It rained on Gabriel and Lea's wedding yesterday. Not hard, but heavy enough at one point—when we all walked in our procession back out of our positions down the aisle, I was a bit struck by how wet I was. On the other hand, it indicates how
not bad it was that my suit was dry again within minutes. Or maybe it was just something about the fabric in my rental suit, I don't know.
In any case, this was also why, when Lea took out her paper with vows written on it, she began by saying, "This is gonna yet wet and it's gonna get weird."
Mandy was standing right behind me in our positions amongst the groomspeople, and she didn't miss a beat: she whispered into my ear, "That's what she said."
It was all I could do not to stifle my laughter. And this has almost no relevance whatsoever to absolutely anything else that happened yesterday, but I needed to share it. I repeated it yesterday to everyone I could. I mean, that meant I had about two or three opportunities to share, but whatever. At one point, Josh, Lea's best friend, was standing by himself on the other side of the table where most of the wedding party had been seated, and I was standing by myself near my plate. I am not often able to come up with anything to talk to Josh about, but after he said something relatively innocuous to me—maybe about the weather, I can't remember for sure—I told him about Mandy's "That's what she said" gag. When I got home I texted it to Laney, because Laney, of all people, says "That's what she said" to me
constantly.
I suppose there's a kind of quasi-deliberate irony to the fact that "That's what she said" is a severely dated and overused gag, and the only people who ever still say it around me are actually women.
Anyway! Gabriel and Lea's wedding. This occurred to me this morning: Lea was absolutely the star. I know this isn't some revolutionary revelation or anything, but even if that were not the traditional fact of weddings throughout history, Lea still would have been the star. And it should be noted that, in spite of its structure still being like most Western, English-speaking weddings, this was one of the most unconventional weddings I have ever attended—and certainly the most unconventional to be presented and organized within a fairly recognizably conventional structure. It was all in the details, and boy were there a lot of unconventional details, more specifically what I would call "nerd flourishes." Standing up in the wedding party during the ceremony, I was very distracted by the guy in the audience, maybe eight rows back, wearing a Darth Vader helmet through the whole thing. This was one of four former Charles Wright Academy staff members who used to work with Gabriel who was there, and Gabriel had very directly encouraged him to do this.
It should also be noted that I don't think Gabriel took any less part in organizing this wedding than Lea did, didn't do any less of the work, and had no less investment in its success. I would even venture to guess the "Star Wars" theme was what he wanted a bit more than Lea, but Lea being just as much of a nerd was simply delighted to go for it. There were Star Wars references galore, but also subtler references to
The Bachelor and even pie in honor of
Twin Peaks because of the venue's location in Snoqualmie. Notwithstanding all of this, Lea was still the star yesterday—which, I would say, was also what Gabriel wanted. And it's not like Gabriel was a minor part, as I just clarified. I'm just saying: if Gabriel and Lea's Wedding were a movie, it would be called
Lea and Gabriel's Wedding, and Gabriel would be second billed. Lea's name would be above the title.
Who would get third billing, then? Someone in the wedding party? If that were the case, and had he actually been able to attend rather than staying home sick with covid, it would probably be Andy. In his absence, though, when it comes to third billing . . . I suppose it would have to be me! Or my suit, anyway. This may not have been the idea for everyone else there, but hey—I got regular compliments on my suit, and I can only speak from my own experience:
LEA D
in
LEA AND GABRIEL'S WEDDING
with
GABRIEL N
and
MATTHEW'S SUIT
Of course, I did not have the experience of Gabriel moving through the day in
his amazing suit, with its burgundy color, actually complimenting Lea's beautiful bridal dress, and probably more specifically tailored—complete with
a lightsaber holster—than all the rest of the groomsmen suits combined. In all likelihood, Gabriel received far more compliments on his suit than I did on mine. He was the groom, after all. And he did look spectacular.
But we're talking about my suit right now!
I got several photos of myself in the suit because I kept handing my phone to Mandy and asking her to take my picture. (The one above of me in the field, though, she took with her phone, and texted to me later. The photo quality isn't quite as good in that shot but I still like it!) I wanted photos with both the jacket on and the jacket off, because I was so enamored with the color combination, and having the jacket on covered too much of the pink that I chose to go with the blue—particularly the wonderful paisley pattern on the back of the pink vest, but also the light pink dress shirt I bought separately to wear instead of the white one that came with the suit rental.
