Last Friday, Mer and I got to go to our second former-student wedding. As an added bonus, they were both founding members of my improv group, The Royal Fools, back in 2005. Josh and Kristen had been dating since high school, so I think they have been dating six or seven years now. They finally got married, and it was great getting to see a lot of former students, some of whom I had not seen in two or three years.
Josh and Kristen got married at a modern but pretty church north of Akron. Mer and I knew most of the groomsmen – three of the five were former CVCA graduates, and one other was Matt, Clarice’s fiance. We also got to sit with Clarice and Michelle in the church, and they sat with us at the reception too, so we got in a pretty good visit.
The wedding was nice, but fairly brief, perhaps because it was on a Friday evening. It was made up of the lighting of the unity candle, one song, the exchange of vows and rings, and the kiss. Short and to the point. While Kristen marched in to Bach, she and Josh marched out to “The Imperial March” from the Star Wars trilogies. That was a lot of fun.
The newlywed couple greeted all the guests, row by row, and then we got to blow bubbles at the bride and groom as they got in their car. Since we did bubbles at our own wedding, I am always happy to repeat the experience.
The reception was at an Eastern Orthodox church, in one of their two halls. We grabbed a table near the front so we could see the bridal party. On the plus side, we could see, and we got to eat pretty quickly. On the down side, we were near a speaker for the DJ. He was playing tons of cool music from the big band era and the Rat Pack era, but it was often too loud for us to carry on long conversations (although not always).
As part of the appetizers, Josh and Kristen had provided a “candy bar” where there was a large variety of candies. They also had crackers and cheeses. It was a fun idea, and kept me and Mer happy while we munched and chatted. Our tablemates were Clarice and Michelle, our colleagues Dale and Linda, and a former student, Jessica, and her husband. It was a fun group.
After the bridal party arrived, there was much food and then the cutting of the cake. After cake, they twenty-somethings started dancing, and it was fun to see them on the dance floor. Mer and I hope to be able to do more of that at future weddings, but we want to take some swing lessons first. We left the wilder folks dancing sometime around ten o’clock. As far as we know, Matt and Clarice are up next, with their wedding in the spring.