my step-cousin's jewish wedding

[catwoman007]

so this past weekend my brother, mom and i drove down to LA for my step-cousin's wedding. i really hate traveling with them because for some reason the three of us just don't get along. the drive there and parts of the drive back were needless to say extremely frustrating. we got to the hotel friday afternoon, took it easy and went to the rehearsal dinner at chevy's. it was nice seeing my family really happy and relaxed, although the only people i knew were the groom, his mom (my aunt wendy), and my uncle john who is the only relative there by blood. anyway, saturday was hot but i stayed and lounged about in the air conditioned hotel room. i took my time getting ready so it took much longer than usual but it felt good to be able to do all that at a not so rushed pace. we drive to the Skirball Cultural Center off Sepulveda somewhere way north of LMU and we get there around 6. the wedding was supposed to start at 6:30 and started at 6:45. it was outdoors in a courtyard, with candles and lights everywhere. the wedding luckily finished before sunset. it was a well done jewish wedding that although i didn't understand the hebrew spoken, it was interesting to listen to. plus i have never since my cousin cliff cry, ever. he constantly had to break out the handkerchief to wipe his eyes. anyway, we migrated to a different courtyard for the receiving line, chatting and drinks while the staff made the previous courtyard into our dinner location. i'll be honest, i wasn't really having fun at this point because my family didn't really know anyone, and my uncle john and aunt wendy were needless to say, busy. luckily the found some time and chatted with us for awhile till we migrated back to the previous courtyard. there we found our seats and the band immediately started the party. right away they started playing traditional jewish wedding music where the bride and groom are lifted on the chairs and all that fun stuff. (they even played a little of fiddler on the roof which of course made me extremely happy.) they served dinner and desert really late into the ceremony which also means the speeches were done late in the night too. the couple were cutting the cake when we left after 12:30! then again the cake was only there for photo ops but still. i danced with my uncle and he obviously knows how to actually dance so i had trouble keeping up with him. he told me that being as young as i am i should have more rhythm than that. :( ah man. oh well. i knew i had rhythm when the booty songs came on but i resisted dancing too much since the family was watching and i didn't have a group or friends to shield me. luckily i danced with my cousin cliff and he just did the normal sway type dance with me. it was fun but at the same time i've realized how much i don't know him anymore. it's weird. anyway we got back to the hotel around 1, i had a hard time sleeping then we woke up around 7:30. ugh. then we drove home, blah blah blah end of story. :)

I'm really glad we got to go, but i really miss how close cliff and i used to be. marcus too, his younger brother. marc is manic depressive and has a severe anxiety of being around people, so he didn't come to the wedding. that made me even more sad. i really miss how close cliff, marc, me and john were. they've always been the cool older cousins to us and they still are, but in a very different way now. i love them both dearly, maybe because i cling to the memories, or because i adore my uncle and they are his step kids, i don't really know, but it felt right to think all this over on the way home.