Celebrations of love JULY 26, 2018 ● ULSTER PUBLISHING ● WWW.HUDSONVALLEYONE.COM
A history of weddings The Hudson Valley has a grand tradition of romance, nuptials and honeymoons
Eleanor Roosevelt in her wedding dress for her marriage to her fifth cousin, Franklin Delano Roosevelt, on March 17, 1905. Quipped president Teddy Roosevelt, who gave away the bride, “It’s a good thing to keep the name in the family.”
Weddings, romance & beyond
26, 2018 2 | July Celebrations of Love
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Guillarme Seignac’s 1888 painting The Wedding Procession captures the sultry solemnity of a summer wedding.
The sweetness of summer weddings By Paul Smart
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hat’s summer without a bit of romance? When one is younger, it’s a time of quick friendships away from all a school year entails. It’s a time for travel and for
summer jobs followed by summer nights. Many of us wooed our partners during sultry heat waves. Married, as well, in big or more intimate affairs where a bit of sweat accompanied dancing under a tent. It’ss hard to think of these months without weddings somewhere. There’s nothing like planning a vacation that involves at least a couple of days getting together with old friends and enjoying all
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that’s involved in a grand series of parties being paid for by others, no expenses spared. It’s easy to remember those joyous times when everyone made do, and when our celebration of the ideas behind love were allowed to blossom. We can recall books or movies we’ve seen, or music we’ve heard and art we’ve seen, that recall past emotions that once caught us unaware. We recognize in a complex pai9nting the exact color in an early love’s eye, or perhaps just a dress. We are brought back to the way a song once overwhelmed us or conjured memories of older, deeper childhood songs. Romance that arises in summer is different from that of the indoor months. The weather is hot and a bit sticky, like what happens to the sweetest breath after a bit too much wine. Summer is a garden in bloom, evanescent and fleeting. It contains stories of regrets, nostalgia and hope. Summer is romance. Live it, and love.
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July 26, 2018 Celebrations of Love
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How we learn to love Cherishing what makes us most human By Dante Kanter
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French royal named La Rochefoucauld was famous for writing down little sayings he would think of at parties. He’d publish these little sayings, called aphorisms, in booklets which you can fit into your back pocket. The word aphorisms was originally used in ancient Greece to mean the diagnosis of a disease or disorder. My professor told me that an aphorism has the same instincts as a hedgehog. It curls up into a little ball when poked or frightened. When she said this, the professor curled up her hands this same way. The line from La Rochefoucauld that has stuck with me most is a particularly prickly one. It goes like this: “Most people would not fall in love if they had never heard of such a thing.” This may very well be true. Most people, I am guessing, could get along perfectly well without loving anybody. They could come back from work to cook a delicious meal, spend the night alone and free from responsibility, and wake up the next morning to do the whole thing over again. Plenty of people live like this and are perfectly happy. Rochefoucauld never says love is a bad thing, only that, like many other things, it doesn’t come naturally. It has to be taught. In my hopeful brain, Rochefoucauld was saying that people had to be taught how to love each othe, before it was too late! Besides my parents, my two best teachers were Barney and Carrie Bradshaw. In Barney’s universe, love was a tool, Iit fixed scraped knees and secured neighbors with their bowls of sugar. In Sex and the City, love was a badger let loose in someone’s living room. It forced Carrie Bradshaw and her friends to spend time with men they hated. They sometimes had to betray their friends. It broke their hearts and made them mean and bitter. I would watch the show late at night, from behind my parents’ bed. The characters were these huge titans, towering over their coffees, chatting. Even the name, Sex and the City, was salacious to a six year old. We kids could barely get through the first word without crumpling into embarrassed laughter. To spare myself, I re-christened it The Boyfriend Show.
An older generation looks on a younger one’s discovery of love with nostalgia and acknowledgement, as this rendition of a Daniel Maclise painting demonstrates.
