4:33 p.m. - 2004-10-19
The Folks.
Alex's sister decided to add a wedding to her marriage, so I was invited across the water to see it happen and finally meet his parents.

I spend every holiday with my father, so I was relieved to finally meet Alex's folks without having it become a capital "M"-meeting, complete with microscope and me underneath. Everyone would be too distracted by Thea's blinding white gown--and getting their proper share of the hors d'oeuvres--to pay overt attention to me.

I was also pleased, however, because if Alex went any longer without ponying up the feminine goods, Ma & Pa Alex were quite naturally going to start wondering if I were A) real B) a heroin addict.

The relatively mild pressure of the event did not preclude me from spending 6 hours of compulsive shopping the day before the wedding, as every handbag and pair of shoes I owned seemed suddenly cheap, too casual, too g0th, too old-fashioned, or non-ironically chintzy. It was terrible. A bad handbag would speak volumes. In fact, in my patented Surreal Nightmare World, any of my cheaper handbags would undo its clasp and start flapping its hinged gums as soon as I hit the dance floor.

"Wow! Look at this spread. Lovely wedding! Say...it's nice to be out somewhere that doesn't reek of gin and cigarettes. Could you scratch my back for a second? I've got a condom in my zippered compartment and it itches like a mother!"

Anyway.

...Eventually I found a pair of slighty sexy classic black pumps and a small matching bag to pair with a cherry sweater and my grey flared pencil skirt.

Alex, not to be outdone, bought a lovely yellow dress shirt--and had his long Travis Fimmel-ly angel hair cut off.

It was his idea, but I squirmed happily throughout the outpatient procedure in the neighborhood's only trendy barbershop. At one point, a young businessman opposite me became so curious at my good cheer that he at last demanded "What's the occasion?"

"Time for a change," Alex said from the chair, as the stylist gave him what she called "rock star pieces" near the front.

...The back of his neck hadn't seen the light of day for a year and a half, and is still curiously alluring.

We set out for the wedding at an unforgiveable 8am Saturday morning, taking the ferry. The day was grey and the barge was fairly empty, in its large, bare, brightly-lit cleanliness like a movie set on Dream Sequence day.

10 minutes offshore, Alex confessed to having forgotten the address of the wedding at home. "It's near the ferry dock, though," he said, and settled back to doze for the hour-long ride.

I read from Bruce Sterling's Holy Fire and engage in residual worry.

I needn't have, though. The wedding was in a modern, newly-built reception hall quite close to the docks, easily recognizeable due to a coterie of tuxedo-d groomsmen roaming around a water fountain outside, smoking and savoring varying levels of freedom.

We went inside, and found Alex's mother first. She was a very motherly sort indeed, in a plum mother-of-the-bride ensemble and low heels in which she stood just over 5 feet. She has a round, flushed face with kind brown eyes, and blonde wavy hair fading to pure white. Alex resembles her only in the wave of his hair, but in this I found a source of glee nonetheless. She was distracted by her responsibilities, but smiled and shook my hand, embraced her strapping son, and went off on her next mission.

We found Alex's sister Thea next. She banged open a dressing room door and leaned out in her veil and a full, floor-length, beaded version of Marilyn's white gown in The Seven Year Itch. She was hesitantly blonde with big brown eyes and a lively expression.

"Hello, Alex," she trilled. Then--"Oo, hi Vexinia!"--recognizing me from the photo Alex carries in his wallet.

"Hello!" I answered, unnerved. Usually I am the most wild-eyed one in the room.

....I couldn't think of anything else to say, then, which is stupid because when a woman sees a bride, a Compliment to the Dress is in order. My manners failed me, however, as I was distracted by a desire to style her hair differently.

Alex's Aunt Leyla then appeared with Thea's toddling daughter Lacey. Leyla looked very much like her sister--Alex's mother--and Lacey had the brown eyes and blonde hair of both. She was--also--the Prettiest Baby in the World (tm).

I am not normally captivated by small children until they talk (thusly revealing the delightful existential madness of the 24-month-old mind) but Lacey was truly a stunning child--the kind who gazes out at one from the black-&-white domestic fantasies of Clinique or Calvin Klein fragrances, or the weirdly overdressed "GAP Baby" ads.

