Second Time’s a Charm

One of the most memorable weddings I ever officiated was also the most unique. Most weddings are attended by a mixture of loving family and special friends. Large or small, the couple gets an audience. The bare minimum you need for a lawful wedding in most states is five. There are the two mates, an officiant (or judge), and two witnesses. Every five person wedding I have officiated made my heart happy. Maybe it is the intimacy of it, or perhaps I just got lucky enough to meet some really awesome people. Either way, they all left an impression.

The wedding I won’t ever forget was between a bride and groom with a wild history. Their story involved a previous stint as bride and groom. In fact, this couple had already been married many years ago. Here’s the tale. Let’s call the groom Clyde, and the bride Bonnie.

So Bonnie and Clyde met like most couples through mutual friends. They started dating, fell in love, and decided to tie the knot. Happiness ensued, and that happiness produced two children. As the children started to sprout, something unfortunate happened. It wasn’t that they stopped caring about each other, but their marriage began to crack. It didn’t involve heavy fighting, unfaithfulness, or even irreconcilable differences. But fall apart it did.

They got a divorce. Only they remained friends. They co-parented. They went on adventures, holiday outings, and school events together. Bonnie and Clyde loved their two kids, and in a way they still loved each other.

As the years passed, they thought it made logical sense to pursue other relationships. Eventually, they found other companions. After much time with these new partners, they reasoned that it only made sense to marry them. So they both remarried.

Did this affect their kids, their joint parenting, their friendship? No. All those pieces remained interlocked. Meanwhile, their new marriages didn’t produce any more children.

I think you can guess what happened next. Those new marriages didn’t make it. I’m sure those spouses reasoned that after the knot was tied, this strange connection between these two divorcees would change. But it didn’t.

This part of the story is challenging, because any kind of separation of two people who connect their lives through marriage is special, and it is sad when that connection is broken. But that is part of the human experience. We live, we love, we fail, we fail again, we grow, we try harder, and so on and so forth. This wasn’t a part of the story that Bonnie and Clyde were proud of, nevertheless, it was how the scene played out.

I actually thought about leaving this part out, as to write more of a fairy tale. Only that would actually diminish the story, because it’s inauthentic. My own story has so many ups and downs, and so does yours. Why sanitize another’s journey, when it’s those low spots that allow us to empathize with one another. Not all of us have experienced that accomplishment when you reach the mountain top, but we all know what it feels like to slip and fall backwards.

Bonnie and Clyde, both feeling a little strange after two divorces decided it wasn’t worth trying again. Besides, they still had their children. They still had their friendship. They could still find purpose and joy through their quirky family situation.

Then came the day when the kids grew up. They both graduated from high school, moved out, and started living their own lives. Without this common link, what would happen to their friendship?

Now you definitely know where the story goes. They kept hanging out. They still talked, only the conversations got deeper. One day, their exchange took a turn when they wondered aloud why they had gotten divorced in the first place?

As they dug deep, they realized that apart from returning to different neighborhoods at the end of the day, not much had changed from their first years together. Although legally they had separated, they hadn’t stopped needing each other. Their love had taken one strange road trip, but they hadn’t ever fully exited the vehicle.

It was at that point that they reengaged their original courtship. But they were very cautious at first, taking things slow. They told no one. It was their own private secret. The result of that experiment is what led them to me. They called once they had determined to remarry. They told me their story, and I shaped a unique wedding script around it.

The wedding day happened at a beautiful location. Red and yellow flowers hovered above green grass. White and green aspen trees waved in the foreground, while snow-tipped mountains rested in the background. Bonnie and Clyde were joined by me, a photographer, and the owner of the venue (those two served as witnesses). I felt honored to be a tiny part of their amazing journey back together.

After the ceremony, they told me they had one more thing to do. They were about to call their children. As I said, their evolving relationship had been a secret. They explained that their children wanted them to reunite. They had dreamed of it for many years. Knowing this, they couldn’t risk hurting them if the new relationship didn’t blossom. Anything short of marriage would have been heartbreaking. With that possibility now evaporated, they could finally tell their children that their family was whole once again.

That final part moved me to tears. So I made my exit, imagining the incredible emotions that call was about to create. This wedding happened many years ago, but I still think about it often. Yes, love is a funny thing, but when it is real, it is undeniable.