The Euphoria of Weddings

We recently loaded up the "big" car and headed almost three hours west to a wedding in the beautiful mountains of Pennsylvania.  The ceremony was a light-hearted, sweet celebration of young love. I think. As usual, we were late and missed most of the ceremony save the final prayer and recessional.

I come from a very large family and have been going to weddings since I was a little Ette. "Don't eat until you get to the reception," my mother would order, "your [insert relative] paid a lot of money for this wedding, you can eat there!" It was our duty to make sure that our relatives got what they paid for. We were expected to eat our dinner and dessert, but not the Jordan Almonds; we had to give them to my mom.

The same edict was handed down about dancing. "The DJ/Band was so expensive. Get out there and dance... and bring your sisters." From young to old, the dance floor was always packed. Dancing, it seemed, was mandatory and at family weddings.  Were we out there because our mothers told us too be, or was something else driving us? Calling us to the dance floor like a Siren’s song?

Long gone are the wedding with the lavish cocktail hours where you can find every food imaginable and countless butlers passing anything the chef can skewer on a stick. Nowadays you find long lines for the one buffet station stocked with common cubed cheeses, crackers and cured meats, and the butlers are few and far between. Unfortunately the cocktail hour at this wedding was no different.

The buffet reflected the season, with fresh fruit along with the cubed cheese, but once the food was quickly eaten it wasn't replenished.  I did not have high hopes or expectations for the rest of the night. 

The reception room was well appointed with a marble dance floor and plenty of room between the twenty plus tables. The walls were full of large, unobstructed windows that seemingly brought the green of the outside in and the three chandeliers which hung above the dance floor were elegant and tasteful.  The chairs were wide and comfortable and there was enough room at our table of eight that I didn't have to keep my elbows tucked in - a habit from growing up in a big family crammed around a little table.

The reception quickly got down to business. In a rapid succession the bridal party arrived, the couple had their first dance, salad course...oops grace...salad course, the best man's toast and then dinner was served. After dinner there was dancing, dancing, cake and more dancing.  The wedding band never missed a beat, playing the ubiquitous Top 40 songs and (thankfully) mostly avoiding country music.

Looking around, something struck me right away; a lot of people were dancing and once someone was on the dance floor, they didn't leave.  You would see people get off dance floor just long enough to take a pee, grab a drink or grab another dance partner. I was even more intrigued by the people dancing at their tables. Not the polite/shy chair dancing, but people were stand-up dancing...at their tables. They were into it too! From young to old, everyone everywhere was dancing.  Everyone knew the words to every song and the moves to every dance. The entire reception hall seemed to sway together like the leaves on a tree blown by a lovely breeze.

I thought about this phenomenon for a few days.  Could it be that they were all commanded to dance by their own mothers like I was so long ago?  Could it be that there was a Top 40 hits cult to which they all belonged?  Were they ringers, professional wedding dancers paid to have a good time?

And then I realized that what I had witnessed, had been a part of, was the bliss brought on by love, by food and by an open bar.  This bliss exists, on some level, at every wedding. Maybe it wasn't their mothers command or an eternal pledge of worship to the Black Eyed Peas that made them get on the dance floor, maybe it was just the euphoria of weddings.  The desire for everyone to be a part of this special time for their loved ones, to celebrate the start of a new life together, the hope that the more you enjoy yourself at a wedding, the happier everyone's life will be.