Not so much fun doing the weddings.

Monday I only performed 3 wedding ceremonies, and Wednesday none.  Where have all the loving couples gone?

Monday I had one sweet loving couple.  They had several friends with them and her daughter was the ring bearer.  This one wedding kept me from losing all faith in marriage is a loving wonderful thing.

Wedding number 1:
Background, bride was an American citizen, groom was not.  A third party was doing all the talking, another witness is taking lots and lots of pictures. 

The clerk handed me the license and said this is an immigration wedding.  Oh crap!  I hate, hate these.  They don't tell us that the purpose of the wedding is to get someone a green card.  But it is so very obvious. 
I start asking questions, lots of questions. One witness is taking pictures fast and furiously for proof. And the organizer is trying to answer the questions before the bride can.  I looked at the organizer and said, " If they can't understand me and can't respond to my questions, I can not legally marry them."  She backed off.  I asked if they had their own vows or did they want to use the traditional vows.  The bride said, "Oh, I'm not ready to say vows to him yet."  That right there tells you a lot.

I did a down and dirty ceremony.  Do  you . . ., Do you . . ., and then By the power vested in me . . .

I hate doing the three legal sentence ceremony.  No romance, no feeling, no happiness.  It is a business deal.

Wedding number 2:
I am back at my desk waiting for the next license.  The clerks had told me two were in the works.  I am reading, the clerks in the back are working away on their computers.  Power failure.  We are in an area that has no windows, it is as dark as the inside of a cow's stomach.  I don't do dark.  Let's say dark makes me panic.  Luckily I have a flashlight app on my phone.  No dark, YAY!  Then the generator kicked in.  Not dark, but sort of like half power.  The clerk brings me the license.

The couple is dressed up for their wedding.  The guests are pretty spiffy too. I ask if everyone is healthy, they are going to climb stairs.  No elevators when the generators is running.  We have to use the stairs to the second floor.  But this is like a third floor climb.  The lobby has really really high ceilings, so lot of steps.  We go upstairs, me carrying my trusty phone in case the lights fail again.

The bride asks me if their friend, who is an ordained minister, may do the ceremony.  I tell her no, this is a civil ceremony in a government building.  He may say some words but I have to do the ceremony.  When we turn the corner the bride sees our nice wedding room.  She freaked out.  She was not going into that room.  If they were in there it would look like a chapel. She then refused to have any vows in the wedding.  She wanted me to just sign the license and say they were married.  Why the big freak out you say.  They were having a large wedding in July.  Therefore they couldn't do anything that was like a wedding.  So I told her no, I couldn't just sign the license.  I would take them back to the clerk. They could see if they could get their money back for the ceremony. 

No, she had to get married today.  So standing in the little lobby, I again did the three sentence ceremony. The bride would not allow any pictures taken.  Why they bothered to dress up and bring guests I have no clue. What did they think a civil ceremony was?   It was very weird.

It was a bad day.  I had to do two three sentence weddings.  The first one I understand why the bride didn't want anything romantic.  But the second couple, no clue what the problem was.