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ove is a big word, baggy with overuse. It is an opaque wormhole. I recognize that I am young, too young to be sure of anything. Asking me to write about love is a lot like asking a sack of fish eggs to speak briefly on swimming upstream. It is hard, also, to shake that six-year-old’s embarrassment, to speak honestly in any way about it. As I write this, I am sitting in the abandoned hallway of a dormitory in a liberal-arts college in Ohio. It is long past midnight. I’m sitting outside the door to a high schooler’s room, where he has been staying for the past two weeks as a participant in a writing program for young people. I’m his counselor, and I’m sitting by his door to make sure that he doesn’t sneak out in the middle of the night. He’s been sitting in his room all morning and all afternoon as punishment for running off campus to a privately owned cornfield harvested for the production of ethanol to meet illicitly with a girl that he met here. They both write the kind of poetry I wrote in high school, fast-paced, self-conscious and deadly serious. The girl has been confined to her own room as well, along with a handful of their friends caught with this or that illegal substance. But this high schooler, young and in love, lives off my hall-
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What we learn of love is like Plato’s idea of all we learn of morality, nothing but a reflection of possibilities.
way, so it’s in front of his door that I’ve set up my chair. In these situations, the true meaning of “aphorism” comes through. Rochefoucauld really was diagnosing an illness, one which drove two children to a stranger’s farm in the dead of night. No matter how many side glances of hatred I had caught from my high schooler as I walked him back from the room where he and his compatriots had been interrogated, there was something timelessly moving about watching him and the girl part ways, a sort of Romeo-Juliet, PyramusThisbe melodrama. They’ve been talking all night. I can’t help but hear them through the door, no matter how much I try not to listen. There’s plenty of sighing, and tearing of hair, and comparison of follower counts. They were both going home the next morning, one to California, the other to Connecticut. It was a plainly stupid, hopelessly young conversation, the kind I’ll never have again.
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had my first kiss on Valentine’s Day, while I was watching Abbott and Costello Meet Frankenstein. Costello, working as a museum security guard, suspects that Dracula is sleeping in the warehouse coffin behind him. Every once in a while, Bela Lugosi opens the lid of the coffin, making loud enough of a noise to have Costello turn around before he slams it shut. I know there’s no such person as Dracula, and you know there’s no such person as Dracula, says Abbott. But does Dracula know? We held hands for a long time. We were five years old. At that time, I was forcing my classmates to call me Romeo. I fought the Boys v. Girls War during recess on the girls’ side, all our faces painted with mud. Now that I have fallen in love three or four times, I have a photo album in my head of three or four different lives I have lived. Love is not unlike falling through a trapdoor into another person’s life. Eventually, your eyes adjust to the darkness, and all of a sudden you are walking out of a dive bar in Cincinnati full of people you’ve just met into the thick heat of a Midwestern summer. The two doomed lovers have finished their conversation around three in the morning. I heard my camper shut his laptop and adjust his sheets, pretending to be asleep. I heard them making plans to sneak out to that same cornfield. It’s their last night, after all. They planned to wake up at five in the morning. As I finish this essay, I am sitting in my room. It is six in the morning, and the sun has already risen. About an hour ago, I heard my camper’s door creak open, his cautious footsteps sounding down the stairs and into the early sun.
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Pieter Bruegel’s The Wedding Dance captures the pure joy and near mayhem of big weddings.
The seating chart There’s an art to making weddings work By Elisabeth Henry
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h, it’s her wedding day!” my seven-year-old exclaimed as we drove past a modest country cabin many years ago. A young bride had stepped outside, and we caught the moment a fresh breeze lifted her veil and train, making for a fairy-tale photo. My little girl had her own feeling about weddings, even though I had not had one, and she had never been to one. When we did plan hers, it was magical. Finding the gown. Choosing the flowers. Tastings at caterers. We got stumped by the seating chart. We were
not alone in this. A seating chart is a combination sudoku, Rubix cube, 3-D combination puzzle that will not, with any amount of wrestling, come to ground. Just Google “wedding seating charts.” Oy. It must be worse now. Everybody is so touchy. Another bride, another June, another sunny honeymoon, another season, another reason for disciplined deep breathing and Alka-Seltzer. And all because of the seating chart. Especially now, when This Land of Liberty is as cross-hatched and bruised and puckered as Mr. Balboa’s face in Rocky 45.
