Wedding Fantasies

Little girls are notorious for fantasizing about their future wedding dates. They dress up in over sized gowns and tie together a bouquet of colorful weeds so they can march down a mock aisle and fake marry the little boy that lives down the block who thought he came over to have popsicles and play on the slip n' slide. After that they play house, where they live in a discarded refrigerator box and have someones younger brother who just wants to be included in the game for a pet dog (if there's more than one younger sibling around then they also have a cat and boy do those two get in to some shenanigans). Well, for boys we don't really fantasize about weddings until much later. ... like 3 and a half minutes before we pull the ring out of our pockets and shakily ask you to marry us. That's the first moment we even have a concept that a ceremony might take place some day. But I'm learning something new about the time line of wedding fantasies, you see the little girl isn't the first one to have it. ... it's her father. ... and it's not really a fantasy as much as a nightmare. Our first instinct when we look at our little girl (or in my case little girls) is to selfishly dub them "mine". "That's my little girl!" And we all know what happens the moment you claim something as yours. ... you start freaking out about people trying to take it from you. The proud father instantly develops a little Golum inside with horrible grammar that whispers in our ear to "protect the precious!" We start playing this loop in our mind of the next 30 years and how we are going to handle these boys that come and "trys to stealz them away froms us." So that soft focus wedding fantasy that our daughters have is also playing in our mind, but more with a Stanley Kubrick style shot and a death metal soundtrack playing to it. But there is one part to the fantasy that we view with moist eyes and a heart melting smile. ... the father daughter dance. I try to block out the wedding fantasy and keep it from ruining my days, but yesterday a song came on the radio (this happens to me a lot) and all I could think of was having that last dance with my daughters before I pass them off to their betrothed. The soft focus, the back lit image, the slow motion. ... it was magic. Don't get me wrong, I can definetly wait for that day, I'm in no rush at all. But when it comes and that song starts up. ... cue the rain maker cause a storm is coming. And as a string quartet plays Guns n' Roses "Sweet Child of Mine" I'll spin my little girl across the floor, fighting the demon inside that screams to keep her for myself, and pass her off the only other man capable of loving her as much as I do. And if he hurts her I'll break his freakin' neck. Now that's a fantasy that makes me smile.