Black Lamb

Life goes on

May 1st, 2007

BY ELIZABETH HART

I finally got a trip in an ambulance. I’d had relatively minor trips last year: a hamstring torn while falling over the dog in the middle of the night (he’s still having nightmares), a sprained ankle dodging the sudden rise of a sprinkler head (hey, it was the biggest, scariest one on our property), a twisted knee and another ankle sprained while fainting at the scene of a total stranger’s motorcycle accident — but I’d never been in an ambulance. ’Til now.

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Posted by: The Editors
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A harrowing tale

April 1st, 2007

BY ELIZABETH HART

One wickedly warm day in April over twenty five years ago, I swayed dizzily in front of a minister gazing into the eyes of my almost-to-be husband. He returned my gaze with a look of growing suspicion as we stood with our backs to the edge of the lake. The temperature had climbed into the nineties, the humidity close behind. I was trying desperately to control the violent shaking in my knees, which was becoming more uncontrollable by the second, despite the Valium my well-meaning sister-in-law had practically forced down my throat. Whoever invented “foundation” garments and plasticized control-top pantyhose could not possibly have lived anywhere near the sticky Gulf Coast. Good thing my dress covered up the sauna in which I stood, however unsteadily, in the semi-mud by the water’s edge. I balanced on one good high heel —I’d broken the other when I tripped getting out of the car. The train on my dress was trashed, torn by my ragged heel, dragged through the mud, destroyed. No matter, I planned on finding a pair of scissors or a stout safety pin before the dancing began. My dearly beloved was suffering as well, his face and gleaming head purplish-red in the Texas sun. The sweating minister stood facing the water, dark traditional garb gathering up the sun as he ran his finger around the inside of his collar. Daddy dear had a strong grip on me while my knees kept threatening to buckle. I was hugely regretting the tranquilizer threading through my veins, not to mention my lack of breakfast and lunch and the three or four margaritas I’d managed to put away the night before (in between the three beers and who knows how many shots of tequila). My brother stood past the groom’s shoulder glaring at me. He and his wife hadn’t been prepared for the condition in which they’d found me that morning.

“Are you getting up today? I hope you’re not getting cold feet?” (In other words: please don’t tell me I wasted two plane fares from New Jersey!)

“Go away, I’ll be fine.”

“Didn’t anyone tell you not to get drunk the night before your wedding?”

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Posted by: The Editors
Category: All Marriage Issue, Hart | Link to this Entry

Author profile

December 1st, 2002

Elizabeth Hart has never lived without hope, but it has been a struggle to keep up with life’s passages. She’s recently adopted a comfortable middle-of-the-road posture, and so far it’s working. Not that she hasn't done and seen it all — but that was another century. “Only the mediocre are really good at what they do,” said Somerset Maughan. It’s her mantra. All in all, the world is great, motherhood’s rewarding, and she has no trouble finding a passionate attraction to artistic endeavors, the miracles of nature, and life’s experiences. Her Black Lamb column is called The Road Taken.

Posted by: The Editors
Category: Hart | Link to this Entry