It all started a few weeks ago, when I got a wedding invitation from co-workers at my second job. (I bag groceries on weekends to fatten up my Acapulco fund.) She is a cashier and he hauls the produce from the truck to the bin. (Legend has it that they met 26 years ago at this very store when he was about to mop up what a customer had spilled and she slipped in that goo before he had a chance to do his thing. He and his bucket rounded the corner just as she was doing the arm-swing thing to keep her balance…he rushed over to save her and it was love at first tumble.) They're a family acquainted with, shall we say, the 'Tobacco Road' side-of-town culture! When I joined their 'supermarket community' two years ago, they had 2 daughters, 5 grandkids, and not a husband in sight. So when I got the invitation, I decided to go out of what I freely admit is curiosity of my middle-class morality: I wanted to see how they would handle a wedding where they had already put the cart before the horse and the horse had walked one gollywhopper of a bridle trail!

My amusement began when I walked into the church, which is as 'Baptist' as Baptist can be…there was a section of the bulletin board set aside for information about hunting and fishing tours. I sat down in the chapel and could feel the eyeballs turn my direction as they must have wondered, 'Who is this guy with the matching jacket-pants combo and full set of teeth?' And as I looked around back at 'em, there was a gent across the aisle whose shirt label could only have said 'Capri Lanes Collection by Brunswick Automatic Pin Spotters." You could almost smell the bowling ball wax. However, all was not lost; there was one fella with some class: his tie had pictures not of Garth Brooks or Billy Ray Cyrus, but the Rolling Stones! Yes - Mick and company immortalized on a garment that didn't have torn-off sleeves or their punctured-tongue logo!

The music brought us back to our business at hand and in comes the bridal party. Six well-coiffed young ladies wearing matching dresses and matching shawls of a color that doesn't exist in nature. As their shawls began to dip while they walked down the aisle, the tattoos on their shoulders became clearly visible. The bride's elder sister, who is a mondo-freckled strawberry blonde, had an especially large butterfly whose outline was barely visible through all those freckles on her back. (Only a couple of gals fell into this category, I must admit.)

Next came the flower girl, who is blondie's older daughter. She looked simply charming in her white dress and tiara. But was she carrying flowers? No...she was carrying a baby, dressed in precisely the same outfit (well, a little smaller)...a real case of 'mini-me'!

Last we have the blushing bride, escorted up the aisle by her proud papa. For the occasion, Fred had his ponytail tightly braided and held in place by a thin ribbon. Real consideration, he has.

The ceremony began with an invocation delivered by a well-heeled reverend, as most of these things do, and it was all one would expect out of a somewhat traditional June wedding. It took a left-turn halfway through when a young woman, dressed in an orange dress that looked more at home in an Australian's nightmare got up and began to spew forth strange sounds. I quickly recognized it as a song. It is my humble opinion that this girl was getting in some practice time before trying to pass her next "Star Search" audition. It was even bad by Country & Western standards! She sang once more before the ceremony came to an end. I assume we'll have to pay for the song books, since the pages were the only things nearby that we could use to wad up as improvised ear plugs, in the absence of cotton balls.

Vows exchanged, traditions upheld, and time for the receiving line. Fred and Winona were glad to see me, as I them. It was reassuring to see that they were able to refit Winona's upper plate so it didn't droop to the right every time she started a sentence with a vowel. When I passed by the elder daughter, she promptly introduced me to her husband. Miracle of miracles! I was thrilled that she finally had a fella who wasn't gonna get away so easy. Being the astute social gorilla I am, I kept my 'wanted to say' and 'had to say' brain centers at a safe distance from each other:

HAD TO SAY: Glad to meet you. I'm Cal Ellis, her folks' co-worker.

WANTED TO SAY: Glad to meet you. I'm Cal Ellis, her folks' co-worker. How many of her kids are yours?

When I finally worked my way to the happy couple, the blushing bride was thrilled to see the guy whose Doberman-Spaniel mix (I'll save that story for another time) adopted her as one of the family. Likewise, I was equally thrilled to see younger sister Collene, sans skinned knees and elbows for a change. After the brief introduction to her husband, the brain centers were once again kept 20 paces apart:

HAD TO SAY: Congratulations! Glad to meet you. I'm Cal Ellis, her folks' co-worker.

WANTED TO SAY: Congratulations! Glad to meet you. I'm Cal Ellis, her folks' co-worker. So did the tests come back positive, or sumptin'?

Once outside and ready to cast the environmentally-correct bird seed upon the young newlyweds, I spotted some of the things I missed inside. Most prominent was a young man whose years of weightlifting had obviously paid off, but must have ended up squeezing a few blood vessels to the brain. He was attending this happy event wearing a (clean and no-holes!) black t-shirt and suspenders. Next to him was a woman I am assuming -- by her choice of apparel -- is the mother of Miss Star Search Reject. She wore a dress that prominently showed off her tattoo...and it wasn't on her back, folks, if you know where I'm coming from! (And she was certainly proud of them, Oops! I mean, 'it'.)

Finally, the bride & groom left the church, pelted by all this bird seed. They entered a waiting limo...a stretch Caddy, all shiny and new...and driven by a chauffer decked out in his West Virginia finest: a Yankees cap, Tennessee Vols t-shirt and blue-jean shorts!