Of course, we couldn’t stay too sappy for too long. Halfway through the song, Billy Idol’s “White Wedding” cut in, and that was it, the party was officially started. We motioned for the wedding party, who had been in a circle around us, to start dancing, and before you knew it, everyone was on the dance floor. Time for some fun!
The reception went on for four hours, heated up by the live music of the Land Sharks, who play Jimmy Buffet–style songs and who rarely stopped playing, even for a break. All the guests loved everything—the food was delicious; the cake, Tiffany blue and embellished with starfish from top to bottom, was spectacular; and like all brides, I don’t remember a thing. The headwaiter built plates of food for Bill and me, knowing we’d never sit down, but we never got to those, either. Between visiting every table to say “hi” and thanking each person for coming and the dancing and socializing, the time flew by, and our dinners went uneaten.
There were so many family members and friends to see that there was never enough time, but I tried to spend time with everyone. My aunt Chrissy and aunt Barbara and uncle Jack were there. I had not seen my uncle Jack and aunt Barbara ever have so much fun before! Uncle Jack is a slightly eclectic vegetarian with long blond hair who loves the sixties, listens to classic rock, watches World War II documentaries, and wears T-shirts and jeans every day. He owns his own carpet-cleaning business on St. Pete Beach, so dress wear is not part of his daily attire. I think my wedding day might have been the first and only time I have ever seen Jack wear a suit, and he looked great in it!
Chrissy unfortunately had not been doing so well emotionally, but she was there for me, smiling every time I saw her. She suffered from major depression, and I knew big family events were very stressful for her. Sadly, that was one of the last times I saw her happy. It would be less than a year from that day that she committed suicide. I wish now I had had more time with her that day. I wish I had known life would soon never be the same. The pain of losing Chrissy, especially that way, is something I still struggle with every day. I’d rather have a million surgeries than to have lost my best friend that way. But on this day, my entire family was happy, and nothing can ever take that away.
Of course, my parents were both elated! They had been back together for years and everyone was healthy and happy. I even saw them dancing a few times. Bill and I made a special recognition of my mother and presented her with flowers for all she had done to make my dream wedding come true. We even had a cake for my father, and had the whole room sing “Happy Birthday” to him. After all, it was his birthday, too!
Family members I had not seen in years joined in our celebration that day, among them my uncle Ray, who is my godfather, my half-aunt Sandee, and my cousin Tish, who had even made the trip from California.
Sandee was actually my mom’s half-sister. My papa had a daughter with another woman before he met and married my grandma. Times were different back then, and I don’t think anyone talked about his prior relationship. Although I think my mom and her siblings knew of Sandee, they had met her for the first time only ten years earlier. My aunt Chrissy had actually found Sandee via the Internet, and our families had reconnected!
My brother, David, and his longtime girlfriend, Lisa, who is now his wife, both looked great, and I was happy to see them having such a good time. They were the youngest of all of the sibling couples, with David being a year younger than Bill’s brother Joey. As I saw David escort Chetna down the aisle in the wedding party, I thought it might have been nostalgic for the two of them. I had matched them up in the bridal party line since they had known each other from our childhood. I know Chetna remembers the days of us having sleepovers when we were younger, and David crashing our parties! I never asked David if they talked about some of those memories.
One of the more fun aspects of the wedding was watching Bill’s family getting to know my family! Bill’s mother was with his stepfather, Chuck. They were fairly “newlywed” themselves, having gotten married in 2000, although they had been together for more than a decade. His mother was wearing a beautiful dress she had tailored for the special occasion. She looked fantastic and glowing because she was so happy. I thought about the first time I met her—the day after Mother’s Day, as a matter of fact. We hit it off instantly. She loved telling me she thought Bill would likely be a bachelor, loving work above anything else, but hoped he would find true love some day. Well, I hoped today was that day!
Bill’s father and Debbie, his stepmother, were really rocking it, too. Debbie, who was also dressed in a tailored gown, looked wonderful. On the dance floor, they were really cutting a rug. Bill and I may have been the ones who took dance lessons, but they looked as if they had, too!
Last, all of our friends, who had been some of our biggest supporters through some of the roughest times, had traveled from far and wide to be there. I couldn’t believe the Pittsburgh contingent that made it to Florida!
Lakshmi, my maid of honor, had just gotten married herself. We had been best of friends since college, having studied for boards together, traveled for residency interviews together, and shared weekly dinners together during residency and fellowship in Pittsburgh. I have her to thank for ultimately bringing Bill and me together. If it wasn’t for our commiserating over a bottle of wine one night at my apartment about being single at thirty-two, I might never have logged on to DateALittle and never would have emailed Bill.
At the reception, Lakshmi and Tom, our best man, both gave heartwarming toasts. They had me laughing and in tears. My dad made the initial toast, welcoming everyone, and Diane even made a toast. She told the crowd about how I had called her after I found Bill online to get a “background check.” I did do that, and in fact, that’s how I found out Bill had been the same guy she and Dr. Kopits had wanted to set me up with way back in college. Diane spoke of Dr. Kopits and how he was there with us. Imitating his thick Hungarian accent, she ended her toast with something he said often, “BEAUTIFUL!” There was not a dry eye in the room again.
