A View of It Was 20 Years Ago Today

There were numerous signs on my wedding day 20 years ago today that my marriage was destined to fail.




The minister who was supposed to officiate went out of town.  His father was a last minute - and surprise - replacement.

The church moved the piano out of the sanctuary, and locked it up out in the vestibule.  This was to make room for the bridesmaids and groomsmen - even though there weren't going to be any. The pianist, fortunately, knew how to play the organ that was open in the sanctuary, but there was no microphone for the flautist who accompanied him, and could barely be heard.

It was a hot day outside, close to 90 degrees, but the church's caretaker didn't turn on the air conditioner until about an hour before the ceremony, leaving the entire building tepid and stuffy.

The flowers requested for the altar showed up the Sunday after the wedding.

My grandmother, who was meeting my husband-to-be for the first time at the wedding, took an instant dislike to him - she just didn't like the way he looked.

My future father-in-law left the church about 20 minutes before the ceremony to find black and white film.  An architect and photographer who offered to take the wedding photos as his wedding gift, he decided that black and white would "capture the romance" better than the color film he had.  He barely made it back to the church on time.

We never got any wedding photos.  He later admitted he couldn't develop them properly and ruined the negatives trying.

The witnesses and minister signed the marriage license in the wrong places.

Still, we went through with the wedding.  After the minister pronounced us man and wife, introduced us to the church as Mr. and Mrs., and said, "You may now kiss the bride," I gave him a tight, warm hug and said, "Honey, we made it."

He simply smiled and sighed.

It was a harbinger of what married life held in store for us.

To the strains of "It Had to Be You," (the title of which, depending on where you place the emphasis, can evoke enduring love or bitter sarcasm) we walked down the aisle and into four years of sometimes happy, sometimes mundane, sometimes intensely sad married life.  High school sweethearts, we'd dated, broken up, reunited, moved in together, survived his month long hospitalization due to a severe epileptic seizure and a bout with meningitis, moved homes (packing and moving was our honeymoon), and eventually moved away from each other in every sense of the word.

Slowly the happy moments faded, and problems came to the surface.  There was lying, words spoken in anger, confidences betrayed, and a loss of trust on both sides.  We both argued, did silly passive aggressive things to make ourselves feel better and the other worse, pulled away from instead of toward each other, nursed our hurt and feeling of loss separately.  It was easier to do these things to each other than to admit we never should have married each other.  Ultimately, the marriage ended, and when we decided to split, it led to a period where we were the closest we'd been in years - but even then it was more of a tenuous platonic friendship than two people who once loved each other trying to come back together.  It was also a temporary friendship - we stopped keeping in touch.

Today, I think back on that chaotic wedding day.  I remember thinking as I walked down the aisle that my life was just beginning, that I was walking to a new start.  The song we chose for me to walk down the aisle was Stevie Wonder's "If It's Magic."

And it was magic.  I just didn't realize 20 years ago that the new life coming my way would come to me with twists, turns, tricks, magic, I never expected.  That marriage ultimately made me stronger, showed me I could overcome a seemingly unforgivable hurt, made me realize I was capable of delivering an unforgivable hurt, put me on a path of rebuilding myself and self-esteem that I desperately needed, gave me a deeper sense of humor, and showed me that no matter what life throws your way, you'll be much better in the long run if you pick up what's thrown to you, keep what you need and throw the rest back.

What's more magical than that?  In the end, it had to be him to show me how to be a better person, even if that meant he was not the person I was meant to be with for the rest of my life.  I have to be thankful for that, in spite of the bittersweet way I discovered it.

More later, because like the sun that always shines, learning to love oneself is truly magic.