The "Do Run Run"

Isn't this a pretty house? It is in Lake Providence, Louisiana which is an otherwise wretched little town not too far from the Arkansas state line. I was thinking of Jennifer Willbanks the other night and these ruminations brought back memories of this stately old home. You may be asking, "What in God's name does an old house in East Carroll Parish, Louisiana got to do with the "Runaway Bride?" Bear with me. All will be revealed in the fullness of time.

By now everybody has heard about the so-called "Runaway Bride" from North Georgia who told the authorities she had been kidnapped when in reality she was merely freaked over the huge high society wedding she had planned with her fiance. As you may recall, half the town went searching for her all over when in reality she was on a Greyhound bound for Las Vegas. When she finally turned herself in and her kidnapping revealed to be the scam that it was, there was much outrage on the part of the citizens and the cops.

I have recently become friends with an exceedingly proper woman from over in those parts. She knows many of the players. She even knows the prosecutor. And being a proper Georgia girl, she went into apoplexy the other night at the mere mention of RB's name and the recent news that she has sold her story to a production company who will make it into a movie. "Why that girl's crazy." she hissed. " She's been nothing but trouble. She's been arrested a couple of times for shoplifting. Now this. It's just not right that she should profit from her wrong-doing."

And so on.

Me? I got no problem with her making a buck if she can do it. After all, this is America where one person's difficult circumstances is another's "reality show." And I can kinda see RB's point about the wedding Nothing brings out the serious weirdness like a High Society wedding in the South. Granted, she ought not to have troubled the FBI and all with her personal problems. ( Parenthetically, I loved what the female FBI agent told RB when her story started falling apart: " We can't start a federal investigation just because you have cold feet, Jennifer." Hear, Hear!) But getting back to the nuptials, I have been in a bunch of these affairs and I could have told RB that she would have been better off to take the money it would have cost to put the damn thing on and to elope.

The following are TRUE STORIES from some of the weddings I have been in:

My first HS wedding was a Baptist affair I was singing for over at the old Immanuel Baptist Church here in Little Rock. The father of the groom was a local politician and the bride was some doctor's daughter. About an hour before the actual service began, the groom, who I knew a little, came up to me.

" Ummmm, about how long do you think it will take you to get through the Lord's Prayer?" he asked.

" I dunno. You were there last night at the rehearsal. Why?"

" Well, could you maybe speed it up? The less time we are all up there standing together, the better."

" I'm not sure I follow you."

He fidgeted and rubbed his forehead. " After the rehearsal dinner, we all went back to the hotel where we all stated drinking. And we all got pretty drunk I have to say."

" Okay?"

" C (the bride) was tired and went to her room."

" Okay? What's that got to do with the music? Do we need to speed it up because she is not feeling well?"

" No, we need to speed it up because I f_ _ _ _ _ the Maid of Honor. Who is all pissed off at me now. And the less time those two spend standing next to each other the better."

I went and told the organist that we needed to do the presto version of the "Lord's Prayer" before eyes were clawed out and bouquets were hurled.

He just shrugged his shoulders. "Something like this always happens at one of these big deals. People just go nuts." he said. "Either that or the groom makes a pass at me."

I never saw any of the wedding party again. The last I heard, the Bride and Groom got divorced and he and the Maid of Honor got married in Houston where they have lived happily ever after.

So some good did come out of this.

The second really big HS wedding I was in was a grand affair between a couple of my law school classmates in Birmingham, Alabama. The bride came from the toast of Birmingham society. Her father was a prominent physician in addition to having a considerable reputation as a rake. Her mother was a southern fried version of a woman straight out of Eugene O'Neill or Edward Albee depending on how much vodka she had in her. The groom's parents were Ozzie and Harriet by comparison.

F. Scott Fitzgerald once made the famous observation that the rich are different than you and I. I don't think that Fitzgerald had ever encountered Birmingham society. Otherwise, he might have said that the rich are more useless and relentlessly supercilious than you and I. Never had I been surrounded by more completely worthless human beings and never have I since. The small talk at the numerous parties given throughout the week were mind numbingly vapid recitations about golf scores, investments, SEC football and all the women the bride's father was hitting on.

