It’s dark and late, so late I don’t even hear the Clydesdales clopping anymore.
Ambling down Bourbon Street barefoot, I admire my OPI Red pedicure, although surely it will soon be coated with dirt.
Blissfully drunk, my shoulders bump into my friends beside me. I laugh, and so do they.
I walk on my tiptoes like I did when I was little, dangling my strappy sandals by my side.
I’m not typically shoe-less on Bourbon Street, but it’s the night before my wedding and I’m allowed.
Floating along, oblivious, not even sure where the hotel is, just following the feet in front of me.
My belly sloshes, full of too many bright-red, sticky sweet hurricanes. Orange slices teetering on the edge of the glass and Maraschino cherries stabbed on a tiny plastic sword.
Pat O’s serves them in a tall glass I get to take home with me. I save it and fill it with trinkets and Mardi Gras beads, a plastic flower from the St. Patrick’s Day parade last year.
It gathers dust sitting on my bookshelf with so many other memories.
The sweetest memory though? Is finally making our way to our hotel on Canal Street. Hubs walks me to my room, and although we’re not sharing it tonight, he offers to come in and help me wash my feet before we go our separate ways.
He fills the tub with a bit of warm water and bubble bath and helps me sit on the edge of the tub.
“We’re getting married tomorrow,” I say to the man who leans over, gently wiping my dirty feet with a washcloth.
He looks up at me and smiles. “I know,” he says, even as the bath water turns brown and grit settles at the bottom.
I love him. For this and ten thousand other reasons.
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