One year ago today I married Nikki Myhill. Nikki, an otherwise intelligent woman, agreed to marry me for love. That worked well, because I am always skint (look it up).
We chose the Butterfly Conservatory in Niagara Falls as our venue. Nikki arrived late, as is the prerogative of brides. A wardrobe malfunction (a broken zip) had her careening around to the dress maker for emergency repairs. She was literally sewn back into her dress. The dress maker gave her an early wedding present for me: A stitch ripper. Once Nikki arrived everything went smoothly. She was given away by son David. Maid of Honour was BFF Jackie and Best Man was my brother Andy. Ring bearer (looking spectacularly unlike a Hobbit) was Anthony, though when it came to it he didn’t want to cooperate and ran in the other direction. All part of the fun.
During the vows my brother, who was standing directly behind me, kept gently blowing down the back of my neck. I ignored him and just kept smiling. Nice try, ‘bro. I had set up the camera to record the wedding video, but was under instruction from Nikki not to touch it during the event or suffer confiscation of aforementioned stitch ripper. I left the camera alone.
After the ceremony there was much shaking of hands and hugging before we all headed off to the Skylon Tower for a buffet meal, where Nikki and I shared our first dance. We even managed to score some free birthday cake for sister-in-law Jean, for indeed it was her birthday. Note, September is a hard month for us to arrange events, because it is so full of birthdays and other anniversaries. Mom on the 6th, daughter Vicky on the 7th. Various deaths, and of course Jean. I chose not to conflict with Vicky’s birthday, and as the 21st was the only other Saturday available, Jean has from now on to share her birthday with our anniversary. All good.
From the Skylon we went into Niagara Falls. Specifically, Margaritaville. Bad idea. We chose a night where two other wedding parties were in, and 50% of the bar staff had called in sick. End result, Nikki, still wearing her wedding dress, had to wait at the bar for 45 minutes before being served. Really, a woman in an actual wedding dress should get a little priority, don’t you think? This kind of put a dampener on the festivities, so we slid next door to the adjoining hotel instead. It had a bar. A bloody expensive one, but at least we could get served.
A few drinks later the night was over and we all slipped back to our rooms. There was no stitch ripping. There was sleep. Followed the next morning by a full fried breakfast with the family before we all wound our weary ways home, Nikki and I electing to crash on the couch and head off on honeymoon the next morning. Honeymoon being a 5,381km road trip, we wanted to be fresh. Our thinking was this: If we can survive a two week road trip, stuck in a car together, then we are going to be fine.
We not only survived it, we enjoyed it. Taking in Quebec, Montreal, and the joys and sights of New Brunswick, Nova Scotia and Cape Breton we saw a little of everything that makes the eastern Canadian seaboard so beautiful. But that, as they say, is another story. This one is over and in closing, I have only one thing to say. Happy Anniversary, my love.