A Wedding Story

I am now reaching that stage of my life where my friends are starting to get married and settle down (or at the very least, they're getting married). Recently, I was invited to the wedding of a close friend of mine who is a very avid reader of this column (yes, they DO exist), so in order to protect her privacy and that of her new husband, let's just refer to the happy couple as "Stephanie" and "Collin".

Anyhoo, the wedding was back in Central New York, which just like the rest of the country was going through a severe heat wave the first weekend of August. It hit 98 on Friday in Syracuse, and while it wasn't as bad on Saturday, it did call the appropriate dress for the occasion into question, as the wedding was to be held outdoors. I don't own a suit, and with the heat index hovering around the 90s on this afternoon, I wasn't about to get one. So, I opted for a short-sleeved dress shirt and a tie with old baseball cards on it. And sneakers. OK, maybe that's a little tacky for a normally formal occasion such as a wedding, and I do own dress shoes, the only problem is that I wear them so rarely, I can never remember to pack them for any trip that includes dressing up. Besides, what's the first complaint you hear from people at a wedding? The fact that their feet hurt from the shoes they're wearing. Or maybe it's just the ladies that complain about that, I dunno...

Then, I arrived at the site of the wedding and realized that Stephanie and Collin were to be getting married in Renaissance-era costumes and that the bride's brother was wearing a Hawaiian shirt. Suddenly, I no longer worried about being underdressed for the occasion. In fact, the only guys who really made the effort of wearing a full suit were the minister and Collin's best man, who looked like a Secret Service agent in his black suit and dark sunglasses.

Let me set the scene for you at this point: the wedding is taking place in the beautiful village of Skaneateles, NY, and the locals would prefer you say it SKANNY-atlas, not SKINNY-atlas. Skaneateles is the closest thing Central New York has to a real tourist destination, at least not until DestiNY USA finally gets built (which won't happen in MY lifetime the way things are going...) There are nice little shops along the main street, the lake is beautiful, the Clintons stayed here a couple times, and may do so again this month before the State Fair. The wedding is to take place in a gazebo beside the lake, and not only is this a pretty good-sized gazebo, but the first one I've ever seen that has RESTROOMS below it.

Now as this wedding is to take place in an outdoor gazebo and not a normal church setting, the plan appears to be that when Stephanie's limo pulls up, we'll all filter up into the gazebo and start the procession. Except her limo pulled up and then left to circle the block one more time. At this point, the first thing that pops in to my mind is that, knowing Stephanie like I do, she told the driver, "Go around the block another time, make him sweat a little more!" Well, no, the real reason, we discover when the limo pulls up the second time, is that Stephanie was of the belief that we would all be sitting up in the gazebo waiting for her, rather than milling around the park like ducks looking for bread crumbs. So, with a nervous glance at each other that said, "Okay, which one of you wants to go up first?", we all walked up the stairs into the gazebo and tried to arrange ourselves so that all of Collin's friends and family were on one side and all of Stephanie's were on the other side. Except when Stephanie emerged from the limo, everyone with a camera rushed to the one side of the gazebo to take pictures and that promptly ended any notion of "assigned seating".

The bride, naturally, looked fantastic. The groom, naturally, was shaking nervously, until the bride tripped over her dress as she hit the top step of the gazebo. And so the first words of this wedding were not, "Dearly beloved, we are gathered here today...", they were, "I knew that was gonna happen..."

And so, the wedding got underway right around its scheduled start time of 5:00. Vows and rings were exchanged, the minister said, "I now pronounce you husband and wife," and then we all looked at our watches and said, "WOW! It's only 5:10. That was a quick wedding!" Which brought up an interesting dilemma: the reception was to be held on a dinner cruise on the lake; the boat was scheduled to leave at 6, we would board at about a quarter to 6. So, what the heck were we going to do for the next half-hour until we got on the boat? Well, the immediate solution was to spend the bulk of the time emptying rolls of film to take pictures of the happy couple; by themselves, with family members, with their 8-month old son, with the best man and maid of honor.

Eventually, after more milling around the park like, well, like a bunch of confused wedding guests, it was finally time to get on the boat for the reception. A three-hour cruise on the lake, a lot of food, and a general good time to be had by all; a wonderful idea (Stephanie's, by the way). Things got off to an unfortunate start when the ship's captain accidentally called the new husband "Mike". After that, though, everything went great, everyone enjoyed the bounty of food and drink, so much so that at one point, we pulled up next to another boat... in order to get a shipment of more Pepsi, the bride's beverage of choice.

Then, when we got back into port, things just kinda broke up on their own; the bouquet was thrown, but no rice, no limo ride to the airport for the honeymoon, in fact, there would be a barbeque the next day before the newlyweds left for their honeymoon. In all, pretty uncoventional, but these two people, Stephanie and Collin, are to put it best, uncoventional. And so the day served as testament to the fact that even the uncoventional amongst us can find everlasting love. And who among us can't find that infinitely heartwarming?