When I saw the prompt this week instantly I thought of Betty. Several years ago I worked with her and we were friends. She had six children, two boys and four girls. By the time we met, her children were older, three already out of her house and on their own, two still in college and one a senior in high school.
We had almost every day contact for over ten years. During those years, I heard updates on all six children often. I remember the day she told me that her baby girl was getting married. I thought she might be emotional since Ginger was the last one at home so I just let her talk. I wanted to be a shoulder if she needed one.
Betty started talking about Ginger’s plans for the wedding. She talked about the church, number of attendants, flowers, and colors for the wedding, food for the reception. As she talked I thought, “I wonder what all of this is going to cost?”
Betty was excited about the upcoming wedding or so I thought. And then she told me of an offer they had made to Ginger. Betty and Gene offered Ginger the money for all new kitchen appliances including washer and dryer, new furniture for her entire house plus $20,000 for a down payment on a house they wanted to buy if she would just elope. Ginger declined their offer.
The wedding was gorgeous and just, as Ginger wanted. Betty and Gene paid for everything. The pictures were beautiful, something a couple would cherish always.
I want you to know Gene and Betty were not against the marriage just the wedding. For you see with experience comes knowledge and by this time they had been part of five other weddings and they knew what could happen.
And much to their sorrow it did happen. In less than 3 years Ginger and her husband were divorced. Here in North Carolina, it takes a full year of separation to get a divorce so their real marriage lasted less than 2 years. So what Ginger really got for all the money Betty and Gene paid was beautiful wedding pictures with a man who cheated on her.
So if they had eloped, she wouldn’t have all those beautiful pictures in the white leather wedding book to remind her of the loser she married. But she might have had the house she wanted so much. (They never purchased that house; they didn’t have a down payment.)
8 comments:
If I had the opportunity to do it over again, I'd vote for eloping. Too many headaches and too many people telling you what you should do or shouldn't d, and why...without being solicited. who needs it?!?
In India, eloping is not the done thing. I wouldn't advise on it. However, why marry at all?
Weddings and Beheadings
I feel sad when I hear 'divorce' word especailly if it happens just after few months of marriage. God only knows how to get away from thsi problem.
Unfortunately, this has happened to too many couples. I really enjoyed my little courthouse wedding. BJ
I think big weddings are stupid! What a shame Ginger didn't take the offer!
A well-written piece!
It is a fact that 50% of weddings end in divorce and 50% end in death. It seems silly to waste a buttload of money on a big wedding. I would have taken the money and run and run and run.
I am not sure I have an opinion one way or another about the wedding--I myself was part of a big one (I would have gone smaller, but that wasn't in the cards), but, even if our marriage fails, it was a glorious day--but this was an excellently written story, I really enjoyed it.
How sad that the marriage they'd so looked forward to lasted such a short time.
I remember when I got married my father offered to buy me a gold-plated ladder so that I could elope in style. I laughed that that wasn't particularly generous since my room was on the ground floor! (Obviously we were both kidding.)
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