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"Santa Rosa Sunrise"

As the sun rose on the gulf horizon like a perfectly round ball of fire, the bride lay sleeping.  As Pastor Randle wandered aimlessly with the photographer through the white sand, the bride lay sleeping.  As the seagulls soared and the pelicans skimmed the blue ocean, the entire wedding party lay sleeping. 

Finally, a loud banging on the condo door awoke my husband to be.  Very apprehensively he approached my bed, tapped ever so lightly on my cheek and proceeded to say..."Honey, don't be mad..  It's 5:45 and the preacher is here."  I looked him square in the eye thinking to myself "...let me count the ways," and then replied through gritted teeth, "NICE, MIKE." 

Within seconds I sprang from the bed, ran to the rest room, brushed my teeth, washed my face, grabbed my makeup and curling iron as I could hear him running through the condo yelling, "Get up! Get up!  The preacher is here, we're missing the sunrise!"  I'm running in circles with a checklist in my head, marriage license, rings, flowers, dress, hair (oh well), makeup, all the while still gritting my teeth.  For about ten minutes I was so angry I didn't know what to do.  Do I call the wedding off?  Do I re-schedule it?  Do I scream at Mike since he was the one who assured me the alarm was set for 4:30 a.m. and not to worry about a thing?  Then suddenly I thought about the Veteran's Day celebration scheduled for noon that day.  I stopped, relaxed my face, took a deep breath and broke down laughing.  I laughed myself almost to tears.  Somehow, I was able to put the whole thing into perspective.   I figured our troops in Afghanistan aren't worried about it, so why should I be? 

My plan was to be in bed by 9:00 p.m. Friday night, though Mike and my brother insisted we go dancing and celebrate just a little before the big morning.  Four of my dear friends were driving fifteen hours or more from Stillwater to surprise me, so it was their job to keep me out until they arrived.  To my knowledge there weren't going to be any guests other than my brother, my soon-to-be stepdaughter and and her boyfriend.  As you can imagine, I was blown away when they led me out to the back deck of Banana Bob's to find my friends all standing there with these "gotcha" looks on their faces.  Needless to say, we danced the night away and almost slept the morning away.  Pastor Randle was so nice and understanding.  He said a seven piece band at Banana Bob's can make a lot of people late for a lot of things. 

They all waited for me on the beach, the groom wondering if I was coming down to join them.  I did, arm in arm with my brother, the one who forgot to put the tape in the video camera.  (Still not wake)  My stepdaughter's boyfriend, bless his heart, was the lucky one assigned to work the video camera and film the ceremony.  Unfortunately, he figured out halfway through the ceremony that there was no tape in it.  I can still picture him panning around looking like quite the professional.  Faking me out is what he was doing.  Pretending he had it all under control for fear of interrupting the ceremony since the morning had already been mass chaos.  It wasn't until later in the day that my brother found the courage to tell me we had no video.  Imagine that. 

Krispy Kreme donuts, champagne and orange juice took the place of cake and punch.  The Blue Angels air show took the place of a traditional reception.  (I guess you could say we had 125,000 people at our reception). It was the most incredible show I've ever seen.  If you ever get the chance to see The Blue Angels, don't miss them.  They're unbelievable!  We were all filled with so much pride and respect for our country.  Not to mention the honor we felt when we read in the air show that one of only sixteen Blue Angels was originally from Stillwater, Oklahoma, #7 Narrator, Lt. Dan Martin, USN.  How cool is that? 

I suppose just waking up every day is reason enough to rejoice.  Pensacola Beach is beautiful from sunup to sundown.  Who needs a schedule?  This is one bride, who by the end of her wedding day, was that much more proud to be an American, Mrs. Michael Pollaro.  What a beautiful, memorable day it was.  Life's too short to sweat the small stuff.