We Canadians are So Nice: a Wedding Tale

The wedding started off smoothly, much to my surprise. It's really going to happen, I thought, pleased, a little surprised. It had required a lot of work on the part of the bride and groom, neither of them Canadian, one of them living in Pakistan, and with various issues like divorces and visas to arrange along with the usual marriage preparations. We guests met in the City Hall lobby in happy anticipation, and wended our way up the long curving walkway to the green roof, where the Wedding Suite perched.

Hurrying to Service Canada

But the bride and groom, who had ascended previously in the single working elevator, came rushing down past us, going the wrong way and looking a little wild around the eyes. "Changed your minds?" we laughed. No, but a single missed piece of paperwork had halted all proceedings. Service Canada, the agency in charge of bureaucratic forms, had an office on the ground floor of City Hall and apparently had the power to solve the problem. We clucked sympathetically and went into stand-by mode, shuffling our feet in the anteroom outside the Wedding Suite.

We waited, and waited. My phone rang: the groom-to-be. "I have to go home to get another piece of ID," he said, sounding tense, but not hysterical. He specializes in disaster relief care after all.  I sought out the wedding suite receptionist. "What happens if the couple with the 1:30 appointment are a bit late?" I asked. The receptionist has clearly seen it all. "No problem," she said. "We'll let the 2:00 couple go ahead because they're all here. As long as your friends arrive by 3:30, we'll fit them in. Don't worry, they'll be married today." I texted the news to the groom in his getaway (and get-back) car, driven by a family friend who turned out to be the hero of the day by having brought a vehicle and knowing how to use it.

The rest of us guests trooped back down the long curving ramp, through the lobby of City Hall, to gather supportively round the bride, who sat smiling and beautiful and for some reason still calm, clutching her numbered paper ticket. I would have been in tears, myself. It's hard to cheer up the metal folding-chair decor of a Service Canada outlet, but we tried.  I made a quick foray to buy several cups of takeaway coffee at the cafe on the other side of the lobby, and then ended up with an extra drink, which I gave to a woman in the next gray chair over, who in turn offered to share it with the woman next to her. As it turned out, woman #2 was vegan and woman #1 had already added milk, so we all had a rueful laugh and started sharing stories. 

"I'm here to change my name after getting divorced," #1 informed us. Our bride, also a divorcee, nodded sympathetically. Woman #1 continued, "It was a good marriage, don't get me wrong, but it had run its course." Her number was called, and she rose to leave us. As she did she patted my shoulder and said to me in conspiratorial fashion, "This shows them that we Canadians are the nicest people!" She gestured to the cardboard coffee tray, and to our little support group. We all laughed, and she disappeared toward her appointed window.

I turned to the others from my lab and asked, "Should I have told her I'm American, not Canadian?"

"No," answered a post-doc and a PhD student, in unison. "Definitely not. That's a dirty word. Besides, you live here. You're almost Canadian." 

Finally, the prospective groom came back, the official piece of paper got signed, and up the curving ramp we marched again. Luckily it was a beautiful day; no dodging of raindrops or shivering into coats or wraps. We waited for a beautifully arrayed group, all in suits and ties and heels, to go in to the Wedding Suite and to come out, married. One member of our party had a train to catch and nervously looked at the time. Two others dropped out, with regret, to attend meetings. A young woman with a delightful baby boy offered her apologies as the baby became less delightful, and more noisy, and eventually they departed. We remained quorate, though, and when it was our turn to file in to the wedding chamber, there were seats for all. They were wooden, not folding metal, upholstered even. Flowers in tall vases stood in corners. The officiant, a balding man in judicial robes (perhaps he was a judge?) smiled beatifically and looked serene and unhurried. Perfect.

The couple exchanged vows under the judge's guidance. "Are there rings?" he asked. Sort of. A ring for her, a watch, as it turned out, for him. "That's good," pronounced the judge, turning to the bride. "You'll see your hand and know you're married." To the husband: "And you'll look at your watch and know it's time to go home to your wife." 

I laughed. Probably I shouldn't have: how normative, how sexist. How almost-Canadian. Like me.

Bride's bouquet