My Wedding
While my wedding reception was to be held at the Hotel Thayer at West Point, the wedding itself would take place in the rabbi’s study on the campus of Princeton University, where my husband was to receive his Ph.D. the following week.
The day of the wedding I was up in Nanuet, New York, with my mother and my three siblings. My father was at work. We were to drive down mid-morning and have lunch at the Woodrow Wilson Center before the early afternoon ceremony. That morning my mother informed me she had too much to do before the reception, so she wouldn’t be coming to the wedding. I sweetly replied, “If you don’t come to my wedding, I won’t be coming to your reception.” She changed her mind.
All she really had to do for the wedding was bring a cake and a bottle of wine for the kiddush. No time to make a cake, or even drop by the Pearl River bakery, she bought something by Sarah Lee. I still remember the rabbi’s face when my mother peeled off the lid and all the frosting stuck to it. Priceless.
But back to my preparations for what would be my first and only wedding. So far. No morning of pampering, no make up artist or hair stylist, no decent shower because everyone had taken a shower before me and the water was COLD!.
Down we went to Princeton. Was I nervous? A bit. My mother said, “I wasn’t nervous when I got married.” To which I replied, “Maybe your mother wasn’t in the car with you.” (She eloped!). I discovered that my husband-to-be had sold his Ford clunker for $35 to buy a new pair of shoes for the wedding. He had a barber professionally shave him; the guy obviously had never shaved anyone before. The nicks, the dark shadow, they were all there on my husband’s face.
Somewhere, after the meal, I found a place to change into my wedding attire, a simple white cocktail dress with a pill box hat. Then it was off to the rabbi’s study.
Abe had his friend Steve by his side. Abe’s brother, the one we called Uncle Monster showed up at the last minute with his daughter. My father arrived with his best friend Fred Bach. Then we had to sort out who would hold the huppah. Fred was going to do the honors until the rabbi found he wasn’t Jewish. So it was up to Steve and my brothers and the awful Uncle Monster.
The ceremony was very short. I didn’t understand a single word. It was all in Hebrew. Literally, all in Hebrew. So I was mystifyingly married, the ring was on my finger and on my husband’s. After the disastrous cake reveal, exeunt all, with rice being tossed. Sorry, birds. We didn’t know any better back then.
How I would have loved to have photos of my wedding. But instead of hiring a photographer, my mother assigned that task to my brother Joe. And while he clicked away, he forgot to put film in the camera.