Wedding Report

I went to a wedding this weekend. My husband's young cousin was getting married to a beautiful girl from the mountains. My hope is that I would get some good stories to post here, tales of tackiness and horrible couture. Unfortunately, my husband's family is comprised of upstanding, well-dressed Southern Baptists who don't drink at weddings and therefore are not the least bit outrageous. It's disappointing, really.

But I held out hope that maybe the other family--the bride's family--would be a little bit awful. Mother in five-inch heels with tattooed ankles, gum chomping sisters for bridesmaids, that sort of thing. Unfortunately, they also were appropriately coiffed and clothed. Oh, some of the younger women wore too much make-up--this was true across both families--and I could have done without all the strapless dresses. It's not a look that I find generally appealing, mostly because dresses without straps fill me with anxiety. They are so poised to go very, very wrong.

The ceremony itself was lovely, and clocking in at eighteen minutes (my husband timed it), the exact right length for little boys who don't know how they can survive five minutes of all that froth and frippery, much less an hour. Music by Bach, Beethoven and Pachelbel. Bridesmaid's dresses complete with straps, and quite attractive. Handsome groomsmen, always a welcome addition to any wedding party.

At the reception, I sat at a table with my husband and sons and ten or so of my husband's two trillion cousins. I was seated next to Cousin Linda's husband George. I never call George "George" because I can never remember if that's actually his name (it is). Anyway, George has always been a reasonably friendly, laid-back kind of guy, and yesterday he was particularly talkative, telling me about his cameras and his job and how he told the Sears delivery people they better bring his new washer and dryer on Sunday unless they wanted to lose the sale.

It was a nice enough way to pass the time, though I would have rather been talking to Linda about children and clothes and family gossip. Then, today, I find out what the family gossip is: Linda and George have separated after their daughter found some of George's e-mails to another woman. George attended the wedding to put a good face on things. In retrospect, I wondered if I'd been put in a compromising position without knowing it. But life's too short to worry if you've been made an unwitting pawn in somebody's else's marital spat. And I suspect that George was just happy to have someone to talk to who didn't know the terrible truth about his marriage.

All in all, it was a good wedding. The bride was glowing, the groom was over the moon, and the roast beef was rare. I felt cute in my new dress and accessories. Nobody had a strapless dress emergency (I think my prayers held all the dresses up). Really, it was a nice way to spend an afternoon if you believe in everlasting love and extra servings of wedding cake, which I most certainly do.