Here Comes the Bride
I was 26 when I left my work as a country parson to take up the prestigious position as the Minister of Cheltenham Church of Christ Victoria. This Church had the reputation of being a very large and alive Church. But that was a mirage. The reality was quite different as this young country parson was soon to discover. The life of a suburban Minister has some real surprises.
Mrs. Hare was the greatest asset I had when it came to marrying brides. Because the church was so beautiful – white, with a tall tower, sitting on the top of the hill, with a peal of bells to welcome the bride, and a nice drive through luscious green lawns up to the front door of the church – it was ideal for photographs and for the most wonderful feeling of a traditional marriage.
Because I was so active teaching every pupil in every form in every year in the High School which had more than nine hundred students, I was well known to all of the young women of the community. And because we had hundreds of young people in our Church Youth Groups and sporting teams it was only natural that I would have hundreds of weddings. I married more than two thousand brides and grooms over the thirteen years.
People would say that you would forget the people you marry, with three or four weddings every Saturday and perhaps one or two on Friday nights, but most of those people became friends – even people who came to be married whom I didn’t know previously. It was my habit to invite them to attend three interviews where we discussed themselves and their preparation for marriage, and what they were contributing in the way of understanding and knowledge to the marriage that I would celebrate. Then there was the wedding rehearsal, usually the night before, when we met with their parents and other relatives.
I had to make some rules about attending receptions. Over the years we have received literally hundreds of invitations to attend receptions. I would have had two nights a week out doing nothing else but attending someone’s wedding reception. So we set up rules which meant if invited we always purchased a present for the couple, but only attended those wedding receptions where both families were connected in the life of the church.
But Mrs. Hare was my stalwart companion. I appointed her not long after I began as minister of the Cheltenham Church of Christ. Her task was to simply make sure that everything went well. She would meet with the bride and groom beforehand to determine their wishes concerning the kind of bows on the end of pews, the placement of flowers and hymn sheets, and then on the day itself would be simply there to help in any kind of emergency.
With weddings so carefully planned it was amazing how many emergencies we had.
I will never forget Belinda, the beautiful bride, who on a very wet Melbourne day got out of the taxi in a hurry. The rain was pouring down and she wasn’t going to pause in the rain for any photographs – simply get out of the cab and into the church as quickly as possible. The cab driver jumped out of the hire care, came around with a large umbrella, and Belinda opened the door and dived out, forgetting that with her very full bridal skirt she had a hoop underneath which was the fashion in those days. She put one foot in front of the hoop, and one behind as she stepped from the taxi. She tripped herself and fell face forward into the wet gravel before the cab driver could catch her. Fortunately the white gravel that marked the drive up to the church was not very muddy, yet the front of her skirt was covered with flecks of mud and dirt. Belinda burst into tears.
That’s where Mrs. Hare was in her element. I quickly requested the few people who were standing in the porch to see her arrival to go into the church and wait there while Mrs. Hare escorted her straight away into our ante-room and there began one of her tasks – which was simply to restore the bride to her blushing beauty with no trace of whatever had happened. Very quickly she sponged off all the marks of the fall on the road and quietly calmed the upset girl. Ten minutes later the Wedding March commenced with a fanfare and a beaming, happy girl in pristine white came down the aisle on the arm of her father.
Mrs. Hare was always there, not only to console and help brides, but to help some grooms. There have been times when we have had grooms in a terrible state because the bride has been twenty or thirty minutes late. Mrs. Hare knew how to instantly make a cup of coffee for the groom, or get a cool drink from the refrigerator to put him at ease while I stood at the church door glancing up and down Chesterville Road.
There were times when girls got out of hire cars and were so nervous that they were ready to faint. Mrs. Hare would be at their elbow with a cool drink before their entry into the church. Over the years I also became adept at helping brides in the midst of the service.
Loreen was very heavy with the make-up and the mascara. We were singing an opening hymn “O Perfect Love” when Loreen, who was crying bucketfuls of tears with the happiness of the occasion, put her hand underneath her veil and wiped her eyes. Unfortunately, the wiping simply spread black mascara over both cheeks. As the hymn finished I led with an opening prayer – a very present help in time of trouble – and with all eyes closed, while I was praying, whipped out my handkerchief, lifted the bride’s veil, wiped her face clear of black mascara and the remaining tears, and restored her to her pristine state before I came to the “AMEN”.
I suppose on an average of once every three of four months I had to pull out my handkerchief, have a prayer commencing “Now let every eye be closed as we pray unto God” and do some running repairs to the bride’s eye make-up.
