Wedding Meme

Suzanne at Sincerely my Thoughts left out a Tag

(you know me I can't resist a tag for a meme when there is anything remotely more boring I might otherwise be doing) Actually mrangelmeg is away on a business trip and I miss him terribly, so perhaps a bit of nostalgia will make me miss him less.

1) Where and how did you meet?

The version we tell everyone is that we met at a Fraternity (his) party. Neither of us being big for mingling we had both migrated to the safety of the kitchen and began a conversation about the merits (or unmerits) of the local Catholic Church that was supposed to be doing Campus Ministry. This was the parish I liked to call Our Lady of the Nuclear Winter because the priest had a penchant for twisting every gospel message into one that decried nuclear disarmament and the joys of liberation theology. I had left there about a year before for a wonderful parish not far away and was telling him that he should come to my church for Mass.

We actually met about a year earlier because my sister was dating his best friend's room mate. I stopped by their apartment one night to retrieve something from my sister. While I was there he happened to be working on a school project with said best friend. Before I left I stopped at the door of the friend's room and told the most foul off color joke I had recently heard and then left. Who on earth was that, he asked his friend. I don't know his friend replied, the psycho sister of Bill's girlfriend I think. That was our first meeting.

We figured out that we had met that time much later. In comparison you can imagine why we tell the first story.

2) How long have you known each other?

In the fall it will be 25 years. from the second story. I suppose it must be close to 25 years since the first chance meeting.

3). How long after meeting did you first date?

He came to Mass with me that next Sunday, October 11, and we ended up spending most of the day together on and off, but our first official date to a restaurant was October 16. BTW: Maximilian Kolbe was canonized October ll, 1982 so we have always counted him as the patron saint of our relationship. St Max has been a dear friend to both of us over the years.

4) How long was your engagement?

We got engaged in November, a month after we started dating. He asked me to marry him sitting at a stop light in his old red truck. Those quiet engineer types work fast. I got my engagement ring on St Nicholas Day December 6, in my shoe. We were engaged for the required 6 months that the church stipulates.

5)How long have you been married?

23 years. Our stock answer is some of them happy. Lately I would change that to most of them happy. We knew nothing when we got married about how to be married but I think we have done a great job of finding our way.

6) What is your anniversary?

We were Married on May 21, 1983. The day after my mom's birthday. Interestingly we were originally going to be married in August, and my sister and her fiance were going to be married in May and somehow we all agreed to switch dates. I'm really glad I don't think I would have wanted to wait till August. (Oh sorry that probably constitutes TMI from a good Catholic girl)

7) How many people came to your wedding?

Honestly I don't have a clue. I think we invited somewhere around 75 or so. I know that one of my sisters and none of my three brothers were there. All of mrangelmeg's family was there. It was small but fun.

8) What kind of cake?

White cake with rose and ivory frosting and flowers (or cream and crimson if you ask mrangelmeg who is a HUGE IU Fan and bleed cream and crimson)

9) Where was your wedding?

St Benedict Catholic Church in Terre Haute IN

10) What did you serve?

My mom and sisters did the entire reception meal of sandwiches and salads. My two oldest sisters served the food and did a wonderful job and made everything very special.

11) How many were in the bridal party?

Six a groomsman, a bridesmaid, a best man and maid of honor and then male and female Cathlolic witnesses for our marriage license, because our best man and maid of honor weren't Catholic. I don't know why but at the time it was a big deal for us to have Catholic witnesses.

12) Are you still friends with them?

We are related by marriage to some of them. some we haven't seen in years. I would like to think that even though we haven't seen them in a while we are still friends with them.

13) Did your spouse cry during the ceremony?

No, I cried before, but that will be explained in later question.

14) Most special moment of the wedding day?

When the rear door of the church opened up and I looked into the Knave of the Church and saw mrangelmeg's smiling face waiting patiently for me halfway down the aisle. Nothing could ever take that image away from me.

15/16) Any Funny Moments/big disasters?

surreal might be more appropriate: Five minutes before the wedding was supposed to start I was in the brides dressing room and still hadn't put my dress on yet. We were trying to get a crease out of my veil and had plugged in an iron into a wall socket when all the lights (all the electricity) in the entire church went out. The fuse box was in the Bride's room, so the maintenance guy had to come in there and I had to stand in the bathroom stall in my slip while they rummaged around with the fuses to figure out how to get the electricity back on so that the organ could play and the lights and sound system could come back on.

