My son got married today

[Joe Nation]

My first born, my first to marry, my son got married today. I wasn’t there. My wife wasn’t there. My other sons were not there. No grandparents, No aunts. No uncles. No cousins. No life-long friends. Just one person they asked to perform the ceremony and one witness.

The guest list was never grand. They only invited the people that were closest to them. The beautiful conservatory was reserved. The honeymoon was planned. A week in China, a week in South Korea, and a week in Japan seeing all the sights. A trip of a lifetime to celebrate their union.

Slowly, all the plans they had made began to unravel like a slow-moving catastrophe. With the COVID-19 outbreak in China, they had to alter their plans and decided to only visit South Korea and Japan. It just gave them more time to see the other two countries they noted.

Once the virus spread crossed the borders, South Korea and eventually Japan were also off the table. Undaunted, they planned to take a trip to New Orleans and then Las Vegas as a substitute for their grand Asia honeymoon. Even those plans were peeled away. The dinners venues, the hotels, the airlines all regretted the inconvenience and refunded little if any real money.

The venue they had carefully chosen announced that they were closing under orders from the State. The wedding was a matter of weeks away. Every single plan they had carefully made was peeled away like a sticky band aid on a large gash and just as painful. It was as if the world didn’t want they to get married.

Today, they said the hell with all of that and got married anyway. Proof that we will persevere and get through this but only if we do it together. I am so proud of them.

[FM123]

1. How you feel - is how we feel, so proud of them.

Wishing them nothing but the best!

[efhmc]

2. Good for them. I sure hope they can fulfill their dream honeymoon soon.

I was actually just thinking of all the plans for celebrations (weddings) and showers (just cancelled my niece's)confirmations and bar/bat mitzvah, graduations (my gson's probably) etc are going down the drain. Too bad we could not have had a person in charge who was on top of this thing sooner.

[Demovictory9]

3. wow. congrats.

[Tom Kitten]

4. Nice post - thank you

Wishing the best for you and your now bigger family

[Wounded Bear]

5. There will come a time when they can repeat the ceremony...

and have their honeymoon. This will not last forever.

I'm glad they were able to get married, at least, but all the big stuff can be done another time.

[mountain grammy]

6. Congratulations to all..

May they have a long life together in better times.

[dlk]

7. Congratulations to you and your family

Your son’s and his new wife’s optimism is inspiring. I wish them a long and happy life, together.

[MarianJack]

8. I'm proud of them too.

Hopefully this will all be done eventually.

RESIST!

[Texaswitchy]

9. Congrats.

[Lars39]

10. You can have a hell of a party when all this is over.

Love

Congratulations to the happy couple!

[mcar]

11. Congratulations!

Not how you wanted it to happen, but you got yourself a new family member and that is a reason for

[malaise]

12. Happy and sad

[Fla Dem]

13. Congratulations. Sorry your son's plans were dashed.

[smirkymonkey]

14. Congratulations to you and your son Joe!

I am so sorry things didn't work out as planned, but hopefully once this is all over they can finally have the party/honeymoon of their dreams.

[cilla4progress]

15. A lot to be proud of.

Blessings to all.

[gademocrat7]

16. Congratulations and best wishes to your son and his wife.

[panader0]

17. My first born, my 27 year daughter, is due with her first child

on Thursday. No one is allowed to be there except her husband. I live across the
country and shouldn't fly (DVT) and am usually broke, but now is not the time to travel.
She is very healthy and she and her hubbie have three months paid leave.
But she says it is sad to bring a new baby girl into the world in the midst
of this pandemic.
Congrats to the newlyweds and you!

[Wheezy]

18. Beautiful and heartbreaking story

My son and future daughter-in-law are postponing their wedding which was going to be on April 4. It was heartbreaking to watch them come to the realization that the thing they'd been planning for 2 years wasn't able to happen the way they wanted it...or even at all.

Now shooting for October.

In the end, we're all happy we are healthy, but it's still sad.

[lunatica]

19. They made history for the family doing this

The Coronavirus put every obstacle in their way and still they united in a loving lifelong bond. I admire your newlyweds for taking such a brightly hopeful and confident step into their future. Such love and optimism will weather all their rough patches in life!

[Freddie]

20. Congratulations

They should fight to get their $$ back.
My son was supposed to get married April 18. It’s now indefinitely postponed. The wedding venue said they could apply the deposit to another date. The house I rented for a week said the same. Frontier (ugh) has ended cancellation fees and the website said I could use what I paid in airfare for a future flight. I have trip insurance in the rental car. They had planned a honeymoon in Seattle and cancelled it as things started to look bad there, before they decided to postpone the wedding.
They’re handling it well. They WILL get married, just not now. And I’m going to cry like a baby dancing to “The Wonder Of You” (Elvis) with my wonderful son.

[sdfernando]

21. How we face adversity is what defines us.

Congratulations to your son and daughter-in-law. When this is all over the plans can be remade and a true celebration can happen.

Peace

[LudwigPastorius]

22. Mazel tov!

[TNNurse]

23. It seems the safe thing to do.

There can be a party later, there can be an re-enactment. There can be a celebration.

[Joe Nation]

24. Thank you all for the kind wishes.

The future is bright.

[BeckyDem]

25. They sound like an awesome couple!

Congrats!!

