Man and Wife?

Here’s a random thing that pops in my head every once in a while:

You know how people talk about their wedding day as the best day of their life? Well, I’m so happy that isn’t the case with me. Our wedding was, well, a little ghetto. We paid for 94% of it by ourselves, which meant we didn’t spend very much at all. We were soooo young. I was in college and I had a little very part time job watering plants at the hospital and at other businesses. My boss rarely paid me, which for some reason didn’t bother me too much. I liked watering the plants. What did bother me is that I had to take her car with the water tank supplies in it and she had the worst car ever! It smoked and by the time I was finished driving all around town I felt like I had carbon monoxide poisoning. Still, I’m smiling as I think back on that job.

Anyway, back to being young and poor…Randy had a job making decent money. The thing is that we weren’t just planning a wedding but we were also remodeling a house to live in after we got married. Again, that was on our own dime. We ended up living in our little yellow house that we remodeled for 8 years. We brought all 5 of our babies home to that house. So, I cringe at the wedding photos, but the house is endeared to my heart forever.

All of the above is not what I had started out writing. That’s the back-story I guess. Okay, so when we were getting married we were not living for the Lord. We were living for…well…to keep this PG rating…Ourselves. We weren’t going to church anywhere so we weren’t sure who to get to marry us. I had been to FountainGate (not the name back then) a couple of times with Randy’s sister Sheila. Randy had also worked on that church with a construction friend at one time. We knew the pastor, Scott Beard and liked him. We called to set up a meeting with him, and he was so kind to us even though I’m pretty sure he could detect our scandalous shenanigans.

He said that he would marry us and the fee was $50.
Hmm…$50.

We agreed that was more than a fair price. However, $50 was not in the budget. Remember, we were also remodeling a house from top to bottom. Here’s a glimpse of our budget. I bought a yellowish green refrigerator from someone on Sales Blvd for $5. Yeah, $5. I also bought a couch, an ugly ass couch for $5. I bought a set of dishes for guess how much. Yep, $5. Now, if Scott had offered to marry us for $5 then we would have shook hands and left it at that. It didn’t happen though so we were still on the look out.

Luckily (or Unluckily) for us Randy’s other sister Sharon was going through a strange time in her life and somehow got involved with the Mormons. Some cute Mormon boys began to come to over to Sharon’s house to discuss religion, and one of Sharon’s most favorite things to do ever was argue so it was a beautiful relationship. She was highly intelligent and knew the Bible. She would argue with them and they would continue to come over. She ended up meeting several people in their church including a Bishop in the church.

She was so excited to tell us that the Bishop (whose name I cannot remember) said that he would marry us…FOR FREE. Bingo! This was the break we were waiting for.

We had a meeting with the guy.

Us: Can you marry us?

Bishop: Sure.

Us: Can we write our own vows (that happened to be really hippy and makes me blush to think about the things I said.)

Bishop: Sure.

Us: Sharon said it would be free. Is it free?

Bishop: Sure.

Us: Can you be there at 1:00?

Bishop: Sure.

Us as we’re leaving: Have you ever done this before?

Bishop: No, this will be the first one. Is that okay?

Us: Sure.

So, we were married by a Mormon Bishop. I heard from my Mom that when he pronounced us married by the power of The Church of Ladder Day Saints that my Grandma almost had a heart attack. I guess Grandma should have pitched in a few bucks.
So, here’s the random thing that pops in my head every once in a while: Are we really married??? That guy did not seem to know what he was doing. He hardly said a word at the wedding. He just let Randy and I ramble as we declared our love for one another in front of a crowd that was wishing the whole thing would just end already. Have Randy and I just been shacking up for the last 15 years? Was our little ghetto wedding legit?

Recently, we ended up having Miles’s funeral at FountainGate church and Scott Beard was there. He hugged me and I thanked him for allowing us to have the funeral at his church. He said, “Of course. That’s the way it should be.”

It’s funny/strange how in a moment like that where I’m burying a son I can still think, “Dang it! $50 bucks and this is the guy who could have married us!”

So, any thoughts? Do you think it was legit? If a very quiet Mormon Bishop says your married are you married?

Wait, quick side memory associated with Mormons. In college I was taking a speech class. We paired up and had to interview each other then introduce the person to the class. I paired up with the guy behind me. I asked him the usual questions like name and what he was going to school for. He told me his name was Eric and then he mumbled what he wanted to go to school for. I asked him again and he said, “I want to be a Gay Mormon.” A what? “A Gay Mormon.” I’m thinking, “Oh my goodness! What in the world? I didn’t even know you had to go to school for that!” Then he began to talk about his love for animals and nature. I apologized then asked him one more time what he was going to school for. He said, “I told you a GAME WARDEN.” Ah, a game warden. Makes sense. : )

Back to my random Mormon pronounced marriage…so do YOU think we’re married?
I'll leave you with this awkward photo.