Some examples: Upon identifying myself as being from Arkansas to one lady she said, "They fought. They fought."

Upon telling one gentleman that I was an attorney, said, "You work. How unfortunate." This same gallant bastard went on to tell me that he had plea and arraignment coming up on a DUI case in which he had run a police roadblock. Which I am certain amused the Birmingham cops to no end at the time.

" I told the officers that due to the bursitis in my shoulder I was not able to cut the wheel quickly enough." he said with a straight face. They are wrongfully insisting that I was drunk despite the fact that I told them about my bursitis. I intend to take this up with the judge and I will have some badges before this is over."

Finally, after the brunch before the wedding, it came time to clear the tables. A large epicene man who taught art at a local high school was in charge of the decorations. He enlisted the help of some matronly types in removing the orchids that festooned each table. He flitted about crying, "Quickly, quickly! Remove the orchids before the nigras get them."

All of these things I saw and heard in Birmingham, Alabama. Just for fun, repeat these quotes in your most ridiculous southern accent, preferably after consuming 3 glasses of Rebel Yell. That should give you the flavor of it.

Finally, let us turn to the house at the top of the page. The reason this house figures so prominently in my personal history is that the last really decent fistfight I ever got myself into was within the confines of its stately walls. During guess what? A reception after the rehearsal dinner at a HS wedding in Lake Providence.

Let me provide some background. Another one of my law school buddies was marrying a girl who was nominally from Lake Providence. I say nominally because K was packed off to boarding school about the time she started eating solid food. My buddy S came from a working class Polish family out in Scranton or something. He was serving in Army Jag in Ft. Dix, NJ at the time and this would be where he and K would make their home. This went over big with some of the bride's family as you might imagine. As also did the initial decision of the groom's party (all in the JAG Corps) to wear their dress blues in the wedding. The groom quickly realized that their waltzing into the church wearing the uniform of the Army of the Invader might evoke certain unpleasant memories, especially in the elderly in attendance, and they drove to Monroe to rent tuxedos.

So tensions were high by the time I got down there from Little Rock and C, another classmate, got up there from Thibodeaux.

Let us cut to the chase. After the rehearsal dinner, we all went to a reception at the house in the picture. After drinks were served, toasts were made and eventually it came time for the poems written by the bridesmaids. It is SOP in southern weddings for the bridesmaids to recite poems written by them for the occasion usually commemorating events known only to them or to family. As I did not expect any of this insipid doggerel to make me forget Wallace Stevens, I felt that my time was more wisely spent in the back catching up on news with C. And this is where the trouble started.

I immediately was set upon by one of the bride's family, a med student who accused me of " not taking our traditions down here serious enough" thereby causing he and his family great offense.

" You got to be f_ _ _ _ _ _ kidding me!" I explained, trying to be helpful. Whereupon he attempted to perform neurosurgery on me with a beer bottle.

Naturally C, being both Cajun and drunk, pulled me off so that he could take a crack at him. After all, fistfights are to wedding receptions in Acadiana as goofyass poetry is to receptions in the rest of the South. Not much came of it as the altercation was quickly put down by cooler heads. And after an exchange of a few more high words, we took our leave. But not before stealing a cooler of beer that was foolishly left unguarded on the porch.

This was many years ago. We have all settled into our lives and careers. In fact, rumor has it that C is on the short list to be a federal judge down there.

I spoke to him on the phone not too long ago.

" You think that the FBI will ever find out about that night in Lake Providence when they do the background investigation?" he asked.

" They will if they ask me." I said, trying as usual to be helpful.

My friend from Georgia, who incidentally just returned herself from a big wedding in Atlanta in which a makeup artist was flown in from New York for the bride and her attendants conceded that it was all a bit much. (The only other useful information I have gleaned about the event was that the bride was fortified at all times by Bloody Marys and valium.)

"But you know what?", she said. "If that boy goes ahead and marries the Runaway Bride, he's even crazier than her. After all, life doesn't often give you such a good 'head's up' that you are marrying a nut."

So maybe he will have an attack of sense and we will have a "Runaway Groom."

Hope he gets a good deal on the movie rights!