Chapter 5: L'Entre-acte
After the ceremony the family milled around the large lobby of the church, taking pictures and talking, while the nearly 400 guests filed through the receiving line. Below you see some of the pictures taken then: Lexie and Casey, respectively flower girl and ringbearer, groom's cousin and bride's cousin; sisters, Josie and Lexie; and brothers, Jerry and Brian, somehow stuck holding Vanessa's bouquet.
Grandma Gracie was heartbroken because her camera had run out of film just before the ceremony, so she sat in a chair and kept asking other people to take pictures and mail them to her. Uncle Don sat next to her, and various people posed for pictures around them. Grandma Gracie did leap up, though, in order to take a picture with her sons and daughters around her:
By 4:00, nearly everyone had left for the reception, and the rented bus with the wedding party was posing for more pictures outside. Candy and I had somehow been nominated to go to the reception in cousin Jimmy's car, along with cousin Matt. Candy and I were also holding two large glass vases of flowers, roses and calla lillies, from the altar, in order to bring them along to the reception; a candle that Vanessa had forgotten; and a black binder of music that the soloist had forgotten. Since Jimmy was the official videocorder for the evening, using Candy's camera, we were also carrying a videorecorder and a bulky case, and we needed to stop somewhere and buy another tape for the reception.
Jimmy's car was a small grey Thunderbird, parked in the far reaches of the parking lot. By the time we reached it, still carrying vases and miscellaneous things, both Candy and I had mud all up our heels. We made the guys hold the flowers while we piled into the very small, cramped backseat. Once the vases had been handed back to us, we couldn't see a thing--which, in retrospect, may have been a good thing. The ride was extremely--um, exciting. Yeah, it was exciting. First stop: Walmart. No trip to the midwest is complete without a stop at Walmart, after all. Jimmy parked, once more, in the absolute furthest parking spot. We managed to find our way to the A-V section, where Jimmy decided the photo at left would be interesting to pose for. Dave, later, was indeed amused. Tape purchased, we teetered back out to the car and once more settled ourselves. Matt, who all along had said he knew where the reception was and how to get there, suddenly declared he had no idea. Candy and I, out-of-staters in the backseat, clearly had no idea how to get there, so we were relieved when Matt all at once "remembered" the correct turn off. At the reception, of course, Jimmy parked in the most inconvenient spot, but Candy and I were so happy to have actually arrived in one piece that at this point, we didn't care. At right, Jimmy and Matt pose with one of the vases of flowers in the reception hall parking lot.
