How Attending My Best Friend’s Wedding Completely Changed My Outlook On Love

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One of my dear friends from work got married the other weekend and I was asked to accept the honor of being her day of wedding coordinator.

My background as a former Pre-K CCD teacher, office baby shower hostess, and my reputation at work for being the most obsessed with schedules, calendars, and to-do lists apparently qualified me enough to ensure a small parade of Southern belles made it down the aisle and the bride had a stress-free day… ok, ok, low-stress day. I’m no miracle worker.

Spending 48 hours surrounded by the happy couple, their parents, step-parents, siblings, aunts, uncles, grandparents, and friends was a truly enjoyable work environment for me!

Witnessing such an outpouring of love at such a high density was overwhelming. The love of a nervous mother of the groom, attempting to express her feelings through centerpiece arranging. The love of a child from the mother of the bride, providing a salve to her recently broken heart as I cross her boyfriend’s name off my ceremony procession list. The love of a growing family, accepting one another into each other’s lives until death or future holiday-celebration politics do them part.

But the most precious love I saw was the love between the bride and groom. Romantic love. A partnership so special it created a completely original human life. Their six-month old son.

You could say their order of ceremony– engagement, childbirth, and then wedding– was unorthodox, but even if I were to have made their to-do list I wouldn’t change a single bullet point.

Their love is pure and real and a partnership I am honored to have entered into my life. As the maid of honor informed the wedding guests, the love of the bride and groom wasn’t exactly organic. In fact on the night they met she dropped them off at the same bar, drove away and then refused to retrieve the bride at any point further that evening— despite the five-minutes-into-the-date rescue call or any call following. Sometimes people know you better than you know yourself, I guess.

My friends, of course, would know that shit don’t fly with me— namely because I always insist on driving. Come to think of it, perhaps that’s why I’m still single???

I still can’t imagine myself as a bride, hosting my own wedding, or growing an infant within my womb, but experiencing the love of this family has gifted me with many thoughts on the types of love I’m experiencing in my life. Perhaps to attain bliss (wedded or not) all I need is to let go a little, have a drink with the right guy, and surround myself with friends who are good enough to block my calls.