Brother of the Bride
Brother of the Bride Just as there are cat people and dog people, there are wedding people and reception people. Most people, I imagine, belong to the latter category—impatient for the ceremony to...
...The bridal party emerged and formed a perfect tableau...
...I had always harbored a touch of a desire—just a touch—to plan a wedding...
...I was going to produce a wedding to end all weddings, a model to the world (or at least to those few attending): impressive yet tasteful, thought-provoking yet blithe, religious yet unobjectionable, informal yet purposeful...
...It was hot...
...The recessional presents no end of exciting possibilities: Mendelssohn's march has never ceased to thrill, and, if the organist can handle it, Widor's toccata, taken like the wind, is a knockout...
...At a hotel...
...At 3:50, my sister and I were still negotiating the language of the opening and trying to settle on a Psalm...
...Will the bridesmaids be fetching, and will there be obvious flirting between them and the groomsmen...
...I was going to begin with a little address, to give the "service" a dash of what The Book of Common Prayer calls "solemnization...
...If there is singing, it will be a friend of one of the principals, and she will be bad...
...That way, you could have whatever you wanted, performed by whomever you wanted...
...To actually script and run the thing...
...And the kiss...
...At about 3:57, she decided what shoes to wear, and I lighted on Psalm 100...
...Isn't this a little over the top...
...Instead, you will likely hear one of three trumpet voluntaries: Purcell, Clarke, or Stanley...
...How will the father comport himself as he walks his daughter down the aisle...
...At first, my plans were grand and glorious...
...I'm a wedding person, in part because there is no end of interesting things to look for: Will the mothers cry, and what will the nature of those tears be...
...My sister argued that the word "solemnization"—as in, "We are here to witness the solemnization of a union"—sounded perilously like "sodomization...
...In reciting the vows, will the couple be clear and strong, or quavering and uncertain...
...We trooped downstairs...
...The trolley clanged in the background...
...In New Orleans...
...A half-dozen e-mails ensued between us, but we still couldn't achieve the desired medium: less than a papal ordination, more than wham-bam-thank-you-Pastor...
...When she called back, rather than e-mailing, I suspected there might be a problem...
...Brown, the little old lady whom the church can't get rid of because she's a member and has been there forever...
...In due course, a judge—right and proper—would step in and administer the vows...
...It would be done through recordings...
...Then a strange and wonderful thing happened: My sister— whom I had always taken for a reception person—decided that she would get married...
...On the appointed day, we all arrived at the Columns Hotel (where Pretty Baby, the soft-kiddie-porn movie, was filmed...
...I had gotten slightly carried away, yes...
...Rarely now is the bridal march from Wagner's Lohengrin used as the processional—it has been hopelessly lampooned as "Here Comes the Bride" ("all fat and white...
...Most people, I imagine, belong to the latter category—impatient for the ceremony to be done with, eager for the party to begin...
...Then there would be copious readings, both secular and not...
...It's going to be a million degrees...
...And the organ would be played by a great virtuoso, not by Mrs...
...And the reception, oddly, was nice, too...
...She and her fiance had but a single question for me: Would I organize and conduct the wedding...
...I reviewed Scripture...
...You will inevitably hear, as the guests gather, Bach's Jesu, Joy of Man's Desiring, whose angelic triplets will be carelessly broken...
...I was a kid let loose in the nuptial candy shop...
...Very hot...
...Finally, I got it all together and e-mailed an outline to my sister...
...Then there's the music...
...Will it be brief and chaste, or one of those save-it-for-the-dark numbers...
...Uh, Jay...
...The opening, I would more or less wing...
...The singer, a friend of the bride's, was excellent (spoiling tradition...
...Because that's all a "reception" is, really: a big fat party, only one where certain people are unusually dressed and there is this pestilent clinking of glasses...
...On July 19...
...The white-maned southern judge —straight from central casting— played his part to a tee...
...I thought about the wedding at night before drifting off to sleep, and in the morning before rising...
...Jessye Norman would be free to sing...
...After months of deliberation, of debate and delight, the wedding went beautifully...
...I read poetry...
...And the music...
...I mean, we'd like something short and sweet out on the veranda...
...The clergyman: Will he be blandly ecumenical or pointedly parochial...
...But I figured, reasonably enough, that I would never get the chance...
...My study was intense...
...The wedding was to begin at 4:00...
...The guests, though fanning themselves, seemed rapt...
...Jay Nordlinger...
...I reflected on the ceremonies of several denominations...
...she said...
...And don't you think that running back and forth from a CD player would be a little . . . well, tacky...
Vol. 2 • August 1997 • No. 47
