Mawedge is wot bwings us togeder tooday!

Sorry for the very late submission of this week’s post, but I was out of town at a wedding this past weekend with zip time/ coherence to write anything.  And now before you start jumping to conclusions about a wedding post that is surely a polarizing diatribe about the social folly of marriage, just slow your roll—slow it, slow it! 

Ah, the good old days.  Lachiam!

I love weddings.  I’ll say it again; I love weddings—they’re the best!  At the ripe old age of 26 when I shant be going to any more Bar Mitzvahs—well, many more—weddings are now the biggest, craziest, all-your-friends-being-there-est parties around. Money is poured into travel, hotels, food, music, booze, and just throwing the biggest bash imaginable after the wedding.  Nevermind that the reason it’s so big is to commemorate the last time the married couple will party with their friends.  It doesn’t matter because there’s a certain tragic beauty in the mortality of a moment… and in an open bar.

The mid 20 something crowd has so many commitments now-a-day that sending an RSVP to get them to promise to attend an event nine months in the future is really about the only way to get most people to a party.  This weekend I saw some college friends who I hadn’t seen in years, and probably won’t see again until someone else gets married when then another grand celebration of reminiscing, drinking, nostalgia talking, getting drunk, anecdoting, and falling into the desert table will commence.

So maybe it’s the wedding reception that’s really the greatest, but I believe it’s still the whole package deal that makes it work.  Here are a few of the finer points of weddings that shouldn’t be overlooked;

1.)   Drinking with the Father of the Bride –

            Bride’s side, groom’s side, both, the night before the wedding the family patriarchs want to drink hard alcohol, smoke fine cigars, and bring their son/daughter’s friends along for the free ride.  In my youth I thought this was simply a chance to score a few free drinks, but now I realize that I shouldn’t just grab the whiskey and run when no one’s looking.  These guys have great stories, not just about the bride and groom, but about life damn it, and the more you drink, the more fascinating they become.  Don’t miss out on learning why real men take the hard road in life, or how to light a cigar with your belt—just wow.

2.)   Dancing with your Friends’ Wives –

            I see a lot of movies where your Vince Vaugns and Neal Patrick Harrises are taking their veritable pick of the hot single girl liter at weddings.  And maybe this is the case at some post college weddings, but a few years down the road I’m  calling bullshit on this.  Bullplop!  Because everyone at these weddings is married, in a relationship, or at least with a date.  The DJ will inevitably play Single Ladies at some point (usually for the bouquet toss), but none of those giggly and momentarily aggressive girls who take the floor will actually be single, just without rings on its.  Hence, you’ll dance with a lot of friends’ wives and girlfriends.  Your friends will be glad they don’t actually have to dance, and if you’ve been making good use of the open bar, you’ll be more than glad to oblige and break it down.

Unrealistic depiction of weddings.

That's more like it. _                                                      

 3.)   Singles Spotting –

           

            At some point in the night, maybe at multiple points, married guys, ladies, whole couples will creep up to their single friends and have this uncomfortable conversation with them;

            “Hey, do you see that girl, the one in the green dress, she’s dancing over there?”

            “Yeah.”

            “So what do you think?”

            “About her?  I don’t know?  Who is she?”

            “Man, you should go for it—I would.”

            “Do you even know who she is?  Is she even single?”

            “Dude, you’re such a wuss.  Five years ago, I’d totally be all over that.  Woo-woo!

For some reason, all couples want to live vicariously through their single friends, while conveniently contracting amnesia regarding their past single lives.  If this hypothetical conversation would have been continued, our single would have responded thusly;

            “All over that?  You were set up with your wife by friends after seeing her at study session!”

Of course everyone comes to a wedding to celebrate the marriage, to celebrate the overpowering happiness that their friends have found and want to share if only for a day.   And whether the celebration draws its ferver from an era ending, or from one beginning, is really up to the newly weds.  I feel like I’ve seen it go the way of the former more than that of the latter, but I think part of the excitement of a wedding is in never truly knowing which way it will go and hoping for all the marbles.  At a wedding there’s hope, and friends, and warmth, and God willing, an open bar.




Big congrats to Dimi and Jenny.  I love you both and am so happy that I could be there this weekend... and that you had an open bar...