The Wedding Song.....

June 1.....the month of graduations, Father's Day, my birthday, and......weddings.  Today marked a very sobering milestone, at least for me.  We received by email the contract and menu selections for our son's wedding.  Brian and Liz, God love their souls, have been trying their damnedest to get married since Liz was a senior at St. Norbert in 2008.  The original plan was Memorial Day Weekend, 2009. Then the economy tanked. Brian diligently sought employment opportunities in the midwest/Chicago area, where Liz lived. No luck. Liz found a good job after graduation, but they remained 1500 miles apart.  Then Brian became a casualty of downsizing.  While not great, at least it gave him the opportunity to move to Chicago, be with Liz, and look for work where they lived.

I'll spare you the gory details, but it went swiftly downhill from there.  Not only was the original wedding date abandoned, they found themselves living in a rental property that I could only describe as a slum. Tim said it brought to mind "Potterville" from It's a Wonderful Life - horrible rents charged for substandard property and living conditions. Despite windows and doors covered by blankets and plastic to prevent drafts, the temperature inside never went above 55 degrees.  And that was paying $300 a month for electricity. In a lot nearby, there were squatters living in a large tent with a bonfire.....not so bad, you say? This was February in Wisconsin....try it sometime.....

Spring forward to 2011, where Brian has a job - certainly not one he wants to hold forever, but it's something.They live in an adorable 98 year old Dutch Colonial house in a sweet neighborhood. After all these years of trying to do it on their own, they finally asked us if we were still willing to help fund them as they planned a wedding. Of course, we said yes.  The bride's family - which consists of her mother, also unemployed - is not in a position to take the traditional road. And we're back to Memorial Day Weekend, this time 2013.

There is nothing - and I do mean NOTHING - I like better than planning a wedding.  Ask my college roommate:  we planned mine for a year and a half!  I am a total sucker for weddings.  When I was a kid, my Catholic grammar school offered conversational French classes on Saturday mornings, and after class, I would hightail it over to our beautiful, brick Georgian-styled church to sneak in the back and watch the first of the day's weddings - the limo would pull up, disgorge the bride under the canopy, she'd walk gingerly up the steps to the big double doors, and I was hooked.  It was there, my mother told me, that I began my fixation on all things matrimonial - dress, flowers, tuxes, music, the works.  It was also before I realized someone had to pay for all that.

So today, I read with disbelief - and I consider myself fairly well-read on the subject - the cost of a simple, modest reception for 125 people. Somehow I thought we had dodged that bullet by producing only sons, but clearly God has other plans.  I love them, and I would do anything for them - obviously.  They're not asking for the moon; I've seen those kinds of weddings.  They're not interested, and we're not willing OR able. But hokey smokes, as Rocket J. Squirrel would say, that's a heck of a lot of money for 6 hours. And we haven't even begun to talk about flowers, photography, or other peripherals - like a dress.  Liz is not a bridezilla, and I don't want to give that impression.  Both of them have their feet firmly planted in reality. The reality is, it's a racket.  Which will no doubt provide fodder for a lot more posts like this.....stay tuned.....

"He is now to be among you at the calling of your hearts, rest assured this troubadour is acting on His part..."