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lmost every article I read on the subject of seating begins timidly, as though addressing someone already pissed off. Or frightened. That’s because those articles are written by newly graduated English majors tasked with writing about seemingly mundane matters. Oh, they are too young and pure to disregard what they know to be true. They know that many extended families are comprised of warring fac-
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tions that include scrappy narcissists who manage to remain alive because this is a big country and one can still travel across state lines fairly easily. They also know that parents of the couple about to marry oftentimes don’t like each other, or don’t approve of the coupling at all. They also know that there will always be a weird cousin, uncle, or an auntie who forgets her age and hits on the groomsmen. They know that we are living in a time of great civic unrest. They know all this, and they, like the rest of us, don’t really know how to solve this cluster of existing conflicts that have never ever been completely solved, so, why now? And so these sweet, honest young people compose tepid, grammatically correct articles that are almost identical. It is only the hard-liner Miss Manners types that provide advice which reads more like dictate than information. But, these edicts are time-honored. Could it be that long-established standards for seating charts function as most etiquette does? To prevent war? In that case, it’s worth a look. A chart of traditional seating for the wedding party shows that at a rectangular head table the bride sits to the left of the groom. The bride’s father sits to her left, the groom’s mother sits to his left, and the best man sits to her left. The groom sits to the bride’s right, the bride’s mother sits to his right, the groom’s father sits to her right, and the maid or matron of honor sits to his right. Much as I want to trust these postings, I am dismayed to see that at a round table the bride sits to the groom’s right, her father sits to her right, her mother to his right, her grandmother to her right, then her uncle (the favorite, I assume. Or only) and her uncle’s (current) spouse. The groom sits to the bride’s left, his father sits to his left, then his mother, then his first auntie, his godmother and his godmother.
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o you spot the contradiction? Are rules to be dictated by the shape of the table? I say, consult the authorities, add the required common sense, and gently seat our most respected guests as we know what works best for each. I was not able to get any authority to definitively sanction this approach by press time. A seating chart is recommended not just for the wedding couple and parents but for the entire crowd. That may not be as crucial with a small wedding. But if there are more than 20 guests, it’s helpful to provide structure. I had the experience of being at a large wedding with no seating arrangements. There was a riptide of confused guests desperately consulting each other about what to do. At any kind of sit-down dinner, assigned seats tend to make things simpler. To begin with, it ensures each table will be filled to maximum capacity. Furthermore, for plated dinner service, things
Celebrations of Love July 26, 2018 An Ulster Publishing publication Editorial WRITERS: Elisabeth Henry, Dante Kanter, Harry Matthews, Rossi, Paul Smart, Jack Warren EDITOR: Paul Smart LAYOUT: Joe Morgan Ulster Publishing PUBLISHER: Geddy Sveikauskas ADVERTISING DIRECTOR: Genia Wickwire
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26, 2018 6 | July Celebrations of Love can get very confusing for the catering staff without it. For these reasons, many venues actually require assigned reception seating. Once the guest list is finalized, it follows that you can determine how many tables are needed and how many people will be seated at each one. Keep in mind that shape here does play an important role. While rectangular ones make it easier for guests to chat, round tables might be simpler to sort (one needs only to pay mind to who’s sitting directly next to one another). Plus there’s more leg room.
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avigation is key. We know we must accommodate people with physical difficulties. These accommodations involve easy access to rest rooms, and to the dance floor. Osteoporosis and replaced body parts did not dissuade anyone at our various family weddings from getting their freak on. Ease of access must be considered if it is a buffet serving style. Assess your space for additional factors. Is there a spectacular view? We must be sure to honor those who will value that. Sensitive ears? Seat those people far away from the music. At one of my daughter’s weddings, the band was so loud that even my youngest child, a buff
Ulster Publishing Co. party animal/football player, complained to me. It must have been bad. He never complains. Once, after he played a championship game with both a concussion and appendicitis my only clue that he was in physical pain was that he turned down the sandwich I bought for him to celebrate The Big Win. Sensitive or frail people should not be seated at the edge of the dance floor. There’s always that one reveler with a weak core who underestimates the weight of his head as he spins. We want him falling into the lap of Cousin Sherri’s new biker boyfriend, both for safety and for laughs. Warn parents of young children if there are elevators, bodies of water, steps leading to terraces or cellars, open windows, and The Venetian Hour. And side bars. Years ago, my children, in league with little friends and cousins, discovered a lone, unattended side bar at a huge New Jersey family wedding. They immediately got to work pouring, mixing, squirting, shaking, serving. Luckily, my very active Danger! Danger! OCD signal kicked in and I arrived before any of the hooch was sampled by very underage lips. I think. I would have known for sure if, in my pursuit of missing toddlers, I hadn’t had to fight my way
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through all those women dancing to “It’s Raining Men.”