People have been telling me all my life that I look good in blue, and I don't think this has really changed even as my hair has shifted from a lighter blond, to a darker blond, then a salt-and-pepper blond, to the mostly-gray hair I have now that has rendered it a lighter head of hair than I ever had when I was younger. Suits have never been my jam
at all—I haven't worn a legitimate, full suit, I don't think, since Christopher's wedding in 1995 (I showed Mandy
the photo of 19-year-old me in a tux with
a bolo tie, and she had a satisfyingly dramatic response to that)—but, if I have to wear one, I couldn't ask for one better than this, which I got to suit to my own tastes. That was what Gabriel wanted for all of us.
Okay, well,
mosty to my own tastes. There were some limitations to the fact that mine was the only rental suit, such as: the shoes. The shoes looked very nice, I'm sure. They also sucked. I started changing into my suit shortly after 1:00 yesterday afternoon, that being nearly 90 minutes before the ceremony. Once the ceremony was over and the "Cocktail and Light Bites" portion of
the schedule was underway, the shoes were quite uncomfortably cutting into the fronts of both my ankles. I thought: the ceremony is over, who's going to care? So I went back to the closet where my suit bag was hanging and changed back into my regular shoes. I'm really glad I did this, because I honestly think that if I hadn't, by the end of the day I would have been bleeding.
I have one other complaint about the suit: the pants, and specifically the pant legs, around the calves. The woman at Men's Warehouse acted as though this were totally normal, especially for people with "athletic" calves, where the pant legs were too tight on the lower legs, and if you squat or sit and then stand up, the legs stay bunched up around the calves. This happens even from bending over, so just trying to lean down and pull the legs down is not super helpful. The Men's Warehouse lady said all I had to do was push the pant legs down with the opposite foot: easy peasy! I didn't think to mention to her that we'd be spending a good amount of time on wet grass, which would mean "pulling" pant legs down with wet and grassy shoes. In the end, it wasn't that bad, but it's still something I'm sure could have been remedied had I actually bought a fully tailored suit. As it was, I simply wore a pair of pants yesterday that were far too snug on the lower legs. I tend to notice it in a few of the photos, thinking it looks a little odd, but I don't think many other people thought anything about it.
I did have to pull the pant legs down when I got up from my table to make my speech, which was a little awkward, and I even heard someone say "Yeah pull your pant legs down," or something to that effect.
I was the third of four people to get up and make a prepared speech. The order was somewhat randomized, as Emily, the wedding planner, had come up to wedding party people to ask if anyone planned to, and she just decided the order would be: Josh (Lea's best friend), Mandy, me. I was genuinely surprised that Julie, Lea's Maid of Honor, did not make a speech. I am certain that had Andy, the Best Man at home sick with covid, had been there, he would have done one, and I bet Emily would have told him to go first. With neither the Best Man nor the Maid of Honor making a speech, I'm really glad I did get up and say something—if I hadn't, there would only have been two speeches from anyone in the wedding party.
Also, I really should have thought to tell Emily that Janine planned to speak, as she had already told me she was going to. She even told me she never wants to but feels she should, like it's a responsibility she takes on, because Ted, Gabriel's dad, never would—although to everyone's shock and anticipatory cringe, he actually did, and we'll get to
that later. I don't know when Emily would have scheduled Janine in the lineup, but I suspect it would be fourth, after anyone in the wedding party spoke, just like what happened anyway.
I have forever hated what I felt was the mistake I made at the 2012 wedding, when I had an original poem prepared, and things like directions for rings etc prepared, but had no actual speech prepared. At the time, in my mind I thought I would "wing it" in the moment, because that struck me as more Gabriel's style. This was a mistake, because I totally blanked, and had to be like, "Okay we'll just go to the next part." I wanted to be much more prepared than that this time, so while I was still in bed Friday morning, I wrote most of the speech on the Notes app in my phone while I was still in bed.
Josh, Mandy
and I all told Emily, when she actually asked, that we had our speeches written out. She asked whether we had "bullet points," and when we said we had written our speeches, she was openly pleased with all of us. Clearly she has experience with the unstructured meandering of unprepared speeches. So, this informed some of the beginning of my speech, which I altered just slightly right before going up.
