Congratulations Mr. and Mrs. Schaffer!
So yesterday was the wedding of sephimb and Dayna on Saturday. I mentioned briefly in my post about spacialk's wedding that hers was the first "traditional" wedding I had been to, at least in terms of the pop cultural idea of weddings--dearly beloved etc., etc.jdcohen's now-wife is a Quaker, and a Meeting isn't really the sort of thing that one expects to find in a marriage ceremony. Unless one is a Quaker, I suppose. And not the way I'm a quaker.
Anyway, they got married at Pottawatomie Park in the wooden pavilion there, which I hadn't realized was even there until a few weeks ago when I went on that boat ride with my parents. It was all strung up with purple bunting and a sign with the bride and groom's names on it, the guests sat on the picnic tables within as well as a few chairs laid out for the occasion (prompting a comment from the minister that it was the only wedding he had officiated at where the guests sat on picnic tables), and--in a moment that both I and softlykarou thought would have been amazing and then it actually happened--the bride descended from the top of the tower down the stairs to the thrilling musical strains of DJ iPad.
The most memorable moment was probably how right when the couple went to exchange rings and take their vows, the sun, which had previously hidden behind clouds that apparently had an 80% chance of rain, came out and shown down right into the dais that they were standing on. It was pretty fantastic.
There was one thing that bothered me, that I'll spoiler here because, after all, it wasn't my wedding: [Spoiler (click to open)]There was a whole lot of Jesus in the ceremony. I mean, it was a Christian wedding, so of course there was going to be invocation of Jesus' blessing on the union, and that didn't bother me. It was the proselytization. The minister kept hoping not only that the union would be blessed, but that the people in the audience would let Jesus into their hearts, and come to understand him, and blah blah blah. It was honestly really creepy, and after the first time I stopped bowing my head during prayers because I mean really? I'm here for a wedding, not a tent revival. Instead, I said the Shehecheyanu to myself.
But I didn't say anything to anyone else about it, because it's not my wedding.
The reception was...well, it was a wedding reception, at a building I hadn't realized even existed and took us a while to find because there weren't any signs until you already turned into the complex where it was. It was actually a nature center, but there was definitely a room that was set aside for banquets, a kitchen, and a catering staff, so I suppose that they had planned for this sort of thing. Anyway, the most memorable incident there was when DJ iPad played Sandstorm, which to a bunch of DDR kids who went to high school in the 90s and early 00s--as most of us who went to the wedding were--was pretty irresistible. I don't know if that's the most packed the dance floor got during the reception, but it was at least in the top three.
I was also able to correct a longstanding injustice. See, when softlykarou and I had our own wedding, we made the guest list and everything was okay...except there were two people that we forgot to invite. We talked to them both and mentioned that it was just that we forgot, not that we had intended to slight them or that it was a deliberate insult. It takes a weight off my shoulders, albeit a small one, and corrects a worry that those people had that we secretly hated them. That was a good outcome.
Yay! Weddings!
Anyway, they got married at Pottawatomie Park in the wooden pavilion there, which I hadn't realized was even there until a few weeks ago when I went on that boat ride with my parents. It was all strung up with purple bunting and a sign with the bride and groom's names on it, the guests sat on the picnic tables within as well as a few chairs laid out for the occasion (prompting a comment from the minister that it was the only wedding he had officiated at where the guests sat on picnic tables), and--in a moment that both I and softlykarou thought would have been amazing and then it actually happened--the bride descended from the top of the tower down the stairs to the thrilling musical strains of DJ iPad.
The most memorable moment was probably how right when the couple went to exchange rings and take their vows, the sun, which had previously hidden behind clouds that apparently had an 80% chance of rain, came out and shown down right into the dais that they were standing on. It was pretty fantastic.
There was one thing that bothered me, that I'll spoiler here because, after all, it wasn't my wedding: [Spoiler (click to open)]There was a whole lot of Jesus in the ceremony. I mean, it was a Christian wedding, so of course there was going to be invocation of Jesus' blessing on the union, and that didn't bother me. It was the proselytization. The minister kept hoping not only that the union would be blessed, but that the people in the audience would let Jesus into their hearts, and come to understand him, and blah blah blah. It was honestly really creepy, and after the first time I stopped bowing my head during prayers because I mean really? I'm here for a wedding, not a tent revival. Instead, I said the Shehecheyanu to myself.
But I didn't say anything to anyone else about it, because it's not my wedding.
The reception was...well, it was a wedding reception, at a building I hadn't realized even existed and took us a while to find because there weren't any signs until you already turned into the complex where it was. It was actually a nature center, but there was definitely a room that was set aside for banquets, a kitchen, and a catering staff, so I suppose that they had planned for this sort of thing. Anyway, the most memorable incident there was when DJ iPad played Sandstorm, which to a bunch of DDR kids who went to high school in the 90s and early 00s--as most of us who went to the wedding were--was pretty irresistible. I don't know if that's the most packed the dance floor got during the reception, but it was at least in the top three.
I was also able to correct a longstanding injustice. See, when softlykarou and I had our own wedding, we made the guest list and everything was okay...except there were two people that we forgot to invite. We talked to them both and mentioned that it was just that we forgot, not that we had intended to slight them or that it was a deliberate insult. It takes a weight off my shoulders, albeit a small one, and corrects a worry that those people had that we secretly hated them. That was a good outcome.
Yay! Weddings!