my Boys–Sean and Rob

What an incredibly fun last two days I’ve had.

One of my favorite things is cooking. And I mean not everyday cooking but the kind where you research, plan, shop and spend two days pulling off a multi course meal.

This month marks the one year anniversary of my dear friends Rob and Sean’s nuptials.  They’ve been together I think 12 years now but just got married in NY, because, they could!

We celebrated hearty last night with a multi course “Lobster Three Ways” dinner with blueberry cocktails, wine and champagne.  I’ll share a photo montage of the meal/meal prep here because you know I love my food prep photos.  The Boys are eating primarily paleo now so that means no grains or dairy.  I made almost the entire meal on those guidelines but I did need to use some cream and of course we did dip our lobster in melted butter.

used these alba aka “seafood” mushrooms that I happened on at the Asian grocery store and boy were they delicious!

The menu was as follows:

lobster canapes

lobster bisque with roasted alba mushrooms – recipe here

brussels sprouts/kale walnut slaw with a homemade miso dressing – recipe here

roasted asparagus and mushrooms with homemade lemon aioli – recipe here

big fat fresh lobster- 1 each

paleo key lime pie – recipe (but I used a different more shortbread crust made w/ coconut flour) here

 

paleo key lime pie that turned out pretty amazing

We had an absolute blast…it was laughter from the word Go and lasted all throughout the evening.  Right up to the moment I passed out on the couch.  No I will not be posting the hideous photos they took of me before they let themselves out.  I haven’t been drinking much alcohol lately during my Summer of Fitness but I indulged like crazy last night.  And had a fantastic time I must say!  Cocktails!  Wine!  Champagne!  Lobster! And nothing in moderation!  Yay!

I love these two so much.  They are my family.  We typically spend most major holidays together (esp. now since my family is spending all the big holidays in Sedona now where they live of course), we’ve traveled together on wild road trips, been through many ups and downs together.  They have a way of turning the downs in to ups which is one of the many reasons I adore them.

Rob and Sean exemplify a kind of love most people aspire to.  They are madly in love, have tons of fun, nurture each other’s passions (they are currently installing a major observatory in their back yard with a professional state of the art telescope that will launch Sean’s new life’s dream–astronomy on a big scale), travel on GREAT trips, are affectionate and respectful to and about each other always and are madly in love (yes I did “accidentally” bookend this sentence with the same phrase and I like it so I’m leaving it).

I just call it magic.

 

I had this made for them for their anniversary

It’s good for me to be around that and soaking in some of that good juju.

I went on Sean’s Facebook just now to grab some photos of them to share and it was like a walk down memory lane of our decade long friendship.  Here are some of my favorites:

in my office for my office opening ceremony

Sean giving me a pedicure…they pamper me so much!

my 50th birthday party

Sean found our “Harry Potter Room” under the stairs in our Sedona house that we never knew was there!

Speaking of magic, I had kind of an awakening yesterday in talking with Max on the phone about a disappointment related to someone I’d thought could really be someone interesting for me to date.  Let’s just say I’m very sensitive about trust and I’ve said it before that, for me, when there is a trust violation that comes up in that delicate trust building phase of a relationship (any relationship), you are dead in the water.  You will never get it back.  Now it wasn’t a big deal–it was just an unfulfilled promise–but for some reason it just hit me hard.  I think what hit me so hard now that I write this was the realization that I was really interested in this guy but I knew, because of a kind of stupid faux pas that maybe someone else could brush off, that I’d always have that waiting for the shoe to drop feeling with him.  And I never even met him!  Kind of crazy.  But I couldn’t escape that clear knowing inside myself so walked away.

I’ll just say it, I’ve been doing the eharmony thing for the last couple of months.  I still haven’t met anyone in person but conversed with less than a handful.  I’m probably pickier than most, not really feeling that urgency for a relationship that makes some more open with their standards, I don’t know.  Also probably just not my time.  Or has Max said “maybe there are some other things the Universe wants you to complete first”.  Wisdom.

In speaking with Max yesterday she strongly suggested that maybe I’m distracting myself with this online dating.  That my likely over reaction to the guy I was really quite interested in was some sort of sign.  That these ups and downs are part and parcel of choosing to enter that arena and the types of people it attracts (it’s a haven for the fickle) and maybe I need to reconsider it.

While nursing my hangover this morning I realized that’s just what I need to do.

I reflected on this life filled with magic that I live.  I think unexpected amazing things/people/experiences drop in to my lap far more than the average person.  I don’t know why this is but I know this has been true, even mixed with all of the tragedy, my entire life.

I realized that by thinking I need to sign up for an online dating site to meet my soulmate is kind of a slap in the face to that which hands me these miracles throughout the landscape of this lifetime.  That it is some kind of fear laid bare and of course it’s going to draw people to me based on that mindset.  Duh!

I need to believe that absolute magic can drop in to my life in this arena too.  Just thinking that, saying it out loud to Max’s voicemail earlier and typing this makes my throat constrict.  This is my biggest learning curve.

I cancelled my eharmony membership and am going to throw this all in to the field that is always operating on my behalf.

As I keep breathing deep, opening my throat and dropping in to/expanding out toward a new way of believing in true love.

I’ll end with the video of the song I sang for the boys last night after way too many glasses of wine.  Then, naturally, we played it again and sang it together.

the morning after table remnants of our party 🙂