And by the way, when I stood up, both Gabriel and Lea acted surprised, with even a bit of a mock "What's he going to say" sort of undertone. In fact, it was
Lea who first said, "Oh, no!" as soon as I stood up. Excuse me? Come on, I'm not
that much of a live wire. (Or mybe I am? I'm just used to me!) Also, I know that Lea wasn't at either of Gabriel's previous weddings (uh, obviously), but I did get up and speak at the wedding reception in 2006, and it went over rather well, although I didn't really stick the landing. At the 2012 wedding I
officiated, and while I did not do nearly as well as I'd have hoped, no one else had that attitude, and I got many compliments. All I can think now, after that reaction, is that if she never knows what might come out of my mouth
now, she should have met me twenty years ago.
Gabriel did ask me last week, when he had called to tell me the news about Andy, whether I planned to make a speech. That day, I said, "I don't know. I've been going back and forth about it." Which was true. But then, when I thought I
might have to step in with Best Man duties during the ceremony, I figured I'd best write one. We learned at the rehearsal on Thursday that there would be no Best Man, just a blank space left in honor of Andy. But, after having shifting my thinking about it already, I went ahead and wrote a speech. And having written it, I sure as shit wasn't going to waste the effort!
I'm going to share the speech with you now, for posterity—annotated:
* * * * *
Before I even had a chance to speak, someone complimented my suit. I can't remember for sure, but I think it was Lea. So, I vamped a little, kind of modeling the suit for the crowd. Someone yelled, "Spin, spin!"—Mandy later told me that was her—and so I even did a spin, and got a nice round of applause. For the record, no one else got
that kind of attention for their suit! Anyway, this was an unexpected delay to the start of my speech, about which I was fairly nervous, on top of the fact that I am not really used to speaking into a live microphone.
Finally, I started:
Hi everyone, I'm nervous. I'm also Matthew. [This part was improvised, not part of the written speech, but honestly it helped disarm even myself to acknowledge that I was nervous. And it got a laugh.]
Well, in the past I learned the hard way that not having it all pre-prepared in writing isn’t such a great idea, so here we are. It made Emily very happy to hear we all wrote out our speeches, so, gold stars for all of us! [The second sentence here was added at the last minute—so last minute, in fact, that I only had it half-written before I had to get up to the mic.]
I have known Gabriel for 29 years, and I think it’s safe to say we have a unique relationship and a unique history. [Gabriel laughed pretty hard at this, which I honestly did not expect, so I added,]
Pause for laughter, apparently. (Both Andy and Brian have known him a bit longer, and I don’t know, maybe one of these days I’ll beat them.)
Anyway. I’ve known Lea for five years. Because of our unique relationship, Gabriel used to say he would introduce me to his girlfriends as a litmus test: if they couldn’t handle me, then it wasn’t going to work. I never truly believed that, but whatever. When it came to Lea, I guess I got old and soft—there was no litmus test with her. [This part also got more laughter than I thought there would be, prompting me to pause, and kind of chuckle nervousely, a couple of times. So when I got back to the written speech, I accidentally skipped the next part, which I really wanted to include because it was the most specific I was going to get about Lea:
Conversely, Lea is just so intelligent, kind, incisive, and cool—I get the sense she can get along with anyone. I mean, she’s marrying Gabriel. And as far as I can tell, she gets along famously with his friends.]
Gabriel and Lea are a match made in a chemistry lab. [They both seemed to appreciae this twist on a popular phrase, the cleverness with which I was kind of pleased with, given Gabriel's history with science and science teaching.]
They are equals in every sense of the word, from the heart to the mind, a key combination that Gabriel needs in a lasting partner. In other words, you deserve each other.
[I said "you deserve each other" the way people often say that to people they hate. I don't know if they thought I didn't mean to say it that way, but I did. I thought it would be funny. Lea laughed and said, "That sounds so threatening!"]
I have a loyalty and love for Gabriel which, outside of his family, is unsurpassed. [Again, something I did not expect: Gabriel actually chimed in at this statement: "That's correct." Mandy later told me that this was when she started to cry at my speech. I really didn't think mine would make anyone cry.]
Honestly, as far as I’m concerned, he is family. And now, Lea is too. I couldn’t be happier for them.
Okay I’m done everybody drink. [I also added this last line at the last minute, but it did make it into the written speech before I stood up.]
Josh, Mandy, and I had all read our speeches from our phones. Janine, Gabriel's mom, went up with paper, and even said, "I have cards!" And she gave a very heartfelt, touching speech. Whether it made her anxious to do or not, I think it made an indispensable addition to the reception (I suppose the same could be said of mine.)