And sometimes that meant fixing the flowers.
It was customary for the bride’s mother to organise the flowers the night before, but some bride’s mothers haven’t got a clue. We had a full range of vases, but this didn’t give the mother of the bride any insight into how she was to arrange flowers. I remember on one occasion looking, after the family had left the rehearsal and the bride’s mother had finished the flowers, to see how they were just dumped into vases. The bunches of flowers were still tied with the florist’s string. The mother had simply unwrapped the parcels of flowers and popped them all into the vases without undoing the bunches. Over the years I became adept re-doing the attempts of some women who really didn’t have a clue about floral arrangements.
I never worried if brides came late, except when we had three weddings one after the other. If the first bride was late it meant that the next brides would have to be late. That was the tricky bit – keeping two lots of guests separated from each other and keeping the drivers of hire cars going round and round the block. Sometimes we even had a driver pull up at the wrong church. The Cheltenham Church of Christ was on top of the hill and the Roman Catholic church was around the corner behind the Church of Christ on the flat and in a side street. Consequently, some Saturday afternoons I would be standing just inside the double doors of the bell tower looking out to see a driver bring a wedding car into the church only to realise that the bride was not mine. The bride herself would often look puzzled and would tumble to the conclusion that the driver had thought we were the Roman Catholic church in the community. So I would wave him on and indicate where he needed to go.
One week a couple came to see me. They were in their seventies. Old Tom was a pretty gruff sort of fellow. He had worked on the wharves most of his life and spent his days carrying bags of wheat and manually handling the cargo. He was a big rough fellow with a gruff voice and one who had put away a lot of products from Foster’s brewery. She was fairly demure and very quiet. Old Tom said to me “Er .. look mate, this is a bit touchy really, but we was wondering if you would marry us.” I explained that I would be delighted to marry them. When we sat down he explained the particular circumstances. They wanted a private wedding with nobody else present. I explained that they needed to have a couple of witnesses by law, but Mrs. Hare and my wife would be happy to stand in as witnesses for them.
But why the secrecy? “Well mate, it’s like this. Me and the missus started living together during the depression. We didn’t have enough money to get married then and we never have been married proper. And we’ve had four kids and they all think that we’re married. One day one of us is going to die and then the truth will be out that we have been living in sin over these years so I wants to get it fixed up proper now.” I told Old Tom that I understood and that we would be delighted to give them a proper marriage. “But I wants it proper. It’s got to have all the usual things.” I raised my eyebrows and asked him in particular what he wanted. “You know – things like bells and bows and hymns.” I told him that we would be honoured to be able to give him bells and bows and hymns even if it meant only a few of us would be there. “The missus has been such a good woman that I feel now I can afford it, that we should have a proper wedding like she didn’t have in the first place only we don’t want our kids to know. I’m buying new rings and we’re going off on a honeymoon straight after.”
So that’s how Old Tom and his missus came one night to be married. Tom had bought himself a suit and the missus a new dress, and he had a ring for her and a ring for himself in two boxes which he gave to me because not only was I the minister but also his best man. The wedding service was lovely. She wore a hat with some lace over the front which she demurely pulled down over her face, and when the time came he lifted the veil and gave her a kiss. They were happy as any two that I’d ever married in my life.
Immediately after the wedding Tom and his missus went out to get in the car to go off on their honeymoon. They were to drive down to some place in Gippsland. Mrs. Hare and Beverley and myself waved them goodbye and wished them well.
It was a great delight to know that everything had been done proper.
The next morning I received a call from Laurie Rose, the undertaker. Could I conduct a funeral for an elderly couple who had been killed in a road accident the night before? As soon as he mentioned their name I realised that it was Old Tom and his missus. They had been involved in a dreadful head-on collision with a huge milk semi-trailer carrying a full load. The collision had occurred on a narrow bridge in Gippsland and they were both killed instantly.
I took the funeral a day or so later and spoke to their family and I was able to say “I knew Old Tom and his wife personally, and I know that they greatly loved each other. I had the opportunity to meet with both of them and speak with them and I know of the love that both had for each other.” I looked down at the two coffins side by side and just rejoiced that everything that Old Tom and his missus had wanted had occurred just the way they had desired and that they had been united together in death. The family afterwards were amazed that I should know so much about them.
A death certificate was prepared, but to my knowledge the family never asked for a marriage certificate and Old Tom’s secret died with him and his missus and it has remained to this day a secret with me.