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ecide whether pets are welcome. I spend most of my life in the company of animals. One of the most lovely photographs from one daughter’s wedding includes our mare. The horse quietly stepped forward and extended her neck, just as my daughter turned to see what she was doing. The photographer caught it. It is a portrait of two pretty girls, nose to nose, greeting each with familiar affection. In defense of animals, loud music and inattentive humans spell misery for innocent pets. It’s not how they roll. They prefer the sounds of nature and the calming strokes of their favorite people. And keep this in mind. Dogs evacuate their bowels and urinate to claim territory or when stressed. What an unlucky discovery midway through the Cha Cha Slide. These days there are lots of dietary concerns. Most wedding caterers offer vegan, gluten free, and other customized options. Some of this is affectation. Most medical professionals agree that celiac disease is not as common as would be assumed, given the preponderance of those claiming to be “deathly allergic to wheat.” But some of it is very, very important. At one friend’s very posh wedding, her new Jewish inlaws were offended by the presence of shrimp during the passing of the hors d’oeuvres. Rightly so. Even though it absolutely was the caterer’s very foolish error, it was a dreadful mistake. There are less serious, but still noteworthy details to honor. For instance, my husband’s family would grow quite silent should a waiter offer to sprinkle parmesan on a marinara dish, and confidence in the nuptials would be questioned later in an obscure Italian dialect in furtive whispers and unmistakable hand gestures. I love group activities at weddings. Traditional ethnic weddings are rich in them. At one Ukrainian wedding, there was a game where the groomsmen kidnapped the bride and then set challenges for the groom in order to win her back.
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July 26, 2018 Celebrations of Love
Ulster Publishing Co. One couple I know asked everyone to bring a dish or a dessert or a drink to their wedding. They provided food, of course, but asking friends and family for “pot luck” was not about providing refreshments. It was saying, “Now we are all together.”
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hat is key. That will sustain us when the use of the seating chart is past. I hope every wedding this season (and forever!) will be without blemish in terms of putting aside differences. This is not the time or place for debate. And, yes, there will be mishaps. At one of our weddings, the caterer forgot tablecloths. The coffee machines didn’t work. At another, the cake baker trusted a new employee to deliver the $800 cake, and that new employee dropped it in the parking lot. At yet another, the mother of the bride slipped out to change into more comfortable shoes, and the pressed-for-time photographer took all the family photos without the mother of the bride. In every instance, people came together and despite snafus made the celebration a success. First thoughts were for the new couple. We have all heard about “bridezillas” and “wedding breakdowns.” That’s because there can be so much pressure. So let’s do our best to blow the lid off all of that. I know it’s possible. Come on, people, now. Love one another. Once upon a time, we owned an after-hours joint in downtown Manhattan. Our friend Louie
wanted to have his reception there. It was a small wedding. But Louie’s many connections in the music business and the excellent tunes emanating out on to First Avenue soon drew many well-wishers. Before long, it was large enough to qualify as a for-real block party. All those very different people happy to party. Together. Ah, but those were different times, were they not? Or were they? After all, the wedding is, in part, a reaffirmation of the group. The bride and groom could just go to city hall and make it legal. Is that enough? Years afterward, would there be regrets for missing out? There really is a window of time for this. After all, when that couple stands and declares in the company of others, see this? This is real. And we want each and every one of you to be here. Together. With us. You are a part of this new us. Let there be love. Let there be music. Let there be peace.