It was officially "open mic" after Janine, and the next one was a real surprise, and a delightful one: Tess, Gabriel's daughter, who said she only just decided to say something. And this was after there had been some kind of difficulty earlier in the day, something she was upset about that's neither any of yours or any of my business. At this moment, she was in a different, much more positive, generous and giving space. And she looked stunning, by the way. I'd have embedded a photo of her here, but she's a teenager who can be sensitive about how images of her are shared so I'll respect that here. (Janine may not be as thrilled about my embedding a photo of her above instead, but Janine's a grownup and she can handle it. Also you looked great Janine!)
Anyway, when Tess walked up, she slipped, and very nearly fell over. Everyone in the audience gasped, and in a split second Tess had righted herself and presented her proudly with impressive grace. It rightly got a huge applause. I wish I'd been videotaping it, not because she slipped but because she so impressively caught herself. And then, the speech: I had been fine the whole day up to this point. Okay, wait, I'll have to admit this: I shed a slight tear or two during the actual ceremony, which you could say
got lost in the rain. But that was nothing compared to Tess's speech, which slayed me, with how she told Lea what a great addition to their family she was, and more. I'm tearing up right now just writing about it. Literally. When Tess finished, I turned around and faced Mandy, who was across from me and one over, and she laughed as she saw me wiping tears from my cheeks with my cloth napkin.
Tess was the first speech when both Gabriel and Lea gave the speech giver a big hug.
There was a moment, much later in the reception, when Gabriel came up to me, one of only a few genuine moments of connection between just the two of us the entire day (and that is not a complaint, just a reflection of reality when you are the guests of honor spreading your time and love across a huge number of people—I remember it vividly from my own wedding, and Gabriel and Lea's guest list, no exaggeration, more than five times that of my wedding), and gave me a hug and thanked me for the speech. He even apologized for not giving me a hug after giving it. Nope, nope, no need for that! Tess being the first person to get that was absolutely appropriate. Besides, had they gotten up and hugged me after my speech, I would have started bawling, and nobody needs that.
After Tess, a lovely young woman who said Lea had been her manager at work came up. I think a lot of people who work, or have worked, with Lea—clearly a great reflection of Lea's lasting professional-turned-personal relationships. (During Gabriel's vows, he thought it would be fun to do "crowd work," and he asked for people not in the wedding party to volunteer for him to come to them with the mic so they could say what they love about Lea. The first guy to raise his hand, whose relationship with Lea I never quite ascertained but he was gorgeous, said: "Lea is the nicest person on the planet.") Gabriel's nephew, Garret's eldest son Leighton, surprised by getting up to speak; I was told later that this was wildly out of character for him—and he killed it.
Okay, so now we can mention Gabriel's dad, Ted. Given the recent bullshit with his and Garret's little brother, Marcus, Gabriel has actually told me I can write anything I want about him–and it's not enough of my story to get into detail here anyway—but, he never made any such clarification about his dad. So if he wants me to edit this later, he can just tell me and I will: I've heard a lot of very bad things about this guy, who I've only met a few times. Probably just at each of the three weddings, although this time around I never spoke to him. In the times he did, he seemed nice, I guess—but that means about as much as someone saying "Harvey Weinstein was always perfectly nice to me!"
Janine told me that Ted had called Gabriel to ask what he should do at the wedding, because he's father of the groom, and Gabriel just kept saying, "Absolutely nothing." I guess other people have told Ted he should have some more official role
because he is father of the groom, apparently not understanding that history plays a role here. Which is to say, when Ted was seen walking up to the microphone, probably half the people there—including me—had a very "Oh, shit" gut-reaction with far more cringe-inducing tension than anyone could possibly have had when I had stood up to speak. I am certain Gabriel and Lea both particularly had no idea what to expect in this moment.
He even stumbled on his way to the microphone—and I mean
stumble, not like the accidental slip that had happened with Tess—and I briefly honestly wondered if he was drunk. But, after a moment, when he got to the mic, I kind of thought,
Oh. He's just old.
And, however much credit this man actually deserves (and I am in no position to say, except that I know many people who would insist that credit for him is in limited supply), his speech was brief, fairly organized, had some genuinely effective humor, and surprisingly well done. He started by mentioning how he once "caught Gabriel in bed"—here was a split-second
oh shit moment—with a flashlight under the covers, reading the encyclopedia: "Who does that!" ,,,Oh. That's actually kind of sweet, and very on-brand for Gabriel. And he ended the speech with a direct acknowledgement of the "May the Fourth" Star Wars theme: "I'll end by saying something no one else here can say.
