A SOUTHERN WEDDING

I recently attended a wedding (if you are in a suit you attend something, if not you just go) and I started thinking how much the event has evolved from when I got married. My wedding slithered along on these two things that looked like fins compared to weddings today. By the way isn’t Darwin’s theory ridiculous? If we really evolved from things that slithered along on two things that looked like fins, how come there are STILL things crawling around on two doohickys that look like fins? Shouldn’t they be humans by now instead of sitting there looking at their watch? Meanwhile my cat wakes up for 20 minutes out of the day, and he thinks, “this a-hole busts his balls for 12 hours including the commute and yet fully believes he is higher on the food chain than me. Speaking of food chain, what’s in the fridge?” Then he takes a little nap.

Sometimes, like when I see a baseball team that doesn’t have a facial hair dress code, I think we might be moving back in the other direction. In case we devolve back to fish, I make a note to practice my swimming, and I eat a bowl of plankton at lunch, although I do put Sweet ‘N Low on it.

Anyway, this affair was a “destination wedding,” at least according to my GPS. In picturesque Fairfax, Virginia, two fine young people were joined together in holy matrimony. None present could think of any reason why they should not, even though the groom was a Mets fan. I held my peace, although I can’t be expected to do that forever. The wedding was outdoors, the weather was perfect and the ceremony went off without a hitch, as Wilton Parmenter once eloquently said.

I remember sitting for all those damn photos after my own wedding: the muscles in my mouth started to quiver from holding a smile for 7 hours. I began to look like an evil maniac. I started to say things like, “So Mr. Bond, we meet again… and this time it looks as though the cards are in MY favor. Hahahahahaha… HAHAHAHAHAHAHA!” These days they just take the pictures and Photoshop the smiles in later.

During the cocktail hour they had a mashed potato bar, something I had never seen before. It was pretty good, but when I tried to order a Mash-hatten, a Spudweiser and a Tater-tini I got a dirty look.

The hostess kept coming up to the mother of the bride with administrative updates: “The potato bar ran long, so we need to shorten the father/daughter dance- just one father can dance by himself.”

When I looked out onto the dance floor and saw this assortment of young and old, I realized that we could really learn something from this as a society. The first thing I learned was that young people don’t really dance any better than old people. In fact some of the AARP crowd looked fairly elegant doing a waltz. The fact that they were waltzing to “The Thong Song” threw me at first.

The hostess appeared again: “The salads took too long so we are going to use short ribs instead of prime ribs.”

The bride did not throw a bouquet, nor did she invite anyone put any garters on her leg. Yeah, we skipped that one too at our wedding. I could picture any number of my friends either failing to install the garter correctly or failing to come back out from under the dress.

As the hours got smaller and glasses got emptier, the degree of difficulty in the dance moves increased, and people were having a hard time pulling them off. Once people form a circle and shame others into gyrating in ways they have only read about, it can get dangerous, especially for older people. Spinning about too fast causes centrifugal force to act in unpredictable ways, and I’m pretty sure I got hit with someone’s teeth. Another girl attempted a triple axel but failed to stick the landing.

One orphaned gal grabbed me for a dance, unaware that I am a lousy dancer. I could see by the look in her eyes that she had been disappointed by men before; possibly even by me before.

The reception sent a wave of memories flooding back for my wife and I. The main thing we remembered is that we couldn’t recall anything that happened after the toast.

The hostess materialized again and said, “The last dance ran over so I’m not going to be able to finish my sentenc”



Incidentally, there is an old wives tale that purports that the tradition of brides carrying bouquets started because in medieval times people bathed so infrequently that the flowers masked their ripe odor. This is most certainly false, but it could explain the tradition of wedding cake. A bride that smells like flowers is nice and everything, but imagine how attractive your betrothed would be if she smelled like cake??