One Wedding and a Funeral

Life cycle events are always fascinating. I’ll start with the happy event.

One of my occasional camera operators got married last Saturday. I was asked to attend the rehearsal, although I’m not really sure why. After all these years, it wasn’t likely that the ceremony would have even one element that I hadn’t seen before.

The church was where Oak Lane and Mt. Airy overlapped, which was something of a treat for me. My mother’s parents lived in Oak Lane for most of their lives, and my father’s parents lived in Mt. Airy for many years. My family lived in Oak Lane when I was very young, and I have many memories of that area. Driving past our former homes was an interesting trip down memory lane, especially since I hadn’t been past our home on North 17th Street in a very long time.

Rehearsal was interesting, what with the cherry-picker inside the sanctuary. The roof had a leak directly above where the bride and groom would be standing, and the cherry-picker was there for the repairs. Ok, so that was something I hadn’t seen before.

I didn’t know exactly what was happening, as all of the participants started gathering in a circle. About the same moment that I realized that everyone was going to pray together, I was “invited” to participate. “You too, sweepea” was the command of the woman in charge. And who was I to argue? We all joined hands and prayed.

It must have worked, because the rain did not materialize on their wedding day, and the roof didn’t leak on them. Kimberly and Shawn had a great and happy day together. Their honeymoon was in Cancun, and they had stocked up on flu-fighting goods.

On Friday, the day between the rehearsal and the wedding, I got an email with a very disturbing subject line. A fraternity brother had passed away suddenly, and the email was the funeral information.

“Passed away suddenly” is, of course, a euphemism. There was a widow with two young sons, one thisclose to his Bar Mitzvah. The rabbi called it a tragedy, and, at least for the survivors, that’s pretty accurate. I certainly know about the kind of madness that leads to such an end, but that doesn’t make it any better.

On Monday, I took the ride to the funeral with three other Brothers, each of whom I’ve know for more than 30 years. We met up with many others at the funeral, some of whom I’ve also known for more than 30 years. I looked around at these guys, my good friends, and realized that we have grown old together.

So there’s no big philosophical conclusion here. This was a glimpse into my world from the last weekend. That will lead into this weekend, where I’m covering a second-generation event. I covered the parent’s wedding, and now it’s their daughter’s Bat Mitzvah.