Humor by John Christmann
Royal Flush
On Friday April 29th, Prince William of Wales will marry Catherine Middleton at Westminster Abbey in front of an intimate gathering of 1,900 invited guests, a few dozen television cameras, and the world.
As happy as I am for them, I can’t help but wonder, who gets married on Friday morning? I guess the Abbey was booked.
My wife and I were married on the very same date, but on a Saturday. We did not employ horse-drawn carriages to our wedding, but we did hire a few attendants to park cars. My wife wore a delicately made wedding dress, purchased from a wedding boutique, which I am sure someone somewhere designed. She looked beautiful, even without a flowery hat. I wore a simple black tuxedo, without medals and epaulets, which I still have today. It no longer fits me.
Since then I have enjoyed a wedding band around my finger. On occasion it has been fired and re-forged against the anvil of marriage, but it has never broken. In addition to my wife, it now symbolically encircles a lady, a couple of lords, two cats, and more loyal flesh-and-blood in-laws than even Buckingham Palace can hold.
Frankly, I think it would all be the same even if we were married on a Friday morning.
We also have some wedding photos from that day, but I don’t look at them much. I have glowing memories instead, which I take out and share with the kids this time every year. Unlike photos, memories don’t remind me that I no longer fit into my tux.
So with all of the media coverage of their ceremony, I wonder what kind of wedding day memories the new Prince and Princess of Wales will share when someday they take the throne and their wedding clothes are too snug?
They certainly won’t remember me pissed on Beefeater Gin loudly toasting the Queen Mother In Law before getting tossed on me arse by a bunch of deadpan Redcoats in tall furry hats. Or wriggling unabashedly to Crocodile Rock on the reception dance floor.
That’s because I wasn’t invited to their wedding.
Not that it matters—since my own anniversary is on the same day as the Royal Wedding, I can’t attend anyway. Still, I doubt in future years we will all be getting together to celebrate our anniversaries at Kensington Palace either.
But I am happy for them. And for the record, I appreciate their wedding. I happen to like the public display of love and commitment that weddings represent. Open bars are good too.
You see, I believe that any couple can run off and make promises to each other on a deserted beach in front of god disguised as a South Pacific sunset. But try stuttering nervously through very public vows before rows of acquaintances seated uncomfortably on hard benches, many of whom you barely know but who will become family the instant you say I Do.
And awhile later, in front of your new collection of vague family friends and freshly inebriated in-laws, try showing off your best left-footed dance moves while your designated song is playing in the background—the very song you will temporarily forget years later after your wedding clothes no longer fit.
I believe that it is then, and only then, that a couple earns the right to make promises to each other on a romantic beach sanctioned only by a warm, enveloping sunset. I don’t care who they are.
As fate would have it, there is another Royal wedding this weekend. Bill Royal, a local plumbing contractor from Teaneck, New Jersey, will marry his long time girl friend Katie in an outdoor ceremony taking place poolside at the Westminster Marriott Courtyard. It is the second marriage for both of them.
I wasn’t invited to their nuptial event either, but I suspect it won’t be as perfect in the eyes of the nightly news as the other high profile wedding at Westminster Abbey.
I suspect there may be troubled stepchildren and unconvinced family members present. Guests may drink too much. The band will probably be too loud. The best man will fall in the pool. The bride’s gay nephew might dash out and catch the bouquet. Strangers could crash the wedding.
Or worse. They could run out of champagne.
But regardless of the ceremony, the end result will be the same. A happy couple will go forth together headlong into an uncertain future with each other. How can this not be happy? After all, it’s a Royal Wedding.
So here is a toast to all happy couples entering in matrimony, regardless of your chosen day and venue: I wish you all the happiness I have received in marriage.
Because when it comes to weddings, we are all Royals.
© 2011 Dadinthebox.com