Beth and I decided to elope! It was not much of an elopement. I took off of work early one afternoon and we drove to Bennington, Vermont. (I’d already checked to see what the marriage laws are for the green mountain state and found no wait necessary, and also, through the miracle of the internet, found the Bennington Town Hall.) We drove into Bennington, parked behind the town hall, gasped deeply, asked each other if we were really ready (I said, we can get the license and then think some more), and walked in. We walked into Town Hall and asked for marriage licenses. We’d started! While we are filling out the form the Town Clerk folks are asking if we know where we’ll be getting married, when, by whom (nope, now, nope) and the next thing we know they’re on the phone getting a Justice of the Peace arranged for us (so much for time after getting the license for thinking about it).

The Justice of the Peace's office is this beautiful old house on Main Street, across from a beautiful Roman Catholic Church. We exchanged our vows on the veranda of the office with the Church behind us. I never thought it would be an emotional experience, but my knees were weak, and Beth’s eyes welled with tears as she said her vows. I put my hand up to her cheek twice, just to touch her. I could hardly walk afterwards and could not just jump into the car and drive home, so we walked around Bennington for a while, and went across the street to the church to sit and contemplate the enormity of what we had just done.

It was the happiest day of my life!