For The Record

18 years ago today it was a Friday.

Good memory, hey?

Well, not really...I'm a journaller (sp?). And a scrapbooker.

And 18 years ago today I was working.

So was Mike.

We worked at the same company up in northern Wisconsin.

A teeny-weeny town almost in Upper Michigan. (Talk about "Up North!")

We had been planning our week's vacation. We were the dating love birds of the office. At first, we didn't disclose our office romance, because that was kind of taboo as far as office etiquette was concerned. But, one of the co-owners was Mike's buddy and the other co-owner was my boss and we were pretty close, so after a few months we decided to "come clean."

Anyhow, we had told them about our plans to spend a week (or was it two weeks? I forget...) in Indiana visiting Mike's grandmother.

They were gossipping behind our backs about what a boring time that sounded like! Then, it wasn't behind our backs anymore, because that's the kind of group we were...we were always picking on each other (in fun) and so that became the big joke.

I guess the joke was really on them...

You see, Mike had a minister friend about 3 hours away in Upper Michigan.

And we had been taking weekend trips there for...

premarital counseling...

unbeknownst to anyone else.

So, Friday evening at 9pm after work on March 26th 1993 Mike Bixler and Pennie Brockman got married in L'Anse, Michigan:

We spent our first night in a hotel in Michigan, and then drove back to our house. We had photos taken prior to our wedding (not the ones above...they were from our wedding - the only ones in attendance were the pastor and his family). We stuffed a photo of us in our wedding clothes in cards like this:

We addressed the envelopes with generic titles like "Engineering Mgr." "Marketing Mgr." (to keep them guessing) and put them all in a manilla envelope and dropped them off at work, before heading to the airport. When they opened them the next day, they were all perplexed. Some of them were REALLY scratching their heads, until they opened the card to find the picture we inserted of us in our wedding clothes. When we returned, they greeted us by having the whole office decorated with wedding decorations. They had a cake and I think they probably gave us every houseware you can think of!

We called our families and broke the news and had them meet us at the airport before flying out to Florida for our honeymoon, since we were flying out at the airport where both sets of our parents' live.

It was really fun to get married in secret. I kept the many notes Mike slipped me at work. "Only 160 days left and you're mine!" They were the countdown. It made it so much more exciting - the anticipation was unreal. I still remember that!

I wrote in my scrapbook, "Mike said if he had to do it all over again, he would write the definition of 'elope' in all the cards. Elope - v. to run away secretly,  esp. in order to get married - Apparently the most frequently asked question was "Why didn't you tell us?". :)

Many people have asked if I had to do it over again, would I? The only regret I really have is maybe we should have told Mike's best friend Mark who worked with us and was watching our dog. We did leave a message on his answering machine the next morning, because we couldn't get ahold of him...but he thought it was a joke. (He thought that if we did that SURELY we would have told him...) Then, he came to work to find the card and he blew up. He was hurt, obviously...but he died 5 or so years ago, and he was still mad about that. So, that's my only regret.

But, I do love the personal way we got married. It wasn't about anybody else but us and God. Pretty special. There's no other man in the world who could give me what Mike can - 18 years of working it out, ups and downs, knowing me for better or worse. Really, when you think about marriage in the long run...who, but your spouse can offer you  history? (romantically speaking) There's nobody. Not for me, anyhow...he's the one. I haven't done ANYTHING for 18 years! :) I'm not that consistent of a person. He's my habit, for sure!