.once a bridesmaid.

It slips my mind if I’ve written about A-Zilla’s wedding or not… For now, she will be called A-Zilla until I assign Blog Names to each of my Zillaz. This is my first time to walk down the aisle, in a wedding, because First Holy Communion doesn’t quite count. But I do remember how much fun that day was, a party…in my honor.

.a-zilla and i in april 2005.

Anyway, today, we are nine days away from her wedding! I remember getting the call last June from her, oddly, on a Friday evening, while she was on vacation with her boyfriend. I was busy scrambling to get stuff done and wasn’t able to take the call. The next day, it hit me like a ton of bricks that she was calling to tell me that he was no longer her boyfriend. He is now her fiancé. Upon A-Zillaz return from vacation, she rang me one morning was I was still being lazy and trying to sleep late. It was the call I had been waiting for! My dear friend is now engaged to be married!! With my then boyfriend next to me, it had turned into quite the awkward moment as we gushed like grade school girls about rings, how it happened, what she did, when the wedding is, etc. Like the champ he is, Flo listened intently and was equally excited for my friend.

As luck would have it, I follow Flo to NYC about a week later. You see, his trip was planned, I decided to forego the family vacation and save my money. But once he texted me from the epicenter of my being, New York City, I just had to follow. So I booked a ticket and called my friend and said, “Hey, I am flying in tomorrow, want to hang out.” And of course, see the ring!!

The timing was impeccable that I was able to hug her and share in the joy within a week of the engagement. It was awesome. She was glowing and gorgeous, the ring also, but no comparison to the love glow she exuded. We, once again, gushed like girls about any wedding details that she may have had. All we knew was that it would be huge! It is the combining of two large Italian families and it was known that this would be a celebration of big, fat Italian wedding proportions. Low and behold, she asked me to be a part of it!! YAY! My first wedding. Ever. My first dress fitting, my first bridal shower, while I’ve been to a bachelorette party before, this would be one in which I play a role. Over the next few months, her plans slowly unfolded… the date, the venue, an opinion on a dress, what to buy her for the bridal show, when is the bridal shower, booking airline tickets, dress fittings, shoe shopping, hair and make up appointments….

In March, when I visited for her bridal shower, it was the first time that we were together as two engaged ladies who won the man lottery and are marrying amazing men. We’ve gone from just-out-of-college friends to women who are about to become wives. It was surreal to think back over the years of our friendship and see what we’ve evolved into as women. We are now more mature (sometimes); we’ve decorated homes of our own, are standing up in each other’s weddings and creating another chapter in our book of friendship.

When I think about the wedding next week, I almost always get teary eyed. It this was years ago, the tears wouldn’t fall, but as I’ve grown up, I’ve become softer too. There is more room for love in my heart and more emotion behind my eyes. I think about walking down the aisle with 300+ plus guests, looking at her groom as he anxiously awaits the most beautiful woman in white to approach him. I get emotional thinking about her father giving away his only daughter and her mother finally having her day as Mother of the Bride.

No doubt there will be lots of tears, starting when we arrive in NJ on Thursday. There will be tears as we reminisce about Dunkin’ Donuts, Fire Island, the beach, our jobs and our current lives. It is going to be an amazing weekend that I want to hurry up and get here, yet, I want to slow it down and savor each second and emotion. This is something we will never go through again, together. The next wedding we are in together, she will be an “old, married woman” who can share advice with me on “the first year”, she can share her lessons learned from the wedding day, the honeymoon and those first few months as husband and wife.

My level of excitement could not go any higher right now…well maybe it can just a little bit once I get closer to the my departure time.

A-Zilla and her Groom will make an amazing couple and accomplish many, many great things together. I wish them nothing but a million lifetimes of happiness, a ton of special memories and a life they call their own.

Tanti Aguiri