I am your father." This got a good laugh, even from Gabriel, and then the speech with Ted was done.
It only just occurred to me to wonder how apt that reference was. It's Darth Vader who utters that famous line, after all.
There is so much more I could say about the day yesterday, but I am starting to run out of time—I still have one more Birth Week event to get to today, after all!
I can say this: Gabriel and Lea's wedding was the most fun wedding I have ever been to, besides my own. (Hence the "second-best" reference
on my socials.) The only part I really
didn't like was not being able to take any photos of the ceremony itself, especially since I was part of it! David, Mandy's husband, took a lot of photos and some video, and he suggested he might put them in a One Drive folder or something on a shareble site online for people to pool and retrieve shots.
Even outside the ceremony, I took over 200 shots yesterday. I kept 192 of them. I have never done this with any other wedding besides my own, but I actually
separated them into multiple different photo albums, just to make those numbers more organized and manageable—the "ceremony" album currently has only five shots in it, but I hope to add to that once others share their shots and I can download copies. For the time being, there's four shots of when we were all gathering before walking up the aisle. And then the fifth shot was the one shot I managed while standing up with the other groomspeople: the bride and groom left under a canopy of connected lightsabers held by guests on either side of the aisle. I was really glad I did not leave my phone back in the room where we had all prepared, because this way I could get at least that photo from up there in the wedding party standing spot, when their backs were turned.
So anyway, the
Gabriel and Lea's Weddning collection features seven albums, five of them covering yesterday but also including the weend groomsmen's trip to Lopez Island a month ago, and the rehearsal on Thursday this past week:
Lopez Island (191 shots, which can also be found in
three albums separated by day in a separate collection)
Gabriel and Lea's Wedding Rehearsal (49 shots)
Gabriel and Lea's Wedding: Prep (64 shots)
Gabriel and Lea's Wedding: Ceremony (5 shots, hopefully more to get added later)
Gabriel and Lea's Wedding: Cake (19 shots—the cake was made by Stephanie, who had also made the cake for the 2012 wedding, and for both Mandy and David's
and Shobhit's and my weddings, which both occurred in 2013; Stephanie did not attend in 2012 or this one but this has always felt to me like a great, alternate way for her to contribute)
Gabriel and Lea's Wedding: Dinner (33 shots; these include photos and videos of speeches)
Gabriel and Lea's Wedding: Reception (90 shots, including several fantastic ones of mock lightsaber battles with illuminated blades and the beautiful Cascade mountains as the backdrop of the venue, North Fork Farms)
I took a pretty good number of video clips, in a couple of cases meandering around the space where people were dancing or were playing with lightsabers, etc. I'm hoping video clips I got are uniquely representative of the wedding in a way others did not get. They had to professional photographers but they only did still photography—the woman asked for a portrait of me, being one of the many people who complimented my suit. Plenty of guests did take video at critical moments, like during the ceremony or during the cutting of the cake, of course.
What else can I say? Marcus did come with his family, but stayed only long enough to see the ceremony (I think?) and then pose for some pictures before leaving, supposedly for a soccer match. (I was dying for someone to ask me where Shobhit was while within earshot of Gabriel, so I could say, "Oh, he had a soccer match"—alas, I got no such opportunity.) I actually took several photos of them gathering for their professional photos, and you could really feel both the tension and the clear desire for Marcus's wife for everyone to be getting along better. She and Lea embraced in what looked like a pretty meaningful hug, and I also got a sweet photo of Gabriel hugging one of his little nephews. But, as expected, once the photos were done, that family disappeared, nowhere to be found.
Oh, and Gabriel's maternal grandmother, who is in her nineties and now lives with Janine, was there. She would have to have been by far the oldest person there. Granted, I have no idea how old Lea's two sets of parents are. (None of them spoke during the speeches either. Whether there is anything to make of that, I wouldn't know.) Mandy thought she was the most adorable thing ever. I found myself thinking about how exhausting an event like this for someone that old and frail must be. She looked great though.
I mean, everybody looked great. Especially that gorgeous guy in the audience. And Gabriel and Lea too! Lea was arguably the most beautiful person there, which is saying something because i was there! (You know I had to get that in there.)
[psted 11:30 am]
