Unlike my wedding vows, I never wrote my groom’s toast out. I ran out of time and things got too hectic, so all I was able to prepare beforehand was some basic beats I wanted to hit.

So… I don’t remember it exactly. Someone somewhere has it on video, but not us.

Here’s my best attempt at recreating it:

“The groom’s toast is traditionally the speech where the groom thanks people, and I take that very seriously, because there are so many people I need to thank for making this day happen. This was truly a collaborative affair. We wanted to get our family and friends involved in as much of the day as possible, not just because it saves money… which it did… but also to make the day something that we all share together. So we asked a lot of you to do a lot of things… a lot of things… so many things, that I noticed some of you stopped answering my phone calls. Understandable. You knew why I was calling. I was calling to ask you to do something. And so many of you did so much. And when I think of all the help we got from our families and from our friends and even from coworkers… I have to ask myself… do I deserve it?

"I… think I do." It’s worth mentioning here that this got a pretty big laugh. Seems important to mention.

"But… whether I deserve it or not, it makes me want to pay it back. To be a better son, a better brother, a better friend.

"And then I think of all the things Sarah did to make this day happen, because honestly, I didn’t do half as much as she did. And I think about how good she is to me, all the things she puts up with from me. All the stereotypical ways that I, as a man, can be difficult… and all the specific ways that I can be difficult as just me. I think of how much better my life is because of her.

"And I have to ask myself… do I deserve it? Do I deserve her?

"I hope so. I hope I do. But even if I don’t I’m ready to spend my whole life trying. I want to be a good partner. A good husband. And someday… a good father.

“Thank you.”

In an attempt to help Sarah out with her going-crazy-working-from-home problem, I tried video chatting with her during the day. Just so she could see a human face.

You know, trying to be a good husband. Helping out.

Plus, whose day wouldn't be improved by seeing my face?

Now what?

Our wedding wasn't the last wedding we went to last year, but it was close. Near the end of the traditional wedding season. And now the next wedding season is beginning. We're heading out of town next week to attend our first wedding of the new season.

I mentioned before that while getting our pictures taken we heard honking and cheering coming from the direction of the cocktail hour area. We learned later that a mother and daughter, visiting Galena to look for wedding venues, and hearing that there was a wedding going on, had tried to sneak in to get a peek at the farm while it was hosting an event. Several people referred to them as "crashers" but I don't know if the reality of it goes quite that far.

Anyway, almost immediately upon getting to the farm, they somehow got their car stuck in a ditch and several of our guests helped them push it out. That was the honking and cheering. They drove off immediately.

Now that it's half a year later, I wonder if that girl is having her wedding there now. It's her turn to be us. And with the passage of a year or a half year, everyone moves forward a notch, from looking, to getting married, to looking back.

I think Sarah may be going a little stir-crazy from spending most of her day at home, studying for school. I asked for some advice from Poland, who's worked from the basement of his home for years now.

Poland: Eat lunch outside. Take at least one walk a day. Sniff glue.

Since Sarah's going back to school full-time, I filled out some paperwork (also printed out on leftover, parchment-style wedding paper) to get her on my health insurance. One of the perks of being married.

Except that my workplace is progressive enough to offer benefits to domestic partners as well, same-sex or otherwise. As I joked at the "Explaining Benefits Changes," meeting, "So, why did I even bother to get married, then?"

When we hired our photographer, there were numerous options for how we wanted our photos (besides digitally), various different albums specially designed and artfully layed out. One option, though, was the old fashioned one: a box of pictures that you could place yourself into a nice book of your own choosing. No graphic design, thank you very much.

I remember seeing an example like that thinking it looked nice but would be a lot of work. Sarah said it seemed like just the sort of post-wedding project she was looking for.

Spoiler Alert: Those pictures are still sitting in the box, and I imagine they always will.

My idea for this blog was to spread the "story of our wedding day" out over the last seven or eight months, story by story... as if my memories would remain as crisp as the pictures. But even the big days fade fast, and every day after becomes more about being married than having gotten married.

So consider this blog, coming close to the end, a half-assembled photo album, with lots of blank pages.

So, Sarah had the idea that after the wedding, she'd ride down the water slide in our hotel while still wearing her dress. A "Trash the Dress" sort of thing.

We weren't sure if the pool would be open, though, so we asked the manager the day before. She said she'd get back to us. I got a call from her in Meador's room the morning of the ceremony.

Manager: I put a lot of thought into your request last night. I slept on it. And I just don't think I can let you do it. I know the chances of something going wrong might be slim, but it would be too horrible if something did happen, so I'm afraid I just can't let you. I'm really sorry.

A small disappointment, but it was amusing to imagine the hotel manager spending an evening of honest soul searching about letting a woman in a wedding dress ride her water slide.

And who knows, maybe her dress would have gotten caught on some twist in the slide, leading to some horribly tragic News of the Weird wedding day story. I mean, it was the same pool that I mysteriously scraped my hands bloody in. Maybe that pool is evil.

The morning of September 11th, 2001, I trudged into work at my uninteresting office job, tired, and only half sensing that things had seemed eerily quiet during my commute. I plopped down in front of my computer and started my day as I usually did then, checking in with an improv internet message board. I had few friends at the time, a job I hated, and a relationship, an engagement in fact, that was starting to fall apart (and would, in fact, continue to fall apart in slow motion for a couple more years). I had just started performing, and it was, if not my entire life, then a very big chunk of it.

Anyway, I logged onto the message board that morning and all the thread headlines were things like, "Plane Flies Into World Trade Center" and "Plane Crashes Into Pentagon" and I remember thinking, "Well, that doesn't seem funny at all."

And that's how I found out. I think of that as a strange, modern sort of story.

Improv takes up a much smaller chunk of my life these days, nearly ten years later, but last night I was sitting in a small black box theater, getting ready to do a late night Sunday show for... not many people at all, when Alex leaned over and handed his phone to me. I read a text from his brother that read, "Osama Bin Laden dead. Twitter going crazy. Announcement from president in 45 minutes."

And then we had to run onstage to start our set, the middle group in a three group show. No time to even tell the rest of our cast. Or to confer about whether we should announce it. "Hello! We're the Welcome to Your Thirties Boys! Osama Bin Laden is dead. To start our show we need a suggestion of anything at all!"

Yesterday was Young's Special Day. A dumb fun day or eating, drinking and comic book buying.

Young: I was happy that my friend's gave me something to look forward to instead of dread. Terrific fun. I hope that's the best not-getting-married party I ever have.