Broken Things

Later this year, my best friend will be getting married for the second time. I was a bridesmaid at her first wedding 35 years ago, and I will be the reader at her ceremony this time. Instead of a flower bouquet, she will have a crystal bouquet. Apparently, they are all the rage, in case you hadn't heard. She has asked her female friends and family members to each contribute a piece of inexpensive jewelry, white or silver or gold or clear. Then she will attach the jewelry to a wire stem and turn this all into a bouquet. She likes the idea because it's different, it's something she will keep unlike fresh flowers that die, and there is sentimental value attached to the jewelry.

I didn't think I had anything to contribute, because my jewelry is all pretty colorful. Then I was cleaning out Pink and found a pair of earrings I had forgotten I had. Fake white pearl with silver. Yay! I can now participate. One of the earrings is broken; that wire thing that goes in my ear is missing. But that is not a problem since she is going to be taking the jewelry apart in some cases anyway. So I lovingly wrapped the earrings up and put them in an envelope and popped it in the mail.

I kind of like that what I sent her was broken. We women seem to put a lot of emphasis on having the perfect wedding day, maybe a precursor to the perfect life to which we feel entitled. Certainly the first time around, my friend had expectations based on a combination of the fairy tales we like to believe and the lack of life experience she had at the age of 20.

It's different this time around. For her. For her future husband, who was also married once before. For me, because back when I was 19 I never would have thought that broken earrings would be a worthy contribution. Yet life and love and we humans ourselves are made of missing pieces and broken things.

At her first wedding, I was inexperienced with alcohol and had too much to drink at the reception. I don't remember, but I have been told I was very entertaining. It seems I'm a funny drunk. The last time my friend and I were together (she lives across the country from me) I reassured her I would not do that again. I would drink very little at this reception. She frowned and said in a sad voice, "Oh. How disappointing."

What can I say? I am not about to disappoint my best friend. So I will memorize and rehearse my readings, so I can deliver them without reading any notes. I will find a beautiful dress and shoes, and carefully do my hair, makeup and nails. I will do my friend proud. Then at the reception, I think I might have a little too much to drink. Not way too much like that first time, but maybe a little too much. The Second Coming of the Drunken Bridesmaid with the Broken Earring.

I doubt anyone remembers how well put together I was at her first wedding. How precisely I walked down the aisle at the church on the arm of a groomsman. But people still remember me as the drunken bridesmaid, and they smile. For a while I was mortified, then I was embarrassed, but now I'm good with it.

Missing pieces. Broken things. Second chances. Drunken bridesmaids. It's all good.

Susan