Thankfully, she was overdressed in the traditional way; a taffeta puffball of pink with white socks and shiny shoes. Old school baby-at-a-wedding couture.

I fretted a little inwardly over the her great beauty. I have never wanted children, and probably never will, but I became freshly concerned that I'll go nuts one day and have a baby just to see if it turns out as lovely. Quel horreur.

Lacey was having issues of her own. She didn't recognize her mother all dressed up, and burst into tears.

Finally Alex's father--Alexander Sr--appeared. He was shorter than Alex; burly, mustachioed, with salt and pepper hair and a glint in his eye.

"Why hello! You must be Vex."

"Hello, sir."

"We've heard a lot of good about you."

"Thank you. It's nice to finally meet you."

A number of orienting pleasantries and recent anecdotes were exchanged, including a convoluted story about his work-week and general office dynamics--at which point Alex Sr. briefly digressed to inform me that his nickname at work is "The Dirty Old Man".

"Ah," I said, smiling frantically.

Junior looked acutely embarrassed. But we managed to get onto other topics quickly enough--Alex Senior's years in the service, his adventures in photography and love of cooking. I decided I liked him quite a lot, alarming conversational tendencies and all, which--along with accompanying gestures--Alex has inherited.

"My God, " I said suddenly to Alex Sr. "Lex waves his hands around just like you when he's exaggerating during a story."

This was News to Alex, who looked as though he'd been smacked in the face with a trout, but Alex Sr. beamed proudly.

"That's my boy! And Lex, did she call you?" he said, tickled.

"I like it," Alex said defensively. "It keeps me from being mistaken with anyone else."

He had a point. Thea's husband is named Alexei.

Ha!

We were called inside for wedding photos then. All permutations were exhausted--the bride & groom, bridesmaids & groomsmen, parents & newlyweds, the ringbearer and twin flower girls. And--at Thea's insistence--the bride, her brother and me. I thought this was a nice gesture.

"I want a picture of me lifting her over my head like a barbell," Alex whispered.

"He wants a picture of you being held over his head like a barbell," I tattled.

"Alex...you are so weird." Thea grinned. "Smile!"

We smiled.

At last it was time for the ceremony. A teenage usher insisted I take his arm before he would lead me down the roll of white carpeting to my seat with the bride's family. Alex followed after, his arm dangerously unattended.

A woman with elaborately teased hair and hypnotically blue eyes tapped Alex on the shoulder.

"It is you...Leyla's nephew," she said, eyeing him flirtatiously. "I'm Tracey...remember me? Didn't you grow up nicely. Had your hair cut short, too, since you were in town for Christmas..."

"Yes...hi."

"Very nice. Did they use a razor for the choppy bits? I knew it. I'm getting quite good with one myself down at the shop."

Alex then introduced me in self-defense, which she processed almost imperceptibly on her way to her secondary mission--filling us in on all the local gossip. She was quite interested in it, so I felt compelled to nod and smile, even when she went on about some local acquaintance's crushingly private fertility problems. Alex gamely feigned memory of her subjects.

Tracey seemed genuinely nice, but I was relieved when the rest of Alex's elder relatives sat in the row ahead of us and gave us an excuse to face forward.

Someone cued music over a sound system and the bridal party swanned down the aisle into the chapel in their violet, black and white...giggling bridesmaids with stiffened ringlets and vaguely hysterical expressions, uncomfortable groomsmen and their King, very serious flower girls with measured steps, and the ringbearer, blasé at age 5. The bride and her father were very charming.

The ceremony itself was pretty dry. The vows were chopped into bite-sized pieces a third of a sentence long and took forever to recite, and the minister had known the couple throughout a long, long courtship and lengthened her speech on the meaning of marriage accordingly.

...It wasn't all bad, however, since I deduced from the interminable backstory that the family are used to waiting around.for a wedding.

Whew.

...Why don't I want marriage more?

And more importantly, what made people think a bride and groom could simultaneously dip tapers into a slender glass shade to light a third candle? After 5 attempts they had to take the shade off--perhaps a telling metaphor for the rigors of marriage!--and settle for the no-frills ignition of a fat white candle sitting unceremoniously on a tablecloth. The half-strangled Martha Stewart Within engaged in a good cry. I wondered how much some principle-free bridal catalog had demanded for this goofy logjam. I shifted my gaze to the white bridal trellis and hated it for good measure. Then I bowed my head and prayed when everyone else did, and mustered a genuine enthusiasm for the now super-wedded Alexei and Thea as they walked up the aisle..