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like are inhaled. With a great flurry of a Caesar-like entrance, the couple reappears, followed by a giant tiered mountain of flour, icings, figurines, and finally a great comedic smushing of cake in mouth is seen amidst hoots and peals of laughter and glee. Now, for the first time in this day into night into life event, this party-rite that will hopefully be celebrated in remembrance for years to come, all allow themselves to get down with the first dance. On such occasions a proud and beaming father of the bride leads his daughter onto the dance floor for a slow and often sentimental dance. Before long and with respectfully slow and measured steps, the groom sidles up to his new father-in-law and takes his new bride by the hand. Soon the song changes, perhaps to a classic funk or disco number but just as often a song that has had some significance to this couple through their time together. They are being launched out into the universe of coupledom. PUBLIC DOMAIN IMAGE The evening progresses. We The days of uniformed wedding bands costing the price of a rural home may be passing, but they’re still a joy to behold. find ourselves at dinner, which proceeds, thankfully, without a hitch beyond the great hitching of the day. As the wine flows freely, hiccups abound with sated glee amid the great good cheer, the laughter, here. The service, short as it should be, flows by Harry Matthews and the bonhomie of old friends, family, strangers creek-like in its simple eloquence, led gently by and lovers. As the speeches wind up and the meal the good reverend what’s-her-name. (Did I detect is digested, it’s finally time for some serious fun. It he big day finally arrived. After a hint of altar wine emanating from the lilt of her is time to dance. months and weeks and endless endsoft breath? Whatever, she was great.) For many involved weddings can be intensely less days, after hours and minutes, And voila, a couple is betrothed on earth, under stressful events. Beyond the normal bridezilla minutes so long it seemed that that old the sun and beneath the watchful grace of whatevmanifestations of full-on emotional transformacliche that the hands on the wall clock er benevolent god or goddess, elder patriarch/mation and the turmoil arising from the need for evin the kitchen were in fact moving triarch, shaman, spirit or whathaveyou, to deem erything to be perfect is a stress-inducing predicabackwards had materialized before our very eyes. this sacred union blessed. ment that may only be quelled with the passing of The guests pile in in an orderly fashion, obliviThen the couple seemingly disappears for a time. the day itself. ous to the near-palpable tension lurking amongst Guests are ushered hither and thither, drinks are the sweet-scented bouquets of flowers, here and reached for, tables are found, appetizers and the nough of this flowery stuff. It’s time to get down, let your hair out, kick off Catskill Quartet those tight shoes, grab yourself anProfessional Strings other drink and dance the night away. Every wedding needs good music, whether that Wini J. Baldwin is accomplished through a band or a DJ. Both opMusician / Coordinator tions have the potential to be both great and/or 845-332-8244 catskillquartet@gmail.com B E A R S V I L L E C AT E R I N G
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hear at a wedding but they did them all with such passion and expertise as to make me wonder why they weren’t out there touring the world. (And of course the answer is that they make more doing what they’re doing.) The band was so good, so engaging and obviously loving what they were doing that the feeling was infectious, making even the stodgiest old folks get up on the dance floor and shake what they had worth shaking. A live wedding band will cost anywhere from a thousand bucks for the most basic stripped-down affair you can find, up to $25,000 or more. The band I describe above would definitely have been at the top end of this price range.
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bove I describe what was perhaps the best wedding-music experience I’ve yet had. Now I will briefly tell you a bit about the worst. About 15 years ago I was living in a little village outside of Dharmsala (the seat of the Tibetan government in exile) in north India. Being one of the few westerners for some miles around, I was invited to many social functions of the village, whether it was a local cricket match that went on for three days, or harvest festivities and the like. One of these events was the marriage of a young girl from a neighboring village to one of our village’s young men. On the day of the wedding it seemed like the entire other village had turned up for the festivities. Some came on horseback, most on foot, playing horns and drums and singing as they came. The rest of the day was spent preparing vast quantities of food and then eating that food, with more singing and dancing along the way. This went on with hardly a break for three days. On the night of the second day someone produced a large amount of a local strong rice wine named Raakshi (which translates as ghosts, or spirits). Soon the music started. It was the men who did most of the dancing. An area was cleared in a courtyard where the dancing slowly got wilder and wilder. Everyone knew all the songs as well. I learned later on that they were synthesized versions of local folk music.
The men were all singing at the top of their lungs. More bottles of booze were passed around. The women who were watching seemed more than a little horrified with where this scene seemed to be going. They were right. Before you knew it, punches were flying, chairs were being thrown, tables broken, food thrown all over the place. The music blared and blasted from what sounded like torn speakers of a stereo I couldn’t see. Soon some of the older women appeared, yelling at the men and slapping them. As quickly as it all had started it stopped. Once again the valley was peaceful and quiet. If you find yourself looking for a moral to this tale, don’t look too hard. It’s not there.
