8.20.2006

I'm Goin' to a Wedding

Kacy and Rigo

Last weekend, I went to Kacy and Rigo's wedding.

Kacy had told me she was planning an all-out Mexican wedding. She had her dress, jewelry and hairpiece brought up from Mexico. She said there would be all Mexican music at the wedding. But I didn't expect some of the other differences.

For instance, at many of the weddings I've gone to in the past, people show up an hour and a half early. So when I showed up with thirty minutes to spare, I was afraid I might not get a decent seat.

Instead, I walked into a nearly empty church. So Nadia, Raymond, Allie and I got great seats.

The ceremony was all in Spanish. Which wasn't a big deal, because sometimes, I don't know what's going on in Catholic ceremonies, anyway.

At one point, though, Allie and I both heard the priest talking about quesadillas.

Maybe the priest saw our blank faces. For a brief time, he spoke in English.

Nadia leaned over and said "I don't know why he's speaking in English. You two are the only people in here who don't understand!"

We were early to the reception, too. We sat at a table by the soundboard and watched the band do their soundcheck.

I'm not sure if the band was aware that they were playing at a wedding reception and not a stadium concert. The music was ear-achingly loud.

Allie leaned over and shouted at the guys at the soundboard. "Don't you think that's a little loud???"

They looked at each other. One of the guys looked back at us and grinned.

"YEAH!" He shouted back, gleefully.

During the party, Kacy came running up to me. "Can you and Nighat and Allie and Nadia serve the cake after the champagne toast?"

Now, I had never served cake at a wedding before. I had no idea how to cut the cake in those perfect uniform pieces. But I'd had a few drinks and said "Sure!"

We stood behind the table, watching Kacy and Rigo feed each other cake when Raymond's aunt asked me if we had water.

"Water?"

"You have to have water and a towel to clean off the knife so it doesn't get so gunky."

Luckily, the guy who runs the building knew how it worked and brought out a pitcher of water, a towel and rubber gloves.

I was putting on the gloves and turned to see Nadia had already started trying to cut the cake.

Remember when I said I had been drinking? Well, Nadia had been drinking more.

She was pretty much just crumbling the cake, so I pushed her aside. She stepped back to cheer me on while Allie handed me plates.

This was really the most stressful job I had ever had. It was pretty much cut-and-plate, cut-and-plate, cut-and-plate, with an occasional move-to-new-cake.

Finally, the building dude stepped in and offered to do the cutting. I gladly handed over the job and wiped my brow.

This gave me the chance to see the mob of people crowded around the cake talbe. Some were already holding plates. Others were reaching their hands in to try to grab some cake from Allie.

I looked over and saw Nadia trying to dig into a cake with a fork.

"Nadia! What are you doing?"

"This lady needs a piece of cake right now!!!"

I told you it was stressful!

I found the cake server and started in on another cake. I cut while Nadia gave me plates. We made a great team and we went really fast, but it wasn't fast enough for the hordes!

When we ran out of plates, they shouted "We don't care!" and held up napkins.

On and on we served. Faster and faster. Flinging cake right and left. Frosting was falling onto the floor. Onto our clothes.

We served until the cake was gone. And when it was gone, the hordes just looked at us like "Give us the crumbs!"

I shrugged back as if to say. "It's seriously gone. If you really want crumbs, well, have at it."

The moral of this story is:

If any of you decide to get married and need someone to serve cake, don't you dare even think of asking me!

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