And so Maybelle’s niece has gotten married. At 22, her niece is the same age her mother was when she married in 1973. Back then, Maybelle’s oldest sister, Emma Rae, was kind enough to have her 12-year-old, chubby-cheeked baby sister—that would be Maybelle—in her wedding. Maybelle was quite proud to be included, and it made her feel terribly grown-up.

         No one bothered to school Maybelle in the finer points of wedding etiquette however, because when Emma Rae threw the bouquet Maybelle practically mowed down her middle sister, Theodora, to catch the flying flowers as they arced through the front yard of their family’s home.

         Although Maybelle was usually quite the sensitive and well-behaved child, on this day she did not realize it was proper for the bouquet to land in the eager palms of a more age-appropriate girl. After someone pointed out her gaffe, of course Maybelle apologized and handed over the blooms to Theodora, who was gracious about the whole thing. Then Maybelle asked her mother if she could change out of her bridesmaid’s dress and put on some play clothes.

         Having defied tradition so blatantly, Maybelle wondered later if she might have jinxed Theodora’s chances of finding a soul mate of her own. Maybelle needn’t have worried, though, for Theodora and her husband tied the knot in 1981 and have been married for some 27 years now. Maybelle, on the other hand, did not make her way down the aisle until she was 40. (Six weeks shy of her 41^st birthday if you must know.) Maybe the delay was some sort of cosmic payback for the unladylike bouquet-snatching episode of her youth.

         As Maybelle’s family gathered in Birmingham for her niece’s wedding, she assured the blushing bride she would be on her best behavior. “My flower stealing days are over,” Maybelle promised. The odds would have been against Maybelle anyway, what with her arthritic knees and some 12 taffeta-clad girls to overpower. She did, however, muster up the energy and wherewithal to spend an inordinate amount of time on the dance floor with wedding attendants, family members, and perfect strangers, gyrating to “Tighten Up” as if she had been told it would be her last opportunity to do so.

         Even today, many months after the wedding, each night as Maybelle lays her head on the pillow she prays she will not wake up to find a video of her antics on YouTube, for more than once she has been accused of dancing “like nobody’s watching.” Thankfully Maybelle’s husband, Precious, who is not the gyrating type and instead prefers to stand on the sidelines and smirk, does not know how to work the camera on his cell phone.

         When the time came for Maybelle’s niece to toss her own bouquet, it separated into several smaller clusters so multiple girls could catch them…some newfangled invention called a “breakaway bouquet.” My how things have changed since 1973.

         Maybelle didn’t throw the bouquet at her own wedding in 2002. Something about heaving a tightly wound bunch of lilies toward a room full of middle-aged guests—many of whom were shocked even to be witnessing her betrothal—chewing on crudités seemed a bit unseemly at Maybelle’s advancing age. There was no ripping off of the garter, no smushing of cake into the faces of the bride and groom. Just a man and a woman coming together—a bit love weary but still full of hope—vowing to make the best life they could with one another.

Copyright Amy Lyles Wilson, 2008