The budget of the wedding ultimately proved to have been sunk wisely into the dress and the buffet. Never have I had such good wedding food. Tender salmon, chicken cordon bleu, exotic salads, and good champagne. I ate an unladylike amount, bookended by the similarly enthusiastic Alex Jr and Aunt Leyla, and watched the happy couple slow-dance to Peter Cetera, whose career must've overlapped into their junior high experiences by a scant 3 days at most.

Alex's mother went around giving her drink tickets away and we had still more champagne, and Alex had--altogether--about 5 small slices of cake.

It was while Alex was away on cake reconnaissance that his father approached me.

"How are you enjoying the wedding?"

"Very much, sir. Everyone's been so nice...and the food is terrific."

"Glad to hear it...Vex...I was wondering. Do you get an inkling as to why Alex doesn't come around more?"

Ah.

This.

It's something about Alex that really makes me a bit uncomfortable--his disengagement from what seems to me a perfectly sweet, kind family. His snobbishness over their mainstream habits in books and movies--his disapproval at their provincial ways and "boring" lives. It seems to me a profoundly ungrateful treatment of two perfectly loving, friendly, average parents. I wish I had two perfectly loving, friendly, average parents. I wish I'd never had to lose one and bail the other out of jail.

I said none of this.

"I have the idea," I said, "that Alex wants to impress you really badly. He seems to have this idea that he must 'succeed' in life before he will be comfortable around you all. He has something to prove, and I don't know where he got it.

Do you know where this--mindset came from, Sir?"

"I don't," said Alex Senior, thoughtfully.

And I think he was being straight with me, at least as far as he knows.

"He does love you," I said. And Alex approached bearing cake, so I attempted to look normal.

"Thank you," his father said, with a look so understanding of his son and what I was trying to say that my esteem for the subtlety of him--beyond the jokes and the persona--leaped up quietly within.

We were about to leave for a ferry when Thea appeared in her street clothes and veil.

"No, no!" she said. "You can't leave! I haven't had a chance to speak to either of you!"

"Should we stay or should we go?" I asked Alex.

"Up to you," he said, visibly wrestling with his conscience and a fierce desire to be back at my apartment watching Cartoon Netw0rk.

"Let's stay," I said impulsively.

I couldn't help it. I didn't imagine I'd be back any time soon.

We spent another hour and a half chatting with various members of the family. I solidified my opinion of Thea as a very nice girl, chatted about competitive swimming with Alexei, got Alex's mother's email address (towards which to send vacation pictures) and planted the seed of possibility re: a post-work beer between Alex and Alex Senior. It turns out they work within a few blocks of one another downtown, but Alex never takes advantage of this.

We rounded up our things and went from table to table as the crowd dissipated, bidding our goodbyes.

"You have charmed me," Alex's father said in closing.

It was the nicest thing he could have said to me.

I felt confused on the ferry home. Twilight was falling, the boat was again an empty chamber, and I didn't feel like reading--there was nothing to do but be glad I had gotten through the day in a decent light and to think on the context Alex's family gave to him as a person.

I realize that the average childhood is replete with struggle and disappointment and little resentments, but Alex has never given me any means to understand the casual contempt he displays for his parents. I've seen the effects of divorce in some of my friends' grown lives. I've seen the effects of horrific abuses in others. But Alex either has either outgrown some sort of rebellion and has nothing to replace it with, or refuses to cough up the genuine goods.

"I don't get it," I said, over the dull roar of the engines. "Did they beat you with sticks during childhood? Why don't you ever see them? ...Why can't you at least try to make an old man happy?"

And the answer for all of it was "I don't know."

After a while he fell into the carefully measured sleep of the perennial ferry-rider, and after a while I covered my legs with my coat and closed my eyes, hoping for the same.

I have always been bad at napping, though.

I got up and wandered the windy deck under the deep indigo-purple sky as the lights of the city approached, and after a while Alex joined me and we paced the deck together while I pretended not to think of it anymore.

previous - next