always that drunk lady, never a bride

I love weddings. I love everything about them. I love the dresses and the tuxes and the music and the flowers and the pomp and every last little circumstance of it all. I cannot get enough. I will spend hours looking at the wedding photos of people I barely know on Facebook, critiquing the bridesmaids' dresses, oohing and aahing over the cliched toddler-as-ring-bearer that I just cannot get enough of, because MY GOD, babies in grown-up clothes is like the BEST thing ever, except maybe, MAYBE for clothes on a dog. MAYBE.

So when I actually get to go to a wedding? And see it with my own retinas and pupils and irises? It's like Christmas, and all my presents are free drinks at an open bar and dances with strangers.

This weekend was my second wedding of Wedding Season, and I've got about another month until number three. Beyond the aesthetic (and alcoholic) reasons to love a good wedding, I also just really cherish the opportunity to witness and share in something so monumentally intimate and special with someone I love. Which explains why I would get up at the crack of dawn on Saturday to drive six hours to Louisville and then make the same drive back the very next morning -- that and the open bar, of course.

Then there's also the huge added bonus of being able to see and catch up with friends and sorority sisters who I may not have seen in years. And to stand beside them, as they debate vodka or beer, while in line for said open bar.

This weekend's particular wedding also happened to be an Irish Catholic affair, my first of either variety not to mention both combined. It was in a stunning Catholic church in downtown Louisville, and the reception was held in the Muhammed Ali Center, in a sixth-floor room surrounded by glass, making the sunset over the Ohio River the backdrop for the evening. It was perfection.

So I danced the night away with my sisters and a whole host of people I'd never met, made friends with a groomsman who let me steal the cummerbund from his suit -- well, more like I wanted to put it on to see if I could, as I kept telling people, "bring it back," whatever that means -- and he told me I could keep it. Probably because it looked so good on me. Of course, now I have a cummerbund. What the eff am I going to do with a cummerbund? I'll keep you posted when I think of something.

All told, there's only one thing I would've changed about the whole affair. Early in the evening, I went to the DJ and requested Otis Redding. He said he thought he had something, so I returned to the dance floor and waited and waited and waited. No Otis. So I returned to the DJ booth to see if he had some Al Green. Nada. My next request was just for Memphis music. His response?

"I have some Elvis."

I said, seriously? SERIOUSLY? He quipped back, "That's Memphis music!" I said, yes. That is a correct statement, yes it is. But I need some Memphis SOUL. I need you to get back there and find me some Stax, some Sam and Dave, some Booker T and the MGs, some something I can make love to on the dance floor and do it STAT.

Naturally, he was unable to fill that request, either, so some time later I went back to the booth with what I thought would be a sure bet. Tina Turner.

I said, "Do you have 'Proud Mary'?" He seemed relieved -- probably because he knew that I was close to violence and that none of the wedding guests would remember what happened the next day. He said yes, and while I was momentarily also relieved, before I walked away I asked -- just to be certain -- if it was Tina. Oh, shocker. OF COURSE NOT. Now, please don't get me wrong. I like a little Creedence just as much as the next girl, but when there is a dance floor involved, I'ma need Ike, I'ma need Tina and I'ma need to pretend my legs are half as good as hers, the tramp, and get out there and do that dance.

I walked away, flabbergasted. Isn't there a law against being a DJ and not having a SINGLE Tina song? I mean, shouldn't there be? Because frankly, I would've really preferred "Nut Bush" over "Proud Mary," but if I requested that, well, he might've mistaken it for a pick-up line.

And trust me, we did not need that.


cheers,
elizabeth