The wedding of Ian and Kerrie had an unexpectedness about it. They were two of the most popular young people in our church. They had both been presidents of the Christian Youth Fellowship, were very active in all of our young adult activities, and both had been Sunday School teachers. Both lots of parents were active within the life of the church and Kerrie’s parents were my very good friends, the church secretary and his wife. So this was a big family affair. The wedding of their only daughter was a highlight for all the families in the church. At the wedding rehearsal Kerrie was so vivacious and happy and we had a wonderful time together. However, one thing she said caught my imagination. She said “I’m glad you’re marrying me. I always dreamed that you would conduct the Service. You are the only minister I have known for all my life.” That shook me a bit, but when I came to think about it Kerrie was only a very young girl when I first came to the church and now thirteen years later she was a bride. I had been the only minister she had really known in her life in that church. They had become involved with me in a number of programmes to help families that were poor and struggling, that had problems with disabilities or alcohol. And that’s how “Hopeless Harry” came to her wedding.
Hopeless was one of the characters around our streets. He used to spend most of his time around at the Cheltenham Arms Hotel. He had to walk around the church and up the side street to get to his small house near the back of our church in Pine Street. Everybody who had been round the church for years knew Hopeless Harry. He was always in a state of intoxication, but he was a cheery drunk with big liquid eyes and the bottoms of his eyelids turned out looking red and painful. He walked with a slurching gate from side to side and despite all we did to try to help Hopeless Harry the case was hopeless.
No-one seemed to be able to reach him or rehabilitate him. He called a number of young women like Kerrie “his girls”, only Kerrie was one of those girls who wasn’t frightened to talk to a drunk. And so he had a special affection for her.
The wedding was under way. The church was totally crowded and I was leading through the service when the door into the choir stalls was yanked open with a bang and into the choir stalls lurched a very drunken Hopeless Harry. He tried to sit in the choir stalls quietly but clattered and banged his way in full view of every other person. I paused and looked at him with a look that would have withered grapes on a vine. Harry put his finger to his mouth and said “Shhhhhhh” and then sat down with a thump. Everybody in the church was grinning except the bride’s mother who seemed ready to faint. Kerry was grinning and so was Ian. So was I. I had to settle us all down before we burst out laughing. Just as I was about to start Hopeless leant forward, put his finger to his lips and once more said “Shhhhhhh. Good on yer luv. Youse look beautiful.” The congregation burst out laughing. That only made Harry more bold. Leaning forward he said “Youse is a beautiful bride and you’re my friend aren’t you? You’re one of my little girls.”
The congregation by this time were splitting their sides with laughter. If I didn’t watch out Hopeless Harry would be around out of the choir stalls standing by me delivering an oration. Something had to be done. I quickly walked across to the choir stalls and took Harry by the arm. There were no other available seats out of sight and I knew if I tried to take him out of the choir stalls he would probably reject any attempts to move him and we would have had a scene. I simply sat beside him and for about thirty seconds said “Hopeless, this Kerrie’s wedding. Be still as a mouse. Don’t say anything or move and I’ll let you stay here and watch.” Hopeless nodded his head and agreed. I walked back to the bridal couple and tried to restore some order. Just as I was about to say the next word Hopeless leaned forward and with his finger at this lips said “Shhhhhhh” once more. Fortunately, both Ian and Kerrie were people with great senses of humour and they all enjoyed having Hopeless as their wedding guest.
The other wedding that always comes to my mind when I reflect on those years as a suburban minister is the time I married Lizzie Sweet. I had known the Sweets for some years. They were a hopeless family in the community with every member of the family unemployed, with debts in every major shopping complex and very little hope ever of getting on top of their own lives. Lizzie had flaming red hair and was a very buxom girl. The Sweets were not members of the church but came to us for food parcels and clothing, toys for the kids at Christmas time, and in some emergency or other whenever their power supply was about to be cut off for non-payment of bills. They were welfare dependent people and had no intention of getting off the welfare system. So long as there were decent people to support them they were big hearted and warm enough to accept the support. The wedding was an extravaganza. I knew we would never get paid and that the organist, Mrs. Hare and the church would never get their money, but still it was one member of the Sweet family who was at least trying to do something responsible in life.
However, Lizzie Sweet had decided to marry a person who reflected her father in every way. He was a drunken layabout of a young man. At the wedding rehearsal the night before I gave very strict instructions both to him and to his best man and groomsman that they were to show up the next day for the wedding in a sound sober state of mind.
