K-Nel's Wedding

(Better late than never!)

Houston, Texas, March 10-12, 2006

Friday:
Since there is no classier way to start off a wedding weekend than trying to sneak five people into a hotel as “two people,” that is exactly what Ross, Vilas, Vivek, Gaurav and I did upon arriving in Houston……only to discover that five wedding gift bags had been placed in our room, and we weren’t fooling anyone. In keeping with this trend of sophistication, we promptly went back out to dine in style at Hooters (but not before I managed to get lost in the hotel parking lot because I exited the hotel via a different door from everyone else).

Back at the hotel after dinner, a Jessi vs. Ross, Gaurav, Vivek and Vilas pillow whomping ensued, in which my primary defense was trying to give the boys vicious paper cuts with the hotel room’s “Do Not Disturb” sign. When they finally let me catch my breath, I sipped my water as I recovered from the whomping and sighed, “Oh, water…..” Gaurav somehow determined this was the beginning of a big speech that went something like, “Oh, water….giver of life…quencher of thirst,” and kept repeating this throughout the weekend. After the whomping, we pulled the King James Bible out of the nightstand drawer to check out some stories. Among our favorites were The Calling of Abraham (“Abraham! Your pie is ready!”), and one in which Vivek paraphrased the man and woman’s attraction as, “and they didst become of horn.”

After those bedtime stories, we went to sleep. And by “went to sleep” I mean the guys snuggled into their beds while I was forcibly removed from the beds and was banished to the floor on the air mattress. At least they didn’t step on the air mattress to bounce me awake throughout the night and the following morning. Oh wait, that’s exactly what they did.



Saturday: The Big Day!
While we heard Kristin shouting and running down the hotel hallway that morning, we didn’t actually have a Kristin sighting until the ceremony. She looked gorgeous, although not quite as stunning as Jim Hammack, whom we saw for the first time in five years when we met up with him in the church parking lot just before the ceremony. When we pulled in and saw a guy with a beard and a long ponytail, “wouldn’t it be funny if that were Jim,” turned into “Holy crap, what happened to Jim?” Our first words to him were when Gaurav rolled down the window and poignantly asked him, “Dude, are you Amish?”

The wedding ceremony was a blend of vows in French and English (very cool), various pronunciations of Xavier’s name by the preacher (funny), and lots of singing performances (prompting Jim to rename the ceremony “Kristin and Xavier: The Musical”). True to form, Kristin seemed relaxed and was smiling and laughing throughout the entire ceremony. Also true to form, Mrs. Nelson excitedly greeted us after the ceremony—even Jim, whom she clearly didn’t recognize at first but politely greeted while her face said “who is Kristin’s Amish buddy?” I promptly returned Mrs. Nelson’s fervent greeting by nearly unraveling her dress when my bracelet got caught on it while I was hugging her. This resulted in an awkward dance where we hugged, and then instead of both of us stepping back, I stepped toward her again, with one arm still around her, saying, “Uh, sorry, I think my bracelet is caught on your dress….”

Knowing we would likely be the most obnoxious guests at the reception, we grabbed a table in the corner of the room. Gaurav proceeded to snap pictures of Vivek demonstrating the centerpieces, chairs and other decorations, so that Gaurav could show these decorating ideas to Priya for their wedding, and also so that we could look like a bunch of wedding tourists. Our favorite part of the table setup was the “Mint to Be” box of mints we each received, which we of course decided we needed to throw across the table into each other’s mouths. We also enjoyed the flower petals on the table—Ross ate a few because Vivek promised him $2, and Vivek then complained that he didn’t have any petals. Vivek’s next move was to look up at the ceiling and say “Hey Ross!” Ross replied, without looking up, “yes, I know—there are mirrors in the ceiling.” It was also fun catching up with Jim, who had some good stories, including updates on his sister Bonnie being a “violent radical” (which caused a stranger to turn and look at us, verifying that the corner table WAS a good idea).

Mrs. Nelson was cute and made a big fuss about how happy they were that the Holland group could attend the wedding, and introduced us to her friend. She then enthusiastically gestured toward Ross and proclaimed to her friend, “This young man used to date Kristin!” Mrs. Nelson’s friend asked if she could hang out at our table because she said it looked like we were having a lot of fun. She could have hung out at the little kids’ table and found about the same maturity level.

We ran into a few ASH people at the wedding, including Chris Olsen’s mom, who had the following exchange with Ross, Gaurav and Vilas:
Mrs. Olsen: Ross Conkey?
Ross: Who the hell are you?
Mrs. Olsen: I’m Mrs. Olsen!
Ross: Oh, hi!
She then talked to them for ten minutes about what was going on in their lives, and then suddenly said, “So, do you remember Chris?” (perhaps thinking that Ross and Gaurav playing on the basketball team with him may not have been enough to make him memorable to them in the crowded 250-person high school we attended.)

We also met one of Kristin’s friends from Austin, Elysia. We thought it was pretty cool that she came to the wedding by herself, not knowing anyone, and was going around introducing herself to people and being sociable. So we sort of adopted her as part of our group for the night and included her in our post-reception plans, which ended up being a trip to a local bar to hang out with John Nelson, some other wedding guests, and eventually Kristin and Xavier. I’m surprised Elysia wanted to hang out with us at all after Ross, Vivek and Gaurav proved themselves to be true gentlemen, when she approached them and asked “who wants to dance” and they all pointed to each other.

We had a few drinks at the bar, caught up with John on the latest ASH gossip, talked to Kristin and Xavier for a little while, and then returned to our hotel room to admire all the unopened beer we had left waiting for us in the bathroom sink, and for—surprise, surprise—more whomping. We also had a series of intelligent conversations like the following:

Me: It’s cool that they’re planning to stay a few years in Austin and then maybe go to France for a few years.

Vilas: Wow, they have their lives so planned out—I don’t even know what I’m doing next week!

Me: Well, it’s not like they said, “We’re going to be moving to France on Monday of 2008”…..But I guess no one would have said exactly that……

And guess who slept on the air mattress again that night?



Sunday
So, we sort of told Kristin we’d try to meet her for breakfast, but when we woke up around 11:00, we figured that ship had sailed. We then had to go our separate ways—Ross and Vilas to the Greyhound bus station to catch their bus to Memphis, Vivek and Gaurav to Boston, me to DC—but not before I received the greatest gift of all. Ross (perhaps inspired by Gaurav thoughtfully tugging on my colorful, chunky necklace and saying “I feel like something should happen when I pull on this”) presented me with a bracelet crafted from the finest ivory-colored Hefty trash bag I’d ever seen.

On that note, we all parted ways for the weekend, knowing our paths would NEVER cross again until the following week..…