While I was standing there in my slip peaking over the top of the stall door, my sister came over from the church hall to tell me that the woman who was delivering the cake had accidentally tripped going up the steps and had crushed an entire layer of the cake, she couldn't use it to set up the cake to display, but it was still edible. Why my sister thought I needed to have that information under the present circumstances I will never understand, but that was when I broke down in tears and decided that maybe we should just take a pass and try again some other day.

UNTIL

the fuse got fixed, my veil got ironed, my dress got put on and they opened the back door and I saw mrangelmeg waiting for me in the church.

It was then I realized what was most important that day had nothing at all to do with all the external trappings. The church could fall down around us, so long as he was there and I was there and we said I DO in front of God and the Priest who was witness for the Church it was the most beautiful day of my life.

BTW: The cake looked one tier short but just as beautiful, and the woman who baked it tore up our check so it was free. To this day I have always said that my dad (he died when I was 13) tripped her on her way up the stairs so that he could pay for the cake.

17) Where did you go on your honeymoon?

It was a well guarded secret from his fraternity brothers, exactly which hotel we were staying in that night. I suppose all these years later I can safely tell you all that we were in the Sheraton. We were told later that one particular very drunk brother tried every trick in the book to find out where we were staying but to no avail thank heavens.

Our actual honeymoon was in 1993, mrangelmeg and I went to Gatlinburgh for the weekend without the kids. It was the very first time we had gone anywhere just for pleasure (the other times I had gone with him on a business trip.)

18) If you were to do your wedding over again what would you change?

Two things,:

We had a "Friend of my sister's do the pictures and I would hire a professional photographer. Every time I look at our wedding album I regret that we don't have professional pictures, we just have snapshots from an amateur and some of them are out of focus and some are just missing because they were so bad we couldn't use them.

I am not a cake person. I think I would have gone with my gut instinct and had a cheesecake instead of traditional wedding cake. You see that all the time now, but back then everyone had traditional wedding cake. I would have been much happier with a rich chocolate cheesecake or ganache than I was with a white sheet cake (although our cake top for our anniversary was chocolate, only we knew that)

19) What side of the bed do you sleep on?

Lying in bed mrangelmeg sleeps on the left and I sleep on the right. We even do this in hotel rooms. I think after this long it would be very hard to change to the other way around. I can't speak for him but when I am alone I sleep on the right side of any double bed.

20) What size bed?

Queen

21) Greatest strength as a couple?

Always remembering what makes the other person happy. Also I think knowing without a doubt that we are stronger together.

22) Greatest challenge as a couple?

I would have said making time to be together, but this year with out weekly dancing date on Fridays we are doing a good job of that.

23) Who pays the bills?

mrangelmeg does all the financial stuff because I am dyslexic and get numbers and dates confused which isn't great for checkbooks or deadlines. Ever since he took over our finances we are in really great financial shape and he doesn't mind doing it. He just tells me when to stop spending money and most of the time I listen.

24) What is your song?

We were just joking the other night thatJohn Anderson's "Just a Swingin'" was our song. I like to think it is something a little more romantic than that though.

I nominate I Found Somebody by Glenn Frey besides great lyrics we can dance the nightclub two step we just learned last Saturday to it.

25) Describe your wedding dress

As you can see in the picture (that is a rare picture of me by the way) my wedding dress was a very simple Gunne Sack off white old fashioned Prom Dress actually. It was extremely inexpensive and I still have it in the back of my closet.

26) What kind of flowers did you have?

Going along with the rose and ivory (cream and crimson) theme of the wedding I carried a bouquet of silk roses and babies breathe that I also still have in a box in my closet. I threw a smaller "tossing bouquet" that I made so that I could keep my carrying bouquet. If that isn't the way things are done it should be. The girl who caught my bouquet wasn't upset at all that the one she caught was slightly smaller and I got to keep mine forever.

As to passing this along, if Ashley is reading this and wants something to keep her mind occupied as she stays supine and "resting" I would like to tag her.

Pax