Bay City Runaway

Chapter 22

(1995)

Given the circumstances, Laura's parents were understanding about our new timeline. We had come over on a Sunday afternoon and shared my mother's desire to see us wed before her passing. Mrs. Welch had shared the story of her own mother's illness and passing and how she had not made it to her college graduation and what a regret that was.

We began to receive R.S.V.P cards daily until the last week of our preparations when a trickle dwindled to a full stop. More than 200 friends and family planned to attend; enough to fill the modest sanctuary and cost my parents a fortune in ribeye steak and chicken marsala for the reception.

I let Laura plan the ceremony except for the prelude; I wanted my parents' prelude: "Trumpet Voluntary" by Jeremiah Clarke. She planned hymns to sing, a full communion, hired a soloist to sing Malotte's famous Lord's Prayer. She picked flowers to honor both her mother and mine. All these decisions I left to her, not because I didn't care, but because she had been thinking about this event most of her life; she knew what she wanted, and I knew that I wanted her to get whatever she wanted.

On the day of the wedding, we cloistered ourselves in our parents' homes. I don't know all that went on in her preparations, but I did send a dozen red-tipped white roses with these verses by John Boyle O'Reilly entitled "The White Rose."

The red rose whispers of passion,

And the white rose breathes of love;

O, the red rose is a falcon,

And the white rose is a dove.

But I send you a cream-white rosebud

With a flush on its petal tips;

For the love that is purest and sweetest

Has a kiss of desire on the lips.

I had very little to do. I'd already picked up my tux. Mainly, I waited around visiting with a few close relatives and ate sandwiches and drank lite beer. My brother Mike and his wife Susan had flown in from Des Moines, and we enjoyed catching up.

My dad carefully documented the day with a video camera, interviewing anyone who would tolerate it. He asked me if I had any final words before tying the knot. I was in such a daze both from the beer and from the enormity of the agenda for the day—the one where I say I do and make Laura my girl until death would one day part us—that I was at a total loss for words.

But my mother was the real star of the day. Since the day we shared our engagement with my parents, her health had begun to decline at a steady rate. She was weakening, but she still managed to bring life to the day. She read from the Bible about love being patient and kind. She read palms, an old trick she had learned in Honduras during one of several missions to Central America. And after lunch, she had champagne poured for everyone, including a fourteen-year-old cousin whose mother had held her tongue out of respect, and gave a toast.

She raised her glass and addressed the room with all of the life she could muster. "My son, a man with great prospects, a great mind, and most importantly, a great love for my future daughter-in-law, stands before us today soon to pledge a life of caring, faithfulness, honoring, and cherishing. May he be as great a husband and lover as his father, and may he devote himself to bringing joy and comfort and peace to Laura and to whoever should cross the threshold of their home together. Drink every last drop this very moment as the young lovers will of their bodies and souls tonight. Cheers!"

All present raised their glasses, saying cheers and laughing chugged the champagne. Soon after, my mother kissed me and was helped upstairs to her bedroom, where she would rest until the ceremony.