Our goddaughter's wedding is behind us, and don't I feel as old as Moses.
The bride, bridesmaids and maid of honor all had tattoos and a few had bolts through their eyebrows or rings through their nostrils and I'm betting more hardware in places we won't entertain here.
The ring bearer's hair (he might have been 6) was gelled into a spiky mohawk, and he and the little boy who escorted the little girl who dropped rose petals down the aisle, got into a poking and pinching match at the altar - while the bride and groom were saying their vows.
Where were their parents? I would have twisted an ear off my kid if he behaved like that at such a defining moment in a couple's life.
The times they are a'changin'.
The photo of the wedding party was taken while they were airborne, all having jumped on a cue from the photographer - the bride into the arms of the groom, the rest of the group straight up like cheerleaders. This seemed like an invitation to a ruined gown and sprained ankle on one's honeymoon, but what do I know?
As we made ready to leave, the flower girl ran up to our goddaughter, her once lovely, lacy dress splotched with soda pop and ripped at the waist and on one side. Apparently she got into it with the two boys; who knows what happened to her shoes.
I won't go into details about which anatomical part was drawn in bright red paint on the window of the newlyweds' car (the work of one of the groomsmen), but alongside it were the words "Just Married, and boy are we horny!"
Ah, the curious social graces of youth.
Our goddaughter, I will say, was a spectacular bride. As gorgeous as they come; movie star gorgeous, runway model gorgeous. I can say that because I had nothing to do with it. She was a darling little girl, but I've known darling little girls who grow up to look like fireplugs, and baby boys who arrive looking like Winston Churchill but grow up rather handsome.
You just never know when someone from the ancestral gene pool will show up and wreak havoc with what looks like a promising start.
We hadn't seen our goddaughter since she was 3, when her family moved from Maui to Oregon and things contrived to keep us apart. Thanks to Google, she tracked me down a couple of months ago - 21 years later and living a mere 2 1/2-hour drive north of us.
Imagine.
I have vowed to stop railing against technology, even though nothing confuses nor frustrates me more. It could've been we'd have lost contact forevermore, and here we are, thanks to the Internet, starting our relationship anew.
Thank you, God, for creating people who have brain lobes unlike mine.
A young doe is feasting on the snow peas out front and I should probably chase her off, but she's so lovely I'm going to refrain and treat her to lunch. I suspect she's also the one snitching figs and roses and I may have to work myself up to having a fit, but not today.
I'm in a good mood.
I just took a peach crisp out of the oven, and the house smells like my imaginary grandmother's. Imaginary, because she lived thousands of miles away and died when I was just a toddler, and I never knew her kitchen. But I've always loved the idea of being one myself - a grandmother, not a kitchen. Crisps and cookies would be baking in the oven and grandchildren would grow up with Nana's delicious smells lodged deep in their hearts.
Despite my begging and bullying, I'm not a grandmother; no one pays me any mind.
Whoa, now. Wait just a minute. An epiphany: Goddaughter just got married. If the message written on their car window was evidence of things to come, I could be a god-grandmother before long.
I'm going to light a candle to that.
* Lynne Horner is a former Maui News features editor and writer who now lives in Springfield, Ore. Her "Second Thoughts" column appears every Tuesday. Send email to her at lynnenhorner@yahoo.com.
