Daily Archives: June 13, 2006

TANYA HANSON The Chapel in Retrospect

I love weddings. I’ve bought Brides magazines for years whether I knew a bride or not. Fortunately my husband and I got to host our son’s wedding two years ago, during which time I was NOT MOG-zilla. (Mother of the groom.) I admit to using a personal Nordie’s shopper for my own dress but managed to keep else everything Under Control AND to keep my nose out of the bride and groom’s decisions. But after choosing a harpist, they turned the music selection over to me.

Oh yeah. That started a major hobble down Memory Lane. I picked the lovely hymn “Let us Ever Walk with Jesus” sung at my wedding in California, and my mother’s in Oregon, and my grandmother’s in Kansas, and now my son’s…Bach’s Air on the G String (yes, that’s right. Don’t laugh) that was my processional in 1974. Morning Has Broken, the Cat Stevens hit from that same era that my mother allowed in church only because I found it in an Old English Hymnal and proved that Cat hasn’t written it. (My original choice, John Denver’s Sunshine on my Shoulder was staunchly pooh-poohed by my staunch mother, but if you listen to the lyrics, they’re wedding-worthy.)

Well, my own wedding has naturally turned to haze. And in similar fashion, that year of planning and being SuperMog has evaporated into just a few beautiful Malibu hours, too. Fortunately we still have a daughter. And a niece who’s set a date her bridegroom will never forget: 07-07-07.

But can I take you to the chapel in retrospect? I mean, after-the-fact? Like twenty-five years later? Not only did my husband Tim (a hardbodied fireman with not one romantic chromosome) surprise me with a trip to Maui on our tenth anniversary (during which outing the helicopter pilot played a tape of the infamous Air on the G String while over the Io Valley), my non-romantic spouse gave me the the best romance novel scene ever in 1999 when he took me to Kauai for our twenty-fifth. This time wasn’t a surprise, the trip at least. On the actual day of our anniversary, we wandered the grounds of the resort and came upon the outdoor bar where an entertainer was warbling the Hawaiian Wedding Song.

I turned to Tim and said something profound, like “Wow, that’s apt.”

His reply: “Then I guess it’s time for this.” Reaching into his pocket, he pulled out an eternity ring of diamonds and my birthstone, sapphire.

He hadn’t planned the outdoor singer at all. Or the helicopter Air on the G, you know. I guess it’s just, you know, love and luck. Which is my reward for having fainted the first time I was ever a bridesmaid. At the altar and all. Well, it was Arkansas, in July, with both temperature and humidity at about 150….

Tanya Hanson
THE OUTLAW’S WOMAN
url: http://www.tanyahanson.net/