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f you decide you want a DJ for your wedding, know that it can cost you anywhere between $400 and $3000. If you decide to go that route, I recommend you look no further than local radio legend and all-around nice guy Dave Leonard of WDST. His JTD Productions out of Woodstock is your one-stop full service wedding DJ company. If you are looking for a wedding band, our area is rife with options that a quick Google search will put before you. In my quick search, I was able to find numerous wedding bands doing everything from rock to funk to bossa nova, a string quartet to a 20-piece orchestra, and many things in between. In a week I will be playing at my nephew’s wedding in Vermont. Joined by my two brothers and my nephew, I will be playing a number of old Meters songs which I hope will get a lot of booties shaking. In the end, you’ll probably find most of the fretting and worrying you’ve been doing will have been for naught. Weddings almost always have a way of working themselves out for the best. At most, everyone will have a good time and remember the event with fondness and love. Or maybe that’s just the booze working its wondrous charms of love and blessed forgetfulness…
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fraught with problems and issues. Hiring a DJ is more often than not going to be the safe bet, as well as the less expensive option of the two. A DJ should have as many playlist options as there are guests at the wedding, meaning that if the groom is an ex-straight edge punk turned Emo-loving white rasta, a DJ could, in theory, play nothing but sublime and sunny-day stuff all night, making no one but the groom happy. And he would be in ecstasy… A really good DJ should know how to shape the night; when to get things really moving, getting everyone out on the dance floor, and when to slow things down, when to take that ridiculous request, and generally how to lead the festivities from beginning to end. A band, on the other hand, could go either way. If you choose specifically a wedding band (as opposed to say your favorite local bar band), then your chances are pretty fair that what you get will be a professional outfit that knows all the hits (at least the classics), can accommodate numerous requests across a wide range of genres, knows full well that this gig is not about them (it’s about the bride, genius), and is professional enough to know when to stop and when not. The front person of this group should also be able to play the part of emcee as well. Some of the best weddings I’ve been to have had wedding bands playing at them. When a wedding band is at its best, it’s as if it is playing a concert specifically for the bride. A really good wedding band can, like any live performance compared to recorded fare, elevate the attendee experience enormously. A few years ago my partner and I went to the wedding of her niece in Westchester. It was a heady affair in which no expense was spared, from the top-of-the-line gourmet food to the absolutely amazing band that had been procured for the grand event. Had I blinked, I would have sworn the band had walked right out of central casting and onto the stage before me. From the four lead singers (black guy, white guy, black woman, white woman), to the four-piece horn section, the Latino guy playing percussion, and last but not least the big-haired white guy playing lead guitar, this band seemed to have covered all their bases. (Racially speaking I didn’t want to make this description so black and white, but the band did look suspiciously like an old Benetton ad.) My god, were they good. Not only could they play every great song that you ever might want to
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26, 2018 10 | July Celebrations of Love
Ulster Publishing Co.
Famous weddings The region wasn’t always a destination venue By Paul Smart
W
hen we think of weddings, it’s hard not to get swallowed into the romance of the splashiest of events, where guest lists became matters of international protocol and who wore what set trends that lasted decades.The Hudson Valley, Catskills and Taconics have become a getaway wedding destination of late. Venues, bands, caterers and consultants are big business for those seeking memorable nuptials. Is that not part of a longer tradition? Yes, Chelsea Clinton’s tying of the knot to Mark Mezvinsky eight years ago was a huge local blast of glitz, complete with paparazzi and international attention. Guests rode buses from the cenLAUREN THOMAS ter of Rhinebeck out to the big tents overlooking New Paltz has been a beacon for same-sex marriages since village mayor Jason West took it upon the Hudson and distant Catskills at Astor Courts, himself to perform wedding ceremonies in the winter of 2004. as fine an architectural bauble as Stanford White ever created. ties were well-known for the ways their couples Alf Evers’ histories of And no, this month’s shifted, like tectonic plates, over years. Annandale the Catskills, Woodstock cover girl, Eleanor Roossurvived Robert Lowell and Saul Bellow, Hannah and Kingston touch on evelt, was not given away Arendt and Mary McCarthy. Carolee Schneemann marriages here and there. by her uncle, president has lived for years, through various incarnations, He included anecdotes Teddy, at the family esin New Paltz. Phillip Roth, Sally and Milton Avabout wicked affairs, tate in Hyde Park, where ery, and even Julio De Diego and Gypsy Rose Lee cross-dressing govershe met future husband maintained amiability years after they had relanors and love-sick native Franklin when he was tionships around