I told them that if they did not present well that I could not go ahead with the wedding as I was in no position to ask him to take vows which would be a legal act in the eyes of the Commonwealth of Australia as well as a religious act in the eyes of the Church, if he was drunk and unable to understand what he was saying and signing. I gave quite a firm talk to them as a group of young fellows and was quite confident that all would be well the next day.
I should have known better. First of all this was an occasion where the bridegroom was late. Lizzie and her father arrived in a white Mercedes hire car – naturally! I guessed they wouldn’t get paid either. However, I had to go round to the driver’s door before Lizzie got out to tell him to keep circling the block until I indicated because no-one had seen the groom or the groomsman. They were more than half an hour after the agreed time of arrival. It wasn’t that I was worried that they wouldn’t turn up at all, it was that I was worried they might turn up the worse for wear. So the white Mercedes kept driving round and round and every time they came past the church I would just wave them on while we waited for the groom, the best man and the groomsman.
Eventually an old Chrysler Charger came roaring up the gravel drive to the top of the hill and the groom, best man and groomsman complete with black evening suits with purple ties and waist bands staggered out – rather the groom fell out. He was so drunk that he couldn’t properly stand up. The boys didn’t seem to care. They simply told me that they had been out celebrating with him all morning and the time had gotten away from them.
However, the groom was in such a bad state that I was not prepared for the wedding to go ahead. Fortunately, by this time there were people arriving for the next wedding, so I took a calculated decision – that we could sober up the groom if we were given 45 minutes or so. I leant him up against the wall of the church, stopped the white Mercedes on it’s next route, told them that because of his drunkenness the wedding would be postponed one hour and asked them to drive off elsewhere and then return. I then told the groomsman and the best man to take the groom into our Manse kitchen next door, give him some black coffee, and sober him up. If they weren’t getting anywhere they should undress him and put him in a cold shower in my bathroom and then dress him again and we would meet in one hour’s time for the wedding.
I went in to the church, made an appearance on the platform, apologised to the people present and said the bride was ready and waiting but the groom was ill and we had need to postpone the wedding for one hour. I asked the congregation if they would mind leaving the church while another wedding was held, and then to re-assemble in one hour’s time.
Everybody was sympathetic towards the condition of the groom since I had told them that he was sick. And they went and stood outside having a smoke while others I noted headed around to the car park where I would imagine the Sweets had a beer for everyone.
In the meantime the bride arrived for the next wedding on the schedule and what a delightful wedding it was.
An hour later however, it was time for the Sweets to come back and Lizzie stood at the door while an ashen-faced pale apology for a husband sat in the front row of the church. The guests re-assembled, the bridal march was played, the groom and best man stood up and waited for the arrival of the bride.
It was while we were taking the vows that I began to be troubled. The groom was swaying unsteadily on his feet. I called in an ever present help in time of trouble – a prayer – and while every head was bowed I indicated to the best man by signs that I wanted him to stand beside the groom and link arms with him and keep him upright. The groom was as white as a ghost. We came to the vows after the prayer. As I asked him “Will you take this woman to be your lawful wedded wife?” he looked at me through bleary eyes and then open his mouth to say “I do” and instead of saying a word he suddenly with tremendous force vomited! It was projectile vomiting! Such a stream as you never saw in your life came straight at me, hitting me in the chest, covering my wedding book and splashing over on the side to where the marriage register was on the communion table. The marriage certificate which they were shortly to sign was covered with vomit.
Not just ordinary vomit! Apparently that morning they had had some pasta or spaghetti or something of that kind as well as beer and rum and a whole lot of peanuts and finger food and the result was that all down my front, his front, my wedding book, the marriage register and the marriage certificate and then splashing back on to the bride was his breakfast, morning tea, refreshments, cold black coffee, together with all these indescribable pieces of meal.
I decided there was only one thing to do and that was to finish the service quickly. There was no point having a second delay nor was there any point in just abandoning the wedding. Lizzie had made her choice for better or for worse. She got the better and I had copped the worst! I finished off the service with the minimum legal requirements, got rather damp signatures on the certificate and had the church’s marriage register ruined for the rest of it’s life.
That night in my study I spent some time writing up my journal and looking out of the window at the never ending stream of cars stopping at the traffic lights at the corner of Nepean Highway and Chesterville Road, that wide intersection that was dominated by the lovely white Church with the high white tower noting down the events of another day as a suburban minister.