No nuts, no glory

This weekend was fucking sweet. We (me, my girl, and some of her fam) all head down to Annapolis for a wedding. The bride is her little cousin, so it's a pretty big deal to everyone on her mom's side of the family. All things considered, the wedding was as good as any wedding can be. The weather was hot but not unbearable, the ceremony was awesome, and the drinking began almost immediately. My girlfriends family is from the islands, which means heavy drinking all around. ALWAYS a good time. Almost. Following the ceremony and the better part of the reception, the time comes for the bride to throw the bouquet. We all know how THAT scenario goes. There's a ton of women throwing bows like they're in the low post, and some lucky (or unlucky) girl comes up with the bouquet. Whatever. I was about half way through an extra-strong Vodka tonic, enjoying life. That's when I realize that the chick catching the bouquet is none other than my girlfriend.

I think to myself "this is so dumb," and continue to consume my booze until it hits me. The dude that catches the garter does that whole garter routine with the chick that caught the bouquet. Fuck. This means that some grubby drunk fuck is going to be pawing (and probably have his mouth on) my girl. I'm not feeling that. So I run up there, and put forth a real effort at trying to catch the damned thing. Normally, I'm off to the side laughing at the suckers that are lost in this crazy frenzy. This time, it just happens to be me. I get there and assume the position with the rest of these yo-yos, and the groom does his thing. The garter flies in the air, and my cat-like reflexes get the best of the would-be suitors. I snatch it out of the air, realizing that in front of the rest of her family and everyone assembled, that I'm doomed. Mentally, I prepare myself for the onslaught of jokes that are sure to follow.

The MC pulls us both back to the center of the dance floor once everything has died down, and we go through the motions. After that, we dance to some love song. I don't remember the song, but it's really irrelevant. What I do remember is the weird moment of eye contact that I shared with my girls' mom AFTER the garter placement. I think she secretly hates me.

One thing I distinctly remembered was someone running up to us and handing us these chocolate covered strawberries, which they gave to my girlfriend. She takes a bite, and proceeds to feed me in the middle of the dance floor. Normally this would be a bit weird. Then again, I had just placed my hands inches away from her crotch in plain view of the rest of her family. The strawberry thing begins to pale in comparison. Or at least I thought so.

Fast forward about 20 minutes or so, after the dance, and my girlfriend is heading down to the bathroom. I didn't think much of it, her being potty trained and all, so I kept dancing. I stopped to check a few voicemails, grab another drink, then I head back to the dance floor. She wasn't back yet. I thought to myself "She must be dropping one hell of a deuce." I chuckled to myself because the fact that she's doing this at a wedding was really funny for some reason. I talk to a few people and realize that she still isn't back yet. Something is wrong.

She comes back up the stairs, and tells me that her lips are swelling, and she feels a few hives forming. I ask her if she can still breathe, or if there's any tightening of her throat. Thankfully, she replied no. This automatically launches me into a recollection of all the food we consumed that night, hoping that none of which will have triggered an allergic reaction. I can't think of anything. Every course was prepared with these things in mind of course, because her cousin wanted the wedding to be PERFECT. Or so she thought. What no one seemed to realize was that those chocolate covered strawberries also had a liberal amount of hazelnut mixed into the chocolate. Motherfucker. My girlfriend is allergic to nuts. We're going to need either Benadryl, an epi pen, or a hospital, very soon.

So here I am, wondering what the fuck to do. You see, my girlfriend is a daredevil of sorts. She routinely talks about her allergy when the subject of food comes up, but "preventive maintenance" doesn't seem to be a part of a woman's vocabulary. She didn't have benadryl, she didn't have her epi pen, and we're at a country club that's at least 20 minutes from ANYTHING. We hop in the van, and I'm frantically racing to find an open CVS, corner store, or anything that would have some form of benadryl that she could take.

The only problem with this is that we're in Maryland. It's not the bible belt, but you'd think so. Every place that we passed was already closed, and it was barely 11:00pm. My only recourse at this point is to get back to the hotel, where she has her epi pen in her "real" purse. (For those that don't know, women don't just carry one purse all the time. They feel the need to
"accessorize," which basically means taking all their shit from one purse, and dumping it into another. The shit that doesn't fit gets left behind. None of this makes any sense to me. But that's another story.)

So we drive the 30-40 minutes that it takes to get back to the hotel, she runs upstairs. Her brother is a couple steps behind, and he runs in while I park the van. By the time I get upstairs, she's sitting on the bed and her hands are shaking. If you've ever seen an alcoholic with the DTs, you know what I'm talking about. She tells me that her brother gave her the shot, and one of the side effects is that she can't stop shaking. It's pure adrenaline, so this comes as no surprise.

In a matter of minutes, she starts to regain her composure, but her dress is covered with spatters of blood. One thing that her brother didn't do following the shot was to put pressure on the wound. That means that immediately following the ordeal, blood squirted out of her leg and covered the bottom of the dress. I asked if she was alright, and she said that she was. We sat for a few minutes, just kind of reflecting on the whole situation. It was at that point that she said she was really tired, and just wanted to sleep. I asked whether she felt any tightening in her throat again, and she said no. Her mom came up and took watch, while I accompanied her brother and her sister to the hotel bar.

They told me not to worry and to calm down. This was easy for them to say. Prior to this, I had only seen food allergies once in my life. One of my cousins is allergic to shellfish. We found out about it early, (she was five or six) and acted accordingly. She's not allowed in the house when we're preparing seafood. Then again, what I've seen was also NOT this severe.

It took at least three shots of Jameson and four Sam Adams for me to "calm down."