[barbtries]

26. that's so sad.

maybe you can set up some kind of virtual reception for them.
Mazeltov! Love in the Time of Coronavirus

[diva77]

27. Congratulations! Thank you for sharing your son's story.

bittersweet & defiantly beautiful all in one

[Maeve]

28. Congratulations! Save the party and honeymoon for later

As a side note, we're celebrating our 44th anniversary today so it's a lucky day for a wedding!

[vlyons]

29. Perhaps when this pandemic is behind us, and we come out of isolation,

thay can renew their vows at a big family celebration on an anniversary.

[wryter2000]

30. Good for them

They can have a grand party when this is all over and then go on a fabulous trip. Let me recommended the Galapagos.

[magicarpet]

31. Boy will they have stories to tell their grandchildren.

Love will persevere.

[FailureToCommunicate]

32. Congratulations! Cheers to the happy (undaunted) couple!!

They should definitely pull together some goggle images of all the places they meant to visit and photoshop themselves -and heck, even some friends - into the shots...and make a wedding/honeymoon album!

[iluvtennis]

33. They persisted. Congrats to the new couple. They can have makeup ceremony, reception, & honeymoon

after the crisis has abated.

[demigoddess]

41. or they can plan a reaaaallly great (10th or 5th or 1st) anniversary bash

[localroger]

34. The most important thing that happens at a wedding

...is the vow. Everything else is window dressing. And in times like these, you have to get the important stuff done.

[lpbk2713]

35. So sorry it had to be this way.

I hope they have a wonderful life together.

[Laurelin]

36. Congratulations

I can see where your son got his positive attitude and resilience from.
My daughter's wedding is supposed to be in May so I understand how difficult it is to lose months or years of hard work, careful planning and dreams. My daughter can't even find a jp to marry them because of virus restrictions. I admire your son for managing to face all his changes and you for accepting that you couldn't be there. I hope the newlywed have a long and wonderful life together and that soon you'll get to see them.

Stay well.

[marlakay]

37. I have good friend in Belfast just found out her

Wedding was canceled that she had planned a huge Irish wedding, if you have never been to one they party for like 12 hrs!

They decided to still get married like you son and just have a few kids in backyard toast them will have big party later.

[PoindexterOglethorpe]

38. Don't know about food places,

but the airlines and hotels have been giving full refunds.

I've cancelled a trip to Seattle and I am getting back every penny in pre-paid things. Including Amtrak, which originally was going to keep 25%.

[Liberty Belle]

39. Good for them. They should host a reception next year, for their first anniversary.

[onethatcares]

40. congrats to

the couple. :hi

My gift is in the mail,

[GeoWilliam750]

42. Congratulations to the happy newlyweds!!!

And I wish them a happy hoMeymoon!

[meadowlander]

43. The course of true love never did run smooth.

I know a couple where the bride is Australian and the groom is a Kiwi. With the various travel restrictions in each country both families would have had to self-isolate for a month in order to travel to the wedding.

They're thinking about cancelling but have already put non-refundable deposits down on everything.

It's a story to tell the grandkids though

In sixty years what will matter is how they feel about each other and how they worked together to overcome adversity, not that they lost a couple grand on flowers and prime rib.

[NNadir]

44. My wife has never really forgiven me for our wedding.

After about 15 years, it became something of some amusement, but for a while it really bugged her, more because of the dynamics of her family than anything really about me.

We were stuck in blizzards in Lake Tahoe, she twisted her knee skiing, and I wasn't entirely sure how to put the required chains on the rental car.

We were running out of time, waiting for the roads to clear, but finally we got out, her in a leg brace. We found an open chapel; the pastor there was drunk, no flowers could be brought on but we had some plastic flowers, and an instant camera which produced pictures 100% of which had red eye.

But we got married; our license we'd obtained when landing in Reno passing through Carson City. We got back to our skiing Condo, and she said, "forget it pal," about wedding night traditions, since her knee was hurting with any motions.

The marriage, though, has been wonderful and long lasting.

My father in law who had used a special Italian-American expression to let us know how he felt about us marrying - "I'm not paying for the wedding!" (which I finally understood when watching Moonstruck - but paid for an elaborate fancy wedding for my sister-in-law. (My father-in-law later healed our relationship, and I miss him greatly since he died.)

I think my sister-in-law's marriage lasted maybe ten years; the love in that marriage, fancy wedding and all, was gone well before that.

After many decades, I'm still very much in love with my wife, and the only thing I ask of her is to let me die first, because I couldn't live without her.

In those rare times our wedding comes up, I point out that it is much better if the wedding sucks and the marriage is wonderful than it is the other way around. Now we giggle about it.

The most beautiful thing in my life, by far, is my marriage, and my life has been filled with other beautiful things, but above them all comes the decades with the woman with whom I tied the knot under very sloppy haphazard conditions.

[radical noodle]

45. I'm so sorry you couldn't be there

They aren't the only ones. A family friend had a wedding planned for yesterday and didn't find out until Monday that it had all fallen apart. There was no honeymoon planned, just a nice ceremony at a state park with family and close friends. They decided to wait and do it later because they wanted their loved ones to be with them. I know it's a tough choice for any couple faced with this.

Best wishes to your son and his wife.

[IrishEyes]

46. Congratulations to your son and his new spouse.

[littlemissmartypants]

47. Congratulations and Best Wishes to the happy couple!

Stay encouraged, Joe Nation.



❤ lmsp

[denbot]

48. What's that pithy movie line..

Oh yeah, “life, uh, finds a way”.

[SunSeeker]

49. Mazel Tov!