Better...

So after a lot of talking with my (our) therapist, things are much better with my mother. We've had two very very long talks on the phone about wedding details, and they've been cooperative and civil. All our conflict has been assigned to my bad temper ("are YOU feeling better?"), but let's do whatever it takes to get this show up with as many people feeling happy about it as possible.

And I've gotten exctied about it again! Hooray! And there are so many things to take care of that, far from being bored, I am getting about 5 hours of sleep a night. I like the things that get completed, though, we're actually trying to inject our personality into the gifts we give people. I'm sure as soon as the wedding is over we'll think of hundreds of ways to do this that would have been better than what we're doing, but hey, we're having fun working on this stuff together. Actually, we sat down and made a budget and a plan for the gifts we're trying to give at the wedding, and I am soooo happy we did that.

Now, the down side is that I have no real time for anything else. So the friend of mine who has called me every night for 5 nights in a row needs to stop. Why on earth does she need to talk to me before the wedding?? Wouldn't it be better to talk to me after the wedding and hear how it went? I never really thought about it before, but the very last time you need to be pestering someone is in the month before their wedding.

Of course, I have other problems with this particular person, mostly that I don't really care about talking to her. Another friend of mine has been trying to reach me, and it still won't happen, I still won't have time to talk to her before the wedding, but she doesn't irritate me. She's actually going to be at the wedding, so that's great.

I think when I leave town for the wedding I'll have to change my voicemail:

"Hi, you've reached Elizabeth. I'm getting married in a week, and you should know that if you leave me a message, I will not call you back, no matter who you are or how much I may love you. If this is one of my agents, I have booked out for this time and will not have time to call you back and remind you about it, so DON'T leave me a message about an audition. Unless it's after April 10, I can't make it. Not negotiable.
Now, don't get offended, I am unable to call you back because I am either a) desperately working to finish some inane task, like putting together gift bags for all guests, b) desperately trying to balance the agenda of my mother, my father, my fiance, and everyone else who gives us such "helpful" advice, c) desperately trying to get some sleep so I do not look like a zombie bride, or d) all of the above, and some more "surprise" tasks I didn't know about until I got home.

If you're invited to the wedding, I'll see you there. If you weren't, please know that I wasn't able to invite who I wanted because my parents are throwing their one and only wedding and they had to invite hundreds of people that don't matter at all to me but after all, I'm just the one getting married! It doesn't matter what I'd want!

Thanks, and in case I didn't make it clear, don't leave me a message. I won't be able to respond. If I did, you wouldn't like my response."