Gerald Ford’s decision to dispense with the frilliest frills of presidential funerals was a welcome change in a society that has so cheapened the idea of ceremony that it’s almost pointless to bother.
In fact, it’s the lack of ceremony that seems to convey something more meaningful, as in the case of Ford, a Midwesterner who took a pass on such niceties as the riderless horse when planning his own funeral.
Maybe with a few more acts of “ceremony lite,” we’ll restore some substance to ceremonies, whether they be funerals or weddings. Less is more.
But I think the wedding is the chief villain in undermining ceremonial integrity, with middle-class people spending the equivalent of a third of a starter-home mortgage for lavish ceremonies based on a bad bet. And Hollywood marriages in particular have turned ceremony into a farce.
For celebrities, dropping several million dollars on a wedding amounts to a swipe of the Starbucks card, and this is for marriages that won’t last nearly as long as my three-pack of undershirts from Wal-Mart.
For the sake of the rest of us, who are desperately trying to hold on to the few non-digitized threads of deeper meaning we can still find, we need to create a celebrity middle ground that stops short of marriage.
We’ll just say the celebrities are “going together.” And if they really want to go all the way, they can exchange breakable promise rings.
Then we can be spared gushy news of fairy-tale weddings in Italian castles quickly followed by divorce-bound public spectacles such as Britney’s party-girl marathon.
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If I’m to be force-fed news about meltdowns, I’d prefer to know what we can do about city-sized chunks of the Arctic floating away. At least that means something.
All of which brings me to this point.
I’ll admit to growing crabbier every time the sun comes up. And I don’t see many things that can retard the process–except once in a while.
It was a family wedding, sandwiched between the holidays. It meant a long drive at a time of year when I’d prefer to hide.
There were plenty of reasons for me to feel ornery, not the least of which is my wife’s penchant (other than this, she’s perfect) for waiting as long as possible to leave for an event, assuming every tiny variable, such as stoplights, will work in our favor.
So there we sat, in the back of the church, because we were a bit delayed. Now in a supercritical mood, I started my personal checklist of complaints that I silently run down whenever I mingle with people.
Then the ceremony began. It could have served as a prototype for the low-glitz ceremonies I now advocate. In a matter of minutes, we were already to the best part: the end. But it was an end that blew me away.
Looking at each other, the faces of the bride and groom exploded into smiles. I felt like I was staring at the sun. I don’t think I have ever seen such sweet delight portrayed on adult faces. Here was a ceremony that meant something.
No castles, no paparazzi. Even my pettiness vanished.
Good luck, John and Becca, but I don’t know that you’ll need it.
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