After the official reception was over, everybody went down to the beach bar to keep the party going. Meanwhile, my bridesmaids had set up Bill’s and my hotel room with tons of candles and rose petals scattered everywhere, and a bottle of Scotch for Bill and a bottle of champagne for me. However, we were having so much fun at the after party that retiring for the evening was not popping to mind. Finally, my bridesmaids insisted we go to the room to be sure we blew out the candles before the hundred-year-old historic hotel burned to the ground!
The next morning, we woke up as a happily married couple—extraordinarily exhausted, but happy and married. We had reserved half of a restaurant down the block from the hotel for a brunch so that our guests could come and enjoy some greasy eggs and coffee as they shook off the cobwebs from the party. The breakfast place I had picked out, the Pelican, was a place on the water that I loved to go to with my aunts Barbara and Chrissy before a long day at the beach. While planning the wedding, I found out that my brother’s soon-to-be-wife Lisa’s uncle actually was the owner. I had been going there for years, long before my brother met Lisa in college. It is a small world!
After the brunch, Bill and I went back to Long Island, took a day to pack for the honeymoon, and left for Bora Bora—so far, so good. But things don’t always go the way you plan in life. Are you sensing a theme here?
Bill and I had come to expect that things did not always go perfectly. We left for our honeymoon on Tuesday morning, right on schedule. American Airlines, New York to Los Angeles. We arrived at LAX and had to migrate to the international terminal, with all five pieces of our luggage in tow. We probably overpacked—we definitely overpacked. We had dress clothes for dinners out, shorts and tees, bathing suits, socks, undies, toiletries, shoes, sandals, flip-flops, snorkel gear, some electronics in case we got bored on the plane, books, and so on. So Bill stacked all of our luggage onto one Smart-Cart, we moved to the international terminal, and checked in for our 11:00 p.m. flight to Tahiti by way of Air Tahiti Nui.
At the gate, we were informed that the flight would be delayed a bit, and the three hundred plus passengers for this fully booked flight began to moan . . . and sweat . . . and grow cranky. Then midnight came. Over the loudspeaker, the gate manager announced that the pilots had gone on strike as of midnight, and the flight had been canceled! Now, three hundred people bolted to the customer service desk, but the news was the same.
“We are sorry, but we don’t have any information about when the strike will end,” was the blanket statement from the representative. “We will gladly put you in a hotel for the night and update you tomorrow with the status of the flight.” I could see Bill was getting frustrated, because we were now losing a day of our trip and potentially the entire honeymoon. Our travel insurance was now useless, as we had already “begun” our trip, so we decided to wait it out.
We went to the first hotel via shuttle, but it was sold out. We got back on the bus and went to the second—also sold out. Because everyone else doing the same thing as us (and our five bags) was quicker, they got to these places faster. The third and fourth hotels were also totally booked. Finally, we got a room at the La Hacienda near LAX, where a negative star rating would have been appropriate. It was totally gross. In fact, it was so bad, Bill and I didn’t even take off our socks.
The next day, we went back to the airport early. The customer service person at Air Tahiti offered to put us on a Korean Airways flight, but that meant going to Korea first! Since I wasn’t as avid a flyer back then, I insisted we decline that generous but insane offer to be in the air an extra eleven hours. We waited for another few hours and, miraculously, by that evening the strike was over, and we were moved to the eleven o’clock flight that night.
We arrived in Tahiti at 4:00 a.m. Tahiti time, completely exhausted. The airline put us up in a hotel called the Intercontinental, which was very pretty and clean. There, we showered and slept for a few hours before the shuttle bus back to the airport for the final leg of the trip. A smaller jet was needed to get from Tahiti to Bora Bora, so we boarded that island jumper and headed to our final destination only a day and a half late.
The wait was worth it. At the airport, we were greeted by a few native Tahitians who were armed with leis and fruity drinks. We also met the captain of the small boat that would take us to our hotel, Le Meridien, which was located on the Motu, an outer band of islands surrounding the main island. There, our luggage was finally handled by someone else, and our honeymoon felt like it was finally beginning. Our room was an over-water hut that was beautiful inside but had a thatched roof to give it that “Island” feel. It had air-conditioning, cable TV, a sound system, a big comfy bed, a deck with loungers to sit out on, and a ladder leading down to the crystal clear lagoon below. It even had a glass floor through which we could see fish, sea turtles, and rays swimming under the hut any hour of the day or night. I was in heaven!
I think our experience in Bora Bora was probably unique. The staff treated us as if we were royalty. At first we thought it was because we were honeymooners, but after a few days we realized it may have been something else. It turns out people with skeletal dysplasia do not end up in Bora Bora very often. In fact, the local news had heard of our arrival and came knocking on the door of our hut the day after we arrived! Mind you, this was before our television show existed, so it wasn’t because of that.
Again, being Little People, we were not completely surprised that we stood out to others, but of course never expected the news to show up. We were nice to the reporter, I think mostly because we were still in shock about what was happening. She followed us on our boat ride to the main island for dinner and then kindly we asked her to leave us alone—we were on our honeymoon.
