“The best laid schemes o’ Mice and Men Gang aft agley, An’ lea’e us nought but grief an’ pain, For promised joy!” Robert Burns from “To a Mouse.”
Not the quote I expected to hear from my husband on our wedding night. I also didn’t expect to be in a hospital waiting room praying his appendix didn’t burst before they could remove it, but here we were.
He probably thought the quote would make me laugh. Andrew immigrated to the United States with his parents shortly after his tenth birthday, so he retained dual citizenship. I taught English at the local community college. Surely, I’d appreciate the irony of a Scotsman quoting a Scotsman about fate after missing our honeymoon in Scotland.
Our honeymoon seemed an insignificant loss at the time. We’d reschedule after Andrew recovered. Our marriage was technically unconsummated, but so what? We’d “consummated” like rabbits for the past two years. The wedding ceremony was something we did to appease our parents. The reception was for our friends. We’d already made the commitment that counted. These were the things I told myself sitting there in a room full of strangers wondering when I should contact his family and friends.
I think we were the only two sober people at the reception. I’m not a drinker, and I spent the evening admiring my husband for his restraint. Little did I know the real reason he was abstaining from alcohol was because he didn’t feel well. The last thing I needed now was to be surrounded by drunks and strangers.
I glanced frequently at my watch waiting for the minutes to pass alternately twisting and straightening my wedding ring trying to find the exact center of the front of my ring finger. Anything not to think about what might be going on in that operating room.
Finally, the surgeon emerged and called my name. “Mrs. Campbell, your husband is going to be fine,” he said. “We weren’t able to get the appendix out before it ruptured, so we’ll need to keep him here for a few days. I understand this is your wedding day. Congratulations! I’m sorry you ended up here. The nurse will take you to your husband as soon as he’s fully awake. Do you have any questions?”
I shrugged and shook his extended hand. “Thank you, doctor.” He turned and hurried back through the swinging doors to attend to his next patient.
I’m not usually so religious, but I said a little prayer of thanks. You can’t be too careful, and I didn’t want to seem ungrateful.
To say Andrew’s parents were upset that I didn’t call them until later that morning was an understatement. He stayed in the hospital for the next seven days. Their anger defined our relationship for a much longer time.
The deductible and copays exhausted the small stash of money I liberated from the stack of wedding cards. We had to postpone rescheduling the honeymoon.
***
Every time we rescheduled, something came up and we had to postpone our Scottish honeymoon. Transfers, promotions, births, deaths, a pandemic. Everything that could go wrong did. It was as if the universe decided we didn’t deserve it.
Andrew would quote Robert Burns again, and we’d laugh because eventually we were all cried out. We built a wonderful life together and raised three incredible kids. We visited the Grand Canyon, Niagara Falls, Disney World, Alaska, and Hawaii, but never Scotland.
***
After Andrew’s funeral I decided to try again. Transporting human ashes internationally requires a scannable container, an official death certificate, and a cremation certificate. I expected something to go wrong, but it didn’t. Scotland has no rules against scattering human ashes on most public lands or open country.
The plane touched down and I made my way through customs. The taxi dropped me at a bed and breakfast in Dundee, Andrew’s hometown.
I held our itinerary, written in his expansive scrawl, in my hands finally understanding why I’d kept it all those years. He’d made drawings in the margins and included private jokes about romantic activities.
The house he used to live in looked nothing like his old photos, but it was still within walking distance of his school. I stayed to watch the children play football, then dined in a pub, trying a few of the local dishes on his list, grateful I didn’t know some of the ingredients.
Each day his scribbles led to a new location steeped in history, the MacManus Art Gallery and Museum, Discovery Point, and the Mills Observatory. It was almost as if they’d been waiting for me all these years.
On my last day in Scotland, I scattered his ashes in the Firth of Tay, a place he spoke of affectionately. It felt right, but bittersweet. Andrew was home; his joy finally attained.