Till Death Do Us Part

My wife and I attended a wedding today. It was my wife's fault.

You see, what happened was this: My wife is an optician, and she gets a lot of repeat customers. They even write letters to her employer saying how good she is. Well, this guy who'd gotten glasses from Connie a year earlier came in one day for more glasses and asked for Connie. Unfortunately (fortunately?), Connie was off that day, and he was helped by one of the other opticians, and, as he describes it, "It was love at first sight." He sent flowers the next day (and she wanted to know, "Where's the candy?").

But he was undeterred, and they dated, and today they wed. Because he got her instead of my wife.

During the service today, the priest said at one point that "it takes two to make a marriage." I disagree. I think it takes one to make a marriage. That's what scares so many guys, it's the thought that they'll be diminished by marriage, that they'll be giving up some of themselves, giving up freedom, giving up who they are. But they're looking at it backwards. Marriage doesn't make you less of who you are. Marriage joins you with a partner, someone who has skills and abilities you don't, a partner who has been places you haven't, who knows people you don't, who can help you in ways you can't help yourself. Marriage doesn't make you less, marriage makes you more (if it's a good marriage). I don't think it takes two, I think it takes one: the joint entity that you become. I'm only diminished when my wife isn't at my side to pitch in when I fall short.

After the ceremony, we blew bubbles instead of throwing rice. Rice is bad for birds.

During the reception I left the room to get a soda from the open bar, and found the bartender counting toothpicks. OCD, I wondered? An overachieving attention to the details of toothpick inventory? No, it turns out that the bartender stuck a toothpick in a shotglass for every drink she served. She wasn't inventorying toothpicks, she was seeing how many drinks she had sold.

When the happy couple cut the cake, people lined up with cameras and cellphones. The cellphones weren't for vicarious thrills. The cellphone owners weren't doing a play-by-play to absent relatives, they were taking pictures. This is where technology has taken us. People shooting cakes with phones. A girl at our table wanted to chat with a friend at the other end of the room, and used her cellphone. To talk to someone in the same room!

That was my day.


Blog Tag: Chatter   Blog Tag: Opinion   Blog Tag: Images   Blog Tag: Weddings