A Wedding Story

Like all the best weddings, it had drama, it had romance, and it had comic relief. The man of the hour turned out to be a woman. And the parking lot attendant (played by Samuel L. Jackson) gave us his paternal blessing.

It began when Dave and I drove into downtown Raleigh with our family members following in the car behind us. Miraculously on New Year's Eve, (a big deal in Raleigh called "First Night") we found a space in the parking lot right next to the Safety Court; City Hall was closed for the holiday so we were going to be married in the same place where they process the criminals. The parking lot attendant glanced into our car and asked, "Getting Married today?" I believe it was Dave's tie that gave us away-- not too many revelers bother to wear ties while watching the Great Acorn drop.

Once inside the Safety Court, we sat in a room awaiting our turn in front of magistrate in chairs ominously festooned with chains. The door that leads into the next chamber warns that hats must be removed and only one person may enter at a time. We wondered if we might be taking our vows separately.

When it was our turn, the magistrate called out "Next!" For a moment I wasn't sure whether I was there to order a pound of Salami or marry the man that I love. All six of us crowded into the court room, a fishbowl with glass walls on three sides, including an interesting view into the holding tank. The magistrate checked our paperwork and got everyone's ID. Then we got to cool our heels while a touching scene played out next door: a young man in a baseball cap was seen pulling off his hat, acting penitent for a brief moment, and then gesticulating wildly with said cap. I believe from reading his body language that the cap had led him astray, and therefore he personally was entirely blameless for the drunken debauchery that landed him in the hoosegow. One gesture in particular led me to believe that the offensive baseball cap would banished forever to be replaced by a gimme hat.

The magistrate got back to us and apologized. He felt (quite rightly) that we would just as soon not have our little ceremony be observed by anonymous jailbirds, and so had dispatched the cap-wearer to his future. The magistrate, Mr. Sweeney, now became our guardian angel and arranged for our witnesses to block the view of those waiting their turn outside. Dave and I stood in front of the one solid wall in the room, painted bureaucratic bile green and "decorated" with the Great Seal of North Carolina. And this is the part where we should have had our no-frills, sign-on-the-dotted-line, legal action resulting in the right to call ourselves Husband and Wife. Instead, miraculously, we had the most romantic, most emotional, most touching wedding that one could ever hope for. In retrospect it shocked, amazed, and delighted us that we could reach even greater heights of love with the simple exchange of words and wedding bands. Tears, smiles, and many, many hugs ensued.

Back at the parking lot, Dave, his father, and Gwen got into Dave's car. Their assignment was to drive into Durham and pick-up the wedding cake and--hopefully-- some frilly toothpicks. Before they set off on their journey, the parking lot attendant blessed Dave's union and wished him the best, hoping for Dave the same 35 years of wedded bliss as he, the attendant, had enjoyed. It seemed not to faze him in the least that Dave arrived in the car with a woman and left in the car with an 11 year old girl.

In the other car, the two moms and I drove back home where the prime rib was sitting on the counter waiting to be roasted for our wedding supper. It was just as Jewel drove into the driveway I realized with horror that while I had my ID, my bouquet, and my tissues, I did not have my house keys. No matter, we are very indifferent householders who seldom remember to lock all three doors into the house. Wrong. Today of all days, the house was locked with every lock it possessed. But there was the dog door....

Standing about in our finery, our heels, and pantyhose, we cursed for the first time the complete and total lack of children on our street. We also wondered why we had never taken the time to train Fanny how to unlock the sidedoor. Or why we had never hidden a key, for that matter. But there is a very amiable and obliging teenager who lives on our street who is on good terms with Fanny. So Jewel walked over to her house. But no joy-- Dominique had thoughtlessly decided to go to a party rather than hang about to see if she could crawl through bridal dog doors. Just when we were wondering how best to quickly burn off those extra inches about our hips, Dominique's mother came over. She said, "What the heck, I'm smaller than Dominique." And this tremendous woman, whom I had never met, crawled on her hands and knees and squeezed through Fanny's door. What a heroine! Hereafter, her deeds shall be celebrated in song and dance every anniversary of our wedded bliss.