Wedding Music

I brought a girl home from school to be my date for a wedding I was going to.

Her name was Holly and she was one of the most beautiful girls I had ever laid eyes on. She was shy, and very religious(a Catholic, as I was). Her mother "interviewed" me to check me out and make sure I was an upstanding guy. We actually were going to attend a baptism the next day after the wedding. I couldn't have been any more Cathlolic unless I started putting on  robes and handed out Communion wafers. When she gave her blessing I knew I was IN.

One catch was that she also happened to be right off of a relationship with a good friend of mine. I know, it was risky to ask her to be my date, but it was my chance to see if we had anything in terms of chemistry. She and I had become good friends. She was feeling sad about the breakup, so I extended my invitation to "take her away," even if it meant for just an innocent weekend with family and wedding attending rituals to follow.

We got along as if we were an old couple. Joking around with my parents and cousins. She loved dancing. I never was a big dancer, but since she wanted to, I made damn sure I was out there with her. We polka'd, we did the slow dances(which were very nice) and then there was one song that I remember was the tip of the iceberg for us getting together or not. It was "Strokin.'"

It was very suggestive, which made it funny for a wedding with little kids running around drinking punch and sweating themselves up, as well as guys drinking  beer out of plastic cups and sometimes the bride and bridesmaids doing shots at the bar. 

"Strokin'" was the one song that made us really boogie like no others on Earth had ever boogied before. As if we were the lead stars in a John Travolta dance movie.

"I was Strokin to the East/ strokin to the West/ strokin with the woman that I love best"

On that line, every time, Holly and I looked at each other and I just knew she was the one(or so I thought). Her eyes glistened, her smile was soft and light, her hair, translucent and gloriously bright within the confines of the DJ's multi-colored lighting system-all had made Holly irresistable. While I wished for something more, we had behaved ourselves that night, and later we both went to bed in separate rooms, much to my chagrin.

We parted ways a little while later that year. She met her future husband at a camp she worked at and later bore him two children. I have thought of her every so often and wished that our one night as a "good old couple" could have made it to reality, but that's what memories are for.