Wedding With Old Friends

So Wifey met Jeannette in Junior High School in Brooklyn -- around the same time she met her BFF Edna.  I met Jeannette in '83, when she came down from NYC for a visit -- she was married to Bob, and they owned a breakfast and lunch place in Queens.  A few years later, they moved to the 305 -- Jeannette's parents, her Cuban Jewish Dad, and Honduran Jewish Mom, were living in North Beach, along with Larry, Jeannette's mentally ill brother.

They're delightful people.  Samantha was born a few years after the move, and we watched her grow into a delightful woman.  Her younger sister Erica, just a few months younger than D1, likewise blossomed into a terrific young lady.  Sam is now a family lawyer in town, and Erica is an exec for a Miami tour company.  Last night Erica got married.

The Ds and Sam and Erica grew up together. Sam was the elder stateswoman -- she babysat the younger girls, and last night D1 was remembering how D2 was their little mascot -- the one asked to play inanimate objects when they put on their many shows -- a la Gilda Radner's famous SNL skit.

So last night Wifey and I drove up to Miami Springs -- to the Curtiss House -- a restored historical property where, that's right, Glenn Curtiss lived until his death in 1930.  He build a Southwestern style adobe place, for reasons known only to him.  Then again, he also build Opa Locka -- an Arabian themed city in NW Miami.  Neither vision took off as well as Curtiss's planes, but his mansion exists, right on the Springs gold course, and it was a lovely venue.

Chairs were set up under a bower of trees.  The skies threatened rain, but never came through, thankfully.  Samantha performed the ceremony.  It was lovely.

Erica married Rene, a young Nicaraguan American fellow who was first her friend at the tour company.  It was a recapitulation of her parents' story -- Jeannette and Bob met as co workers at a Brooklyn movie theatre, in the 70s.

After the ceremony, we repaired to the courtyard of the mansion, and a food truck parked outside fed us as we drank and caught up.

D2 was unable to attend, but D1 and Joey Ubered over.  D1 and Samantha relived their childhoods.  It was moving.

Erica's best friend from Palmetto Middle gave the maid of honor speech.  She's a white Jamaican, and told a tale of thinking she had met a fellow oddity -- Erica was blonde with corn rows --  Ashley figured she was Jamaican, too.  Ashley promised she would murder Rene if he ever hurt her sister of another mister.  Rene said he wouldn't disappoint her -- and planned to stay alive.

We left before the Cuban dancers performed -- we drove D1 and Joey back to Midtown -- Dadber is better than Uber.

On the way home, Wifey noted how we rarely see Jeannette and Bob lately, but when we do, we pick up as if there had been no time passing.  She's right.

So another young couple has only just begun, as the Carpenters sang.  It was lovely to be a part of it.