It seems to start earlier every year. Two young people in love find that it is time to take that love to the next level by getting married. This used to be reserved for the summer months with most of the weddings taking place in June. But with the limited space, and resources for this event, ceremonies have creeped on either side of the summer months. It is also no longer regulated to Saturdays, and Sundays. People can be found getting married on Fridays now to the background of a snowy scene. It is the whole reason that I traveled half-way around the world at the start of Spring Break, so I could go and see my niece get married.
In my younger days, I ran a mobile dj company, and spent a lot of my weekends, during the summer months, driving around to various spots in Colorado to play music at various weddings. It got to the point where I knew all of the dance hits by heart, and I had seen everything that could possibly happen at a wedding. It became a cliche to me, and like a lot of people who turn what they love into their profession, I began to get a little jaded about the industry. It amazed me at the amount of money people spent for these ceremonies, and I wondered if they were going overboard a little bit. At the same time, I was witnessing it from the perspective of someone who worked the events and not got to sit back and enjoy them.
It has only been recently that I have gotten to change my perspective on weddings. In the industry, there was talk that on average a person would attend one wedding a year. As a dj, we talked about how we would get sick of certain songs because we knew we were going to have to play them, sometimes, two or three times every weekend. Just because I was sick of hearing “The Electric Boogie” did not mean that the people at the wedding had heard it recently. In fact, it might be the only time they hear it all year long. It was my job to smile and pretend that I was enjoying the choreographed dance that was happening on the dance floor.
Now being one of those people that get to see a wedding once a year, these moments take on a different tone. The bride looked stunning as she made her way down the aisle. I didn’t need to run around the building making sure that everything was in place, and things were happening in a timely manner. Now, I could enjoy my meal, and laugh with the people, enjoy a dance to a song I had not heard in a long while, and make the memories that weddings are supposed to be. It has been a little bit of a challenge to hop halfway across the world to go to this event, but I am glad that I did. It has been great seeing my family again, and participating in this joyous moment.
I don’t even mind that it happened earlier than usual. The snow that caused so many headaches for people to make it to the event, turned into a beautiful backdrop for the wedding. It helped to create memories that people will talk about for years to come, and something the happy couple can tell their kids when they ask about the day they got married. I don’t know when I will get to experience an event like this again, but they are something that I will look forward to just I had like this time.
So congratulations to the happy couple, and thank you for allowing me to see an event from a different perspective. It was truly a great wedding.
John Collings 