What not to say when applying for your marriage license - part one

Well, we did it! Geo and I finally got our marriage license. My gosh, we are a lazy pair of so-and-so's.

We went to the Bucks County Courthouse in Doylestown. Yeah, I realize we live in Philly but getting to Center City is such as dog and I didn't feel like fighting I-95S traffic in the rain.

So we fought with 611- N traffic in the rain.

It was so easy to get there. No lie! It was cakewalk. Stay on 611. Then, bear to the right to Doylestown. Straight ahead. To the left at the fork. BOOM! You are there!

And D-Town was so ... so ... clean. No one was laying on a stoop nearby wondering if we had spare change. No one was standing on a corner proclaiming that Roosevelt should be impeached (I did witness that in Center City once). All of Doylestown's downtown was neat and orderly and manicured. I mean really manicured - almost Stepford Wife-ish.

The courthouse itself is located right at a fork in the road between Main and Court. Geo kept saying "I doubt this is it. It don't look like a courthouse." In between shivering mumbles (it was blastedly cold Friday morning), I told him to shut up and keep walking. He did - begrudgingly. He kept making comments like, "It looks more like a library" and "Are you sure you know where we are?" Quite honestly, I had no clue where we were. I, too, didn't think we were at the right spot but I wasn't going to let him know I was in doubt. When we got to the building's entrance, there was these big ole fat letters saying "courthouse".

"See," I said to him pointing my finger "I told you so. Now where's my apology?"

"Yeah okay. Fine, I'm sorry you dragged my ass up here."

Ignoring him, I went through the glass doors. We walked through another set of double glass doors that lead to the bottom of a stairway to the second floor landing. I must have had my "where-the hell-am-I" look on because the guard said to us,

"Marriage licenses? Up the stairs to that landing, pass through security, go to the elevators to the third floor, go to your right down the hall and it's there on your right side."

Yikes! The man read my mind (not like it's a ripping read). He smiled the entire length of his little spiel and I swear he didn't take a breath. I was in awe.

I looked at Geo and said, "He must be used to that."

Geo shook his head and replied, "Hello? The man JUST said he sees couples like us all the time. Christ, try listening!" By now he was walking ahead of me up the stairway.

I shot him a look. "So says the ass to the woman who he KNOWS is going deaf." I don't know if he heard me. He probably did.

We fumbled through security. I handed the guard my pocketbook which he dropped on the conveyer belt. I made an embarrassed face as I emptied my pockets into the little plastic container.

"Please excuse the contents" I said as I dropped a tampon I had roaming in my jacket pocket into the bucket.

"I don't see anything unusual" he replied with a smile. What was it with the guards and smiling here? Did they go to a class in Disney World on being a good cast member?

I walked through the metal bars and quickly pocketed my unmentionables on the other side.

We hopped on the elevator to the third floor. As I got off, I started walking to my right when I hear Geo say "Wait, is that the right way?"

He was staring at a sign on the wall that had all these arrows and different department names.

"Dumbass, remember the guard's speech? Off the 'vator and to the right."

"Yeah but that sign says for hunting, fishing, and dog licenses" he said pointing down a hall that effectively would have been behind us when we got off the elevator (make a right and a quick right again).

"Yeah, and the arrow points that way. We want to go that way ... to the right the second you get off the elevator. Oh ... and look! That arrow is pointing down this hall! And it says marriage licenses. What a friggin concept!"

I screwed up my eyes and made the most obnoxious dumb face possible. He looked at me and gave me a "Duh!" cross-eyed face.

As we walked the hall, I asked him, "Are you ever going to ask me to marry you?"

"I'm spending fifty bucks on the license. What more do you want?"

"It would be nice if you actually proposed."

"Yeah, okay."

We live together, have a child, and I wash his laundry. You'd think he would at least ask me to get hitched. I wasn't even asking for him to get on one knee. Lord knows he'd have a rough enough time getting back up off the floor.

Be as it may, proposed to or not, we were about to apply for our "death do us part" license.

... to be continued