To the Boy Who Wore Pink Tutus - Cheers!
Wednesday, October 26, 2005
It was at Lone Tree’s Veteran’s Hall – the reception. And as they pulled in, the now-empty limo was just coming out of the long drive. Inside, the dance floor was lit by the skylight above and the tables were nestled under the circular overhang beneath. At each long table on white tablecloths, were placed Hershey’s kisses – milk, striped, and dark chocolate, (Ivy would be proud) wrapped in silver and dark purple, along with little silver bells tied with pencil-thin white and lavender ribbon. In the center of each table was placed a mirror with a glass bowl sitting on top, filled with water and floating flower candles in white and deep purples. Around the bowls were tucked several sprigs of flowers.
And while they waited for the wedding party and the rest of the guests to pass through the buffet line, Mr. and Mrs. Lord-Welches sat at the only little table Dad could find, tucked at the back of the room, and discussed Mr. Lord-Welches’ and Gauti’s cruise to Alaska. And Mrs. Lord-Welches gave Linnea a hug.
“I could just eat you up!’ She said, cuddling her.
And then she always had to talk with Carrie, and gave her a hug as well. And then it was time for the groom’s family to eat, so Mrs. Lord-Welches came over (looking so sharp and lovely in her fitted deep purple skirt and top) to Mr. Lord-Welches, grabbed him by the tie and pulled him away to the food line, much to the guffaws of all involved.
And finally, after a bit of time had passed, the Snicketts’ family arrived at the buffet line to load up their plates with vegetables, salad, mashed potatoes and gravy, sloppy joes, chicken, and a soda or lemonade from the cooler. But it wasn’t long before Colorado came over and spoke with his mom about having the Snicketts move forward to the additional Lord-Welches table up front under the skylight. And so they resettled at a table with a much better view of the festivities. And at their table were little funky-shaped silver heart cut-outs (hollow in the middle) along with the chocolates and bells.
Over the next hour or so, there was a slide show of various pictures from Colorado’s and Lacey’s past, including a shot of Colorado (at sixteen, if Collette remembered correctly), dressed in a pink princess gown from their dress-up box at home, carrying a silver wand, and wearing a crown. This had been the night he and Carrie were planning on going trick or treating, in the summer, after having played some catch at the school yard with Collette and Thursday, walked down to Dairy Queen, returned for a Veggie Tales (yes, it was the “thing” to do back then) and some sword fights in the basement with Dad’s and Carrie’s foils. And following this presentation were two toasts, one from the red-head (at 19 years old), and another from Gauti who joked about and even referred to how geeky and crazy his little brother was.
“The Snicketts can attest to that, right here,” he pointed at their table. “Colorado actually did dress up in pink tutus, with Carrie, I believe.”
They all laughed hard at this, as Carrie raised her hand in recognition. But Gauti also thanked Lacey for “turning his little brother into a man.”
He then passed the microphone off to Sean who presented a gift of singing bride and groom skeletons, dressed in purple wedding clothes, complete with dancing and glowing orange eyes. The room roared with laughter and after a simple “thanks” to the crowd from Colorado, he looked at his new bride holding her non-alcoholic champagne glass and said:
“Let’s get this party started.”
Meanwhile, back at the old home front, there had been a fire drill at 3:18 in the morning, while everyone ran around trying to locate the source of the burning smell. Apparently it had turned out to be collected dust from the heater. Joe slept right through the alarm and, as Rose later said, rather mournfully:
“They didn’t even wake my up!”
And on that cold October afternoon, Linnea was taking a nice hot bath making tidal waves and soaking the bathroom, the ladies looked through a PartyLite catalog from the previous evening, Mom quickly prepared hot baked potatoes with all the fixings and cold tea for lunch (before taking Frances and Linnea to both their choirs), and the Hobcoggins had invited them all over for soup and trick-or-treating for Halloween. Rose was on a photo shoot in her bedroom with the cats, which was not uncommon. She had also hung a new bamboo shade in her bedroom window. Frances had finished off his two grenades from the Amana wood scrap bin complete with carpenters staples for pins. And Carrie had just unwrapped ten text books which had arrived via UPS for her next eight weeks of school – straight through Christmas. There was much whining.
The candle party had apparently been a smashing success, and Mrs. Tecumseh had already been able to book three more parties with Aunt Petunia (for her co-workers following work), Mrs. Bee in January, and Mrs. McCrae.
At the concert the evening before, the crowd had been hoppin.’ The violinist had stomped out with her fiddle in brown leather boots bunched around her ankles, navy and emerald plaid prairie skirt cut above the boots so the white hem hung below the skirt, short-sleeved navy shirt with sporty white collar and the number 99 in white on the back, and her hair tied up in a whimsical knot. There was one wild string-bean espresso-hooked rockin’ mandolin player dancing all over the stage, his legs flying up around and all over the place. And there was the violinist’s brother on guitar, a much more composed fellow. They came out for two encores to the incessant screams and whistles of the crowd at the darkened Pageant. All in all, it was a good concert. Collette still had the thick red “x” on her right hand, meaning, yes, she was still underage.
Lucia called while Collette had Joe and Rose finish their essays for the day. Carrie got off the phone with her after awhile and keeled over in laughter while relaying the latest Lucia incident.
“So she was driving in the car the other day and her steering wheel fell off! It just fell off. And it’s not the first time either!”