program the VCR.
3. My future wife will also have a great personality. She will be really fun to be around, and I will surely be the envy of every man because of it. My future wife will enjoy multiple trips to Disneyland.
4. It is not required that my future wife know how to cook. (I’m such a picky eater, it probably wouldn’t matter if she did.) It only be asked that she learn how to make macaroni & cheese, and chocolate milk. She will have perfect table manners, and not mind that I don’t have any. Aside from that, my future wife will have no problem with me barbecuing meat at least five days a week.
5. She will want to have children, at least three, maybe four or even five. I would hope that she would want to stay home to care for the children, play with them often, and make sure that they don’t throw-up on each other.
6. She will be musical, and have the voice of an angel. (I swear I’d marry a girl based on her singing voice alone, if it were good enough.) She will sing songs to our kids whenever they feel sad, and sing to me too, whenever I get sad. She will not mind my constant drumming (no matter what my parents say).
7. My future wife will happily grow old with me, and put up with me even when I become old and senile. When all of our children have grown and left home, we won’t get lonely because we have each other. At the age of eighty, my future wife still won’t mind watching Transformers with me.
8. Most importantly, my future wife will love me for who I am, and I will likewise love her.
I suppose it’s possible that I might be demanding a little too much of my future wife. I imagine that there’s no way she can possibly hold all the characteristics that I have perceived her to contain. Still, I can’t help but wonder what she’s really like, where she is now, and what kind of life we will hold together. I only hope that when we do find each other, we’ll realize it, and not pass it by all together. She’s out there somewhere, and we’ll meet sooner than we know. In reality, four years isn’t very far away.