Friday, July 08, 2005

X

July 8, 1995.
I didn't feel that we were too young. I didn't feel that we weren't "ready." I knew that we wanted to be together and that we wanted to build our own life.

It was a brutally hot and humid day, as summer days tend to be in South Georgia. The day before I had spent at my house with my dad, my brothers, and some friends. He just relaxed and had a cooked. Nothing terribly memorable and certainly nothing debased. Just a simple affair.

I woke up the next morning and got ready. My brother/best man Muleskinner had the tuxes ready and so Mom made breakfast. I got everything on and then we got in the car. We drove the 45 minutes down I-75 to Tegan's hometown. (We grew up that close to each other but didn't meet until college.)

The first place I went in Valdosta was the site of the reception, the Crescent. We took a lot of the formal wedding pictures that morning, before it got terribly hot and the lighting for the cameraman got too bright. The photographer had a bit of fun with me during all of this. I had not seen Tegan before all of this and so, the idea was to maintain that tradition as long as possible. He staged a series of pictures where Tegan was behind me, then getting closer and closer, all the while preventing me from turning around and then getting a picture as I saw her for the first time. It was annoying, but produced an effective picture.

After the pictures were all finished, we drove up the road a bit and arrived at Tegan's hometown church. I spent the rest of the time before the wedding hanging out in a back hallway/office area of Tegan's dad, who was the minister there. He kept jokingly asking me if I was still willing to go ahead with this? (As if he was gonna let me get away . . . as if I wanted to.) Muleskinner and I just waited. Some of my high school/college friends were ushering people into their seats. Tegan's aunts and future sister-in-law were singing songs. I was fiddling with my small microphone that was attached to my coat lapel (to have better audio on the videotape).

The waiting seemed to go on for ever. Finally it was time for me to take my position at the foot of the altar and wait for Tegan to arrive. The ceremony was good. Tegan's dad officiated and did the vows. Our minister from our college-town church came to officiate the Eucharistic ceremony. It was a longer wedding service than most of my friends were used to, but it was meaningful to us.

The reception was an endless blur of friends, relatives, etc. I didn't get a chance to talk to anyone as long as I wanted and probably didn't talk to some of the people there at all. I don't even remember eating much except the obligatory piece of wedding cake for the photograph. Truthfully, as Tegan would surely tell you, I was somewhat concerned that my friends would screw up the car--even though I had given orders not to. One unfortunate consequence of my concern was that when all was said and done and we were departing, we got in a different car--one that didn't have the food that had been collected for us by Tegan's mom.

When we did get in the car, we drove to Savannah for the night and then headed to Charleston for the next four days. There we spent a great deal of time eating great food, seeing a beautiful city, and just relaxing as a married couple.

It was a great day and the start of a great new life together.

3 comments:

Anonymous said...

Happy anniversary you cutties!!!

Anonymous said...

P.S. What a crappy titile for such a great entry!!!

David said...

Oh well, nobody likes roman numerals.