The treatment we received on our honeymoon went beyond anything we could have expected. Our breakfasts were very special. Every morning, the restaurant’s team would make a special seating arrangement for the two of us. They would adorn our chairs with dozens of flowers, while the other guests ate from the buffet and served themselves. The staff wouldn’t allow us to do that, even when we tried. They would, instead, create a small buffet table in front of us, and then ask us to select from the private buffet they had created—eggs, omelettes, and meats, croissants and pastries, fresh fruits and veggies, cereals and beverages, French press coffee and cappuccinos. It was an amazing spread, every day. And when we had our fill, they would make new plates of fresh fruits and chocolate croissants (my favorite) and place them in our room for us in case we wanted a snack later that morning.
One of the other guests, a regular at that resort, had asked us what we had done to receive this sort of treatment. He went on to say that in the years he had been coming to this resort in Bora Bora, he had never seen any other couple treated with this amount of personal attention. So Bill and I invited him and his wife to come eat with us the next day. It was only fair to share the experience.
Our royal treatment didn’t end with breakfast. The head of guest relations offered to take us for a tour of Bora Bora. We accepted the generous offer and one day sailed over to the mainland and hopped in his car. First stop, his house! We were introduced to his entire family and extended family, all twenty plus people! We next traversed the entire island—winding roads, local hangouts, even the place where, six hundred years ago, ritualistic sacrifices by fire of godlike people, such as those who were short in stature, had been performed! I joked to Bill, softly, “I hope we are not next!” Fortunately, we had an agenda that kept us from “rekindling” old flames. By the time we returned to the hotel, I had been the recipient of more than fifty handmade necklaces made of shells, pearls, and other ornaments only found on the island. The women of the main town, Vaitape, just wouldn’t let me leave without making me look like the Mr. T of seashell necklaces. It was an island shopping spree!
The whole trip was fantastic. We were “swimming” with black tip sharks and stingrays, dining on the water, and lying out on the beach. Even though our ten-day trip had become nine, thanks to some disgruntled pilots, it didn’t get better than a tiny island in the South Pacific with the love of your life. Every day was bliss!
CHAPTER SIXTEEN
Bill
Becoming “The Little Couple”
AFTER THE CRAZINESS OF our wedding and honeymoon, we settled into our lives back in New York. Jen liked Long Island and Port Jefferson, but after almost a year at Stony Brook Hospital, she was a little discouraged with her job. It was not as challenging as she had hoped, and while she really liked her coworkers, Jen’s true hunger was for education through simulation, something she had been doing in her fellowship. As an educator, Jen is looking for new and innovative ways to help educate physicians and medical staff. She is a true believer in simulation, because she feels the value of being able to create realistic scenarios in a safe-to-learn environment is the future. Thus, when the person at the hospital who had hired her accepted a job elsewhere, Jen was ready to make a move herself. “I’m ready for a new challenge,” Jen told me one evening. “Is it okay if I look around at other hospitals?”
I was nervous, as I wasn’t quite sure what Jen had in mind. This would potentially be a major change in many aspects of our life together. I was comfortable on Long Island. I had a business I had established there, so of course, I was concerned about the business. I had my house, which I had really fixed up to my liking. And while she was a little concerned that she had just gotten the job at Stony Brook, we both came to the realization that change is good.
She had taken her position in order to be with me. If it wasn’t as satisfying as she had hoped, I wasn’t going to be the one to hold her back from pursuing her career. Because I owned my business, I had more control over what I could do. Still, I knew that a job change for Jen would likely mean a major upheaval in our lives.
The trouble was that neonatology is a subspecialty that isn’t present in every hospital. Usually, one hospital with an NICU will serve many hospitals in a certain geographical area. Therefore,
there weren’t that many choices for neonatologists. On Long Island, we had more than forty hospitals, but there were only two fully equipped, state-of-the-art, “level 3” NICUs, Stony Brook and Long Island Jewish. Even though New York City had a handful, Jen was specifically interested in an institution with a simulation center, and none of the nearby openings had both a simulation center and a neonatology position available. This newly emerging field of medical simulation was fascinating to Jen on many levels. The simulation centers were pioneering new techniques for testing systems, teams, and response time to improve overall patient outcomes in real life by allowing people to learn from mistakes in a simulated environment. In simulation training, doctors can develop such new procedures, processes, techniques, and communication without ever putting a patient at risk, because they are working on a high-fidelity mannequin, not a living patient. Jen felt that this was an important new field that could lead to immense patient care breakthroughs, and in many ways this field was at the forefront of medical innovation. In traditional medicine, innovation has historically come at a hefty price of trial and error on real people. But in a simulation center, mothers of preemie newborns could learn how to respond to a breathing crisis using a Sim Baby mannequin, so that they would be prepared should their own baby have a breathing crisis. Teams can go through common emergencies and train on how to better communicate with one another. And they can take all of their simulated experiences back to a room, where they can discuss errors and omissions in a “safe place.”
Life Is Short (No Pun Intended) Page 19