Woodstock. Americans. But little in four and she was but two. In terms of rock and roll, famous former-resiterms of actual nuptials. But Eleanor and Frankdent Bob Dylan started coming to the Bearsville Vernacular histories lin did head off upriver area with Suze Rotello, who inspired his early covering life in the Hudfrom Manhattan immepolitical works. The owners of the Café Espresso, son Valley over several diately after their wedwhere the Center for Photography at Woodstock centuries often include ding. is now, kept the singer/songwriter’s many evenotable weddings. Novels Important for the renings with Joan Baez a secret. Later, the former and other fiction explain gion’s weddings lore were Mr. Zimmerman snuck off to Mineola, Long Iswhy so many weddings the 25 ceremonies New land to marry the best friend of his manager Algo unnoticed. Up into the Paltz mayor Jason West bert Grossman’s wife – the model Sara Lownds nineteenth century (and performed for same-sex (born Shirley Noznisky). But then he settled down beyond for many not in in the winter of 2004. to family life in Woodstock… until both started the upper classes) weren’t So was the first same-sex having affairs around town. based on love. Unless marriage of two active Those and other musical-chair relationships two families were sealduty servicemen at West get a full workout in Barney Hoskyn’s recent book ing a deal in the process, Point this past January. about the old rock-and-roll town, Small Town weddings were no elaboBack in 1986, actress Talk, where we hear about Van Morrison and Jarate production. Usually Jennifer Beals and filmnet Planet, Robbie and Dominique Robertson, small, they took place at maker Alexandre RockAlbert and Sally Grossman, Levon Helm and one of the marrying famiwell were married by a Libby Titus (and later Libby Titus and Donald lies’ home. Announcejustice of the peace in Fagen), John and Johanna Hall, Rick and Gracie ments came after the fact. Warwick. I was the witDanko, Geoff and Maria Muldaur, Richard and The bride wore whatever ness. Jane Manuel, John and Catherine Sebastian, Todd best dress she had, the Research uncovers a Rundgren and Bebe Buell, Paul and Kathy Buttergroom a clean suit. lot more famous honeyfield, Janis Joplin and Jimi Hendrix. Suffice it to Only after Queen Victomoons to the area than say there’s a lot of small-town talk. ria married Prince Albert WIKICOMMONS big weddings, as well as A few couples actually lasted to see their kids’ in a huge ceremony, wearpiles of darker marital As much as she enjoyed her wedding, Eleanor weddings in the area. The area drew many, many ing white (a first) did the Roosevelt adored the peace and quiet her new tales. people who felt their love was strong enough to upper classes in Europe, “There was Thomas home in Hyde Park brought her. In her later hatch dreams of married life; to raise kids while and then America, devise Cole, whose marriage years, she created her own getaway at Val-Kill. making music, art or books. It was a destination similar ceremonies and kept him painting in for many who were newly married, not yet a place traditions. Catskill, and Martin Van Buren, who also married to host a destination wedding. Given the number of artists, writers and musiin Catskill but whose wife died before he reached “I wasn’t going deeper into the darkness for anycians who have lived in the area over the years, the White House,” noted historian Vern Benjamin body,” was how Bob Dylan put it in his own authere must have been at least some bohemian cerin a fun interview that saw the lifelong Saugerties tobiographical Chronicles a few years back. “My emonies. In earlier years, mere suggestions of an resident and bachelor of many recent years talkfamily was my light, and I was going to protect artistic life could cause problems; ing of weddings in Westchester (Ted Kennedy that light at all costs.” Noble sentiments. Among Evers described the troubles that utopian comand James Fenimore Cooper), Thornton Wilder’s the few who lasted the longest in the Woodstock munity builder John Humphrey Noyes ran into basing of The Matchmaker, later remade as Hello stew, and around the region, were often the childwhen he moved into the Rondout area of KingsDolly, in Yonkers, and Washington Irving’s own less ones, or those less famous. ton from Vermont, causing a ruckus amongst bachelorhood. “Nelson Rockefeller honeymooned What makes for a famous wedding? Famous those frightened by what the locals called “free with his first wife at Yama-no-uchi in Napanoch. people. Remember the back-and-forth involving love.” Later, in the same general area, George BakAnd there much have been some big events up in the Clintons’ attendance at the Trumps’ wedding?. er of Maryland shocked the area when, as Father Saratoga.” Or that time Sly Stone married someone in MadiDivine, he announced his marriage to “Sweet Anson Square Garden before a paying audience. gel” without having acknowledged his former wife West Point was decidedly unenthusiastic about Memorable weddings are those that mean Mother Divine’s passing. weddings beyond those of returning grads for something to their participants, whether or not In Woodstock, Hervey White and his wife were many years. Most of the generals and presidents they survive the march of time. Or mean somenoted to have had an ll-defined relationship, not associated with the place were too young to have thing, as Happy and Jane Traum have pointed dissimilar to that of Byrdcliffe founder Ralph gotten betrothed while cadets, or already married out, to their kids. Whitehead and his wide Jane. Some communiwhen they returned to teach or run the place.
