ASSOCIATES (vol. 5, no. 3, March 1999) - associates.ucr.edu

        Well, our story actually begins the day of the wedding. My fiance and I had just finished moving my belongings across country, from Wisconsin to California, a few days before. We had made the trip with a Windstar minivan and a 12 foot trailer, hauling along my 2 cats and 2 parrots in the van with us. Along the way we made overnight stops in Springfield (MO), Amarillo (TX), Holbrook (AZ) and San Bernardino (CA). We also stopped to see the big meteor crater in Arizona too. Take my advice--never EVER go through the El Cajon pass above San Bernardino at night, especially while hauling a trailer. It will give you many more gray hairs than you started with!

        Anyway, we finally made it and got somewhat settled in, but that wasn't the end of our troubles--only the beginning.

        The day of the wedding came along not long after we arrived in California. Our wedding was a small one, so small that the bride and groom (us) were putting on our own reception and my fiance had to go over to Sam's Club to pick up our cake and the munchies we planned on having. We both forgot that Saturday crowds at Sam's were awful and it took him an hour just to get checked out. He got home late and I was frantically waiting for him.

        Now we were ALMOST ready to go but we still hadn't been able to find any one to babysit my parrots. Since we were leaving for a short Las Vegas honeymoon right after the wedding, we had to pack up my birds and bring them along too. Traffic was terrible and we had a hard time getting out of the house early enough. By the time we got the the wedding, we were already 20 minutes late for it and the minister was thinking we had either gotten killed in an accident or had eloped without telling him!

        We rushed into the chapel, dragging the birds along in their carriers and the food. While the minister's wife graciously set up the table for us in the chapel's large foyer, I tried to squeeze into my wedding dress. I knew the dress was too small when it first arrived (having ordered it through a web bridal service) but we hadn't had time to get it altered. It also had a small problem--the bodice would flop open and I might as well be topless!

        With help from lady friends already there, I got the bodice pinned up but it still was so revealing that I had to hold my bouquet up in front of my chest to keep from flashing the minister. In the meantime, my birds were settled down in the ladies dressing room, which was close enough to the small chapel that the birds' whistles and calls could be heard plainly throughout the area.

        The wedding got started and while it was a beautiful service, we could still hear calls of "hallooo", coughing and "hi!" all through the ceremony. It was my birds trying to get attention and they were doing it loudly. Coughing is one of their specialties--they picked it up when I had a bad bout of the flu, and if you didn't know it was birds, you might think there was a pulmonary ward in the back of the chapel. The guests stifled their giggles.

        After the wedding, everyone clamored to meet the birds. The bride and groom were forgotten! I had to go get a t-shirt on over my dress so I could put my bouquet down and my shoes hurt so badly, I went barefoot for most of the reception. Luckily it was a short one.

        But that still didn't answer the problem of what to do with the birds on our honeymoon. We were hoping the minister and his wife would take them (the minister was my new husband's brother) but it turned out that they couldn't. So we packed up the birds again and guess where they went? On our honeymoon with us!

        Luckily, the birds are good travelers and we managed to sneak them into our hotel without a problem, even when bringing in two large cages! There are advantages to staying in small chain hotels instead of the big glitzy ones in Las Vegas---they have back entry ways! Things went fine after that and we got home without incident. But everyone who went to our wedding that day will always say it was a wedding for the birds!

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