A successful canoe ride(!) from the church. Dylan (bassist from Glint) needed to get to New England that weekend as well, since he had a gig back in Braintree, so we found ourselves scurrying around New York Thursday evening with our respective weekend luggage, trying to make the 8:00 “Fung Wah” Chinatown bus to Boston. I do like any excuse to get into the city... it was a nice day to be outside and nice to have a travel companion to shmooze and take in the city scenery with. We met a yoga instructor on the train from Nyack… if I may make a generalization here, I’ve found that people involved with yoga tend to be very socially comfortable people.
Right. The wedding. It was such a nice change of scenery (and weather… in the 70’s!). It took place in the rural Vermont town of Greensboro, in the northern part of the state, probably only an hour from Canada. We’re talking, don’t-leave-the-water-running-too-long, “take a left down the dirt road and follow that for a mile or so” Vermont. Very pretty, and peaceful… right on a lake. The ceremony took place at the town church, but the rest of the weekend was centered around the Matteson’s summer house, just up the road. This thing was built in 1912 by (I’m guessing) Myles’ great grandfather (maybe great-great?) and is –huge-. The Mattesons will tell you it sleeps 22 people. They had done a lot of work on it since I’d seen it years ago and it looked amazing.
I got a real kick out of being a groomsman. Being part of that “team,” not just a guest. There were –seven- of us (including my brother), more than I’ve ever heard of at a wedding. It was fun being an usher, all spiffed out in my suit, seating aunts and grandmothers. Heh. Myles had asked me to play piano for the processional, a song off of Dominique’s recent album (she is an excellent singer and harpist) and it went off without a hitch. And I don’t think I’ve ever been to a wedding where church bells actually rang after the ceremony. I was kind of tickled at that one.
La famille Selesnick.It was one of those days where you felt tired before your normal bedtime because of all the activity (er, for those of us going to bed around midnight). Lots of contra dancing… a short-lived but nice Clan Du reunion set… Dad, Jeff, and I played some jazz, again at Myles’ request, amongst all the Celtic and folk music and musicians, which was well received… kegs of Smuttynose beer, a New Hampshire microbrew… some frisbee action… nice to see my family again… don’t try mixing white wine with fruit punch because it’s about as good an idea as mixing Magic Hat #9 beer with vanilla ice cream (what moron and his friend Hogan would do such a thing?)… awesome. At night we had a huge bonfire on the back lawn, complete with a very Wet Hot American Summer/Napoleon Dynamite end-of-the-movie-weird-guy-proving-himself-at-the-talent-show fire dancing exhibition by the day’s token weird kid, backed up by Mike MacNintch, friend of the Mattesons, on bagpipes. It was actually pretty cool, kind of like a raver with glowsticks, except with three-foot long ball-and-chain things on –fire-. Yeah. I was impressed.
The new extended family.
Oh! Heh. And the bachelor party. No, no strippers, nothing like that. The groomsmen and some friends “kidnapped” Myles from an all-too-peaceful Friday evening post-dinner shmooze session, blindfolded him (read: someone threw a t-shirt over his head), threw him in the back of the van, and drove off to a field to have a bonfire and cookout. We toasted and “here-here”-d, told stories and limericks, drank good beer (a nice change of pace from all the PBR and Milwaukee’s Best at the Nyack apartment parties) and ate way too many s’mores and American cheese-topped hot dogs.
Jeff and Ted in the van after successfully kidnapping Myles.
Overall, a great weekend. Congrats to Myles and Dom. And props to the Mattesons for putting on such an affair.
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