2010 was the year of weddings. In 2004 I was in my best friend from St. Cloud State’s wedding, in 2006 I was in my sister’s wedding, and in 2008 I was in my best friend from the University of North Dakota’s wedding. In 2010 I was in three weddings. Three weddings in two months.
August 27, October 2 and October 9 (actually I had two friends getting married on 10/9, but I was only in one of them so that made it easier to figure out which one to go to.) Bam. Bam. Boom. This weekend was the first weekend since June or July that I didn’t have to do something wedding related. Or think about a wedding. Initially I was looking forward to this weekend, but when it came around it was quite strange. My life as a bridesmaid had come to a sudden halt. Ironically enough Monday starts off with a funeral of a very close relative. Three weddings and funeral. Wasn’t that a movie?
My friend Jessica’s wedding was October 2. I met Jessica when I lived in St. Cloud (round two). I worked at a law firm there from July 2007 to July 2008. I met Jessica in my yoga class around November 2007. She was in the back row. Very good at yoga, but I could also tell she had been trained in classical ballet from the way she carried herself. I chatted with her after class and discovered that she was fairly new in St. Cloud, like me, was there for her job but didn’t really know anyone. So she asked me to hang out some time. And we did. And it was fun. Thank goodness for yoga and ballet or I would never have the pleasure of knowing Jessica. I am so glad to have met her. We both got each other through some tough times.
Anyway. Jessica and Jon’s wedding was at Deep Portage Learning Center in Hackensack, MN. Not typically a wedding venue, there was no staff to clean up after the wedding. So the bride and groom informed everyone that they would be coming back to clean the morning after and invited anyone who could to stay and help out.
I had attended a wedding at Deep Portage in August 2009 (maybe they should consider being a wedding venue) and spent the morning cleaning with the bride and groom. It felt wrong to watch the newlyweds up bright and early, vacuuming, moving chairs, and tearing down decorations. Since I knew what it was like, I emailed all Jess and Jon’s friends and asked if we could clean up without their assistance. (I don’t think the morning after my wedding I will be saying to my husband – hey… let’s go clean up from that big bash we had last night.) They had done so much work and planning and suffered many stressful moments that I just wanted them to relax.
So under the direction of Jon’s sister and her husband, who would know what to do with décor, flowers, etc. We decided to do the clean up. At the rehearsal dinner I was to present Jon and Jessica with that gift.
After the father of the groom spoke, Jessica and Jon gave a speech and started handing out gifts. I approached Jessica and asked her if I could say something. She looked kind of confused… probably thinking, “Ok, bridesmaid #6, why in the world would you have something to say at our rehearsal dinner? It was not in the plan.” But she said sure anyway.
I think I have a hard time giving a serious, sincere speech. Maybe not. I don’t know. I have never had to give one before. But suddenly during dinner, I decided that I should write my “speech” in the form of a poem. I tried to make it rhyme. Something I hadn’t done since I was 12.
So I stood up. Held my deposit ticket in my hands. (The deposit ticket from my check book was where I wrote the poem. I had nowhere else to write it.)
Dear Jessica & Jon
We love you a ton.
Tomorrow we will have
So much fun.
The day after that
When up comes the sun –
Please stay in bed, pull the
Sheets over your head.
We’ll clean up DP
Cuz you’ll be so sleepy.
Don’t lift a finger
Just let yourself linger
In the morning after bliss,
Just enjoy your sweet’s kiss.
The end. You don’t really want to read about the cleaning process. Nor do I want to write about it, but it was actually quite fun and we got most of it done before morning.
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