July 26, 2018 Celebrations of Love
Ulster Publishing Co.
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The cake Love is love, even when it’s covered in icing By Rossi
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’ve seen a lot of wedding cakes over these past three decades in countless flavors: old-school vanilla and chocolate, but also red velvet, carrot, ginger, banana, blackberry, champagne, tiramisu, cardamom and countless more. 2018 marks my thirtieth year as a caterer in New York City. My favorite was a Jamaican rum cake that the bride’s mother carried on her lap on the plane all the way from Jamaica. It was packed with so much rum you could get tipsy eating a slice of it. I had two and started singing show tunes in the kitchen. Early in my catering career, a young woman from Nebraska called me, “Um, your food sounds amazing, but before we proceed, I need to know if you’re okay with the fact that my fiancée is a woman.” She sounded nervous. “Are you saying this is a gay wedding?” I asked. “Um .. yes.” “Then hurray!,” I said, “You win the family discount!” “You mean you’re …?” “As gay as the day is long.” I later found out that my Nebraska bride had had the misfortune of talking with a homophobic baker before she called me. “He just about threw up on the phone when I asked if he’d put two brides on the cake.” Half her family didn’t approve of her marrying her childhood sweetheart. She wasn’t sure if any of them would be willing to fly to New York for her wedding. “We’re just gonna have to fill the hall with so much fun you won’t even know they’re missing,” I promised. I lined up an arsenal of gay and gayfriendly vendors. That wedding was so laced with joy it made me cry, though this tough old-school New Yorker is allergic to bright colors and crying. The piece de resistance (aside from my spectacular barbecue buffet) was the wedding cake. The baker I worked with made a gorgeous three-tiered lemon cake with raspberry filling and buttercream frosting. The cake toppers stole the show. Two Wonder Woman figurines were proudly perched on top. That’s just what the brides were; in their wedding gowns, one in champagne, the other in antique white. Two beautiful women, deeply in love, willing to stand against the haters and the naysayers. Wonder women. I’ve catered lots and lots of gay weddings since that wonderful night. They have been as varied and diverse as my straight weddings. A few years back a difficult bride asked me, “What makes gay weddings you cater different from the heterosexual ones?” “Nothing,” I laughed, “except I’ve noticed my gay couples seem to like each other a little bit more.” I was kidding, of course. But I’m not sure that she took it that way. I’d just catered a wedding for two sweet young men, one Greek and the other Irish. My Greek groom wanted to decorate the tables with bowls of pomegranates instead of flowers. “Pomegranates are an ancient Greek symbol of rebirth,” he told me. “We were born again the day we met.”
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hings have gotten better for gay rights. Marriage equality passed (thank you to the late Edie Windsor). Wedding businesses all over the country started hanging out rainbow flags. Smart entrepreneurs began to manufacture gay wedding cake-toppers. You could even buy them on Amazon. For a little while, it seemed like Americans really were ready to embrace the notion that love is love. The case of the Colorado baker who refused to bake a wedding cake for two gay men, citing his
WIKICOMMONS
Sometimes the best wedding cakes are edible art, as with this one at the oft-painted Kaaterskill Falls. religious beliefs, was taken to the Supreme Court, where his religious objections to gay marriage were considered protected views. To me, that was a painful reminder that we still have a long way to go. I think about my two Nebraska brides. It’s hard for me to imagine anyone would refuse to bake these lovely women a wedding cake. Watching them feed each other the first slice of their cake is an image I keep in my head when I want to remember what being in the wedding business is supposed to be all about. I’m not in the market of denouncing anyone’s
religious beliefs. My own father once told me he wouldn’t attend my wedding were I to marry a woman. “I’d consider that an abomination,” he told me. Religion as a reason to denounce gay weddings is not always a Christian thing. My father was Jewish. Wedding cakes are supposed to be the sweet finale to a celebration of love. Imagine if love was the only criterion a baker asked for when deciding whether to accept a wedding-cake customer. “Do you love each other?” Love is love even when it’s coated in buttercream.
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26, 2018 12 | July Celebrations of Love
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