The One Hundred Dollar Wedding and The Million Dollar Marriage

Twenty years ago tomorrow I went to a wedding. It the worst wedding I've been to and it was mine. Two decades later I still think about all I finally learned on that July day when I walked into a small public room in Manhattan and left it as a new bride.

I never doubted I would marry my husband. Some people have love at first sight. I had love at first date. By the end of the evening, after the three hour conversation while the pizza slices sat on table getting cold, I knew that that the two of us were going to be the two of us for the rest of our lives.

Five years later the wedding was the sort of disaster you see on bad sitcoms. We planned to get married at city hall for all sorts of reasons and then have a big party later in the year. My husband decided he couldn’t get married without his family. I realized I wanted my grandmother there because at ninety-five I wasn’t sure she’d still be around for any other possible wedding.

What was supposed to be three people became twenty-three people. Most of them weren’t happy about our last minute plans. In retrospect I could hardly blame them. Weddings are supposed to be planned months in advance, not a sudden mad rush to find some flowers and a dress. After the ceremony my new husband asked one of my new sisters in law to welcome me into the family. She took five steps towards me, made a nasty face and turned her back. My grandmother kept asking what happened to that nice Jewish man I used to date and when my cousin gay cousin Jeffrey was going to get married. Our, “wedding photographer,” was a friend at the time who took pictures that are mostly blurry. I sat there in the middle of it all, madly in love, overwhelmed at the sheer grown up step I had just taken but a little bewildered, hurt and embarrassed.

Today I write this and I think about the man I promised the rest of my life to in front of a justice of the peace in the corner of a busy city so many years ago. There are a few strands of gray at his temples and a few lines around the vivid blue eyes I see in our daughters. I have a few gray hairs myself that I plunk when I think he isn’t looking.

I let myself think about how awful that day was for a few minutes each year. The dress wasn't right. The rabbi wasn't there. There were no bridesmaids or organists or a chuppah and a recitation in Hebrew. There was no best man, veil on my head or a flock of flower girls in front of me like chattering sparrows. I have never been the princessy type but sometimes I regret that I let go of my one real chance to play the part.

 

And then I think about all the wonderful days we’ve had since. I think about the way the hummingbirds were everywhere during our honeymoon in Costa Rica. I think about how many times I’ve listened to my husband's quiet breathing at night and heard his voice during the day tenderly say, “I love you,” even when I don’t feel very lovable at all. I think gratefully about how we have fashioned a sweet, fulfilling, warm life together as parents, as partners and real best friends forever.

Most of all I think about how truly grateful I am that our wedding day was the worst day of our marriage.

So please raise a cyberglass in his honor! To my husband! And to all the good men of the world, the ones who truly love, honor and cherish all the days of their lives. Because the real test of a marriage isn’t whether or not the centerpieces matched the tablecloths or the pretty color of the bridesmaid’s dresses. The real test is not the dress you wore for five hours or the reception hall appetizer or where you put the wedding gifts.

The real test is what happens all the days after.