The Wedding: A Family's Coming Out Story (14 page)

I must have forgotten, if only for a moment,
that this is Montreal.

ANDREW,
DOUG, SHELDON,
AND
ROSLYN

September
1995

ANDREW   
The key decision about
where we’d hold the ceremony was made in July. From the time of our engagement
in January we had vacillated between New York and Montreal as the preferred
location. During that time I did some investigative work in Manhattan,
exploring the options for reception halls.

One day in May, I walked across Central Park
and, on an impulse, strolled into the elegant Pierre Hotel on Fifth Avenue and
Sixtieth Street. Knowing it was far beyond our means, I inquired if I could
meet with the banquet manager. In moments I was introduced to a gentleman who
showed me the main ballroom, and the cocktail area. He offered information
regarding the approximate cost per guest. This was early in my research, so I
had no basis for comparison, but I knew it would amount - regardless of how
many people we eventually invited - to a whole lot of dough.

While the banquet manager was forthcoming with
numerous details, I withheld from him one key detail of my own: The sex of my
intended. Why complicate matters, I asked myself. After all, since I knew we
couldn’t afford this, there wasn’t any point in getting into particulars, was
there?

I’d also called the Four Seasons on East Fifty
Seventh. It’s a spectacular new hotel, with a knockout design that combines
futurist fantasy with classic deco, and even though I was sure it would be
pricey, I was so taken with its atmosphere that I held out hope that we could
have our reception somewhere on their grounds. When I asked to speak to the
banquet manager, I was connected with a pleasant woman who provided me with all
the pertinent facts.

This time, perhaps because it was a conversation
by phone, without face to face contact, or perhaps because she was a woman, and
therefore somehow less threatening than the gentleman from the Pierre, I was
emboldened to plainly lay out all of our facts.

I didn’t hear the sound of any glass - or any
other objects for that matter - come crashing down to the floor on her end of
the line. Once I had heard all the prices, and we toted them up, she might well
have expected that I’d be the one doing the dropping.

With a few more exploratory phone calls to more
realistically priced venues under my belt, I became increasingly aware of the
financial difficulty that lay ahead of us if we planned a reception in New
York. Since Doug and I had already scheduled a fourth of July trip to visit my
parents, I suggested we consider taking a look around my home town.

In fact, I’d floated the concept of moving our
reception to Montreal several times before, but Doug never offered much
response.

DOUG   
I’d had many mixed feelings
about that idea. I agreed with Andrew that prohibitive prices in New York would
mean a much smaller, and more spartan, affair. Yet I wasn’t convinced that an event
as intricate as a wedding could be planned effectively from four hundred miles
away.

New York was obviously the simplest answer,
geographically. And some of the friends we’d made together in Manhattan would
surely find it expensive and inconvenient to make the trip north of the border.
Also, I feared that some of my oldest friends from L.A. would be less likely to
venture to Montreal for a weekend, while I knew most of them welcomed a good
reason to fly to New York, where the wedding could be the centerpiece of a
longer vacation in the city.

I was even more ambivalent about Andrew’s desire
to keep the ceremony in New York while moving the reception to Montreal. When
Andrew and I first seriously discussed the shape of the entire wedding, he
talked of splitting up the ceremony from the reception, and more significantly,
inviting only a small core of family and close friends to the ceremony, and a
much larger group to the reception. This severing of the event unsettled me,
but I couldn’t determine the true source of my dissatisfaction.

“Why not have it all in one place, at one time,
with the same people?”

“I don’t like being the center of attention.”

“How can you have a wedding - even if it’s just
the reception part - without being the center of attention?”

“It’s not the same thing. I can’t explain it.
I’d rather have the ceremony with just a few friends and family, and then have
a big party afterward.”

I had always disliked the idea aesthetically,
and more significantly, I thought it would send the wrong message to those
attending the reception. I feared it would appear that a ceremony between two
men was something to be hidden. And now that Andrew wanted to actually search
for a reception hall in Montreal, I was able to articulate the key question
that had troubled me ever since Andrew first suggested fracturing our event
into two distinct halves.

“Is this about self-hatred? Are you calling it
shyness, when on some level you don’t really think you deserve a wedding?”

ANDREW   
It really is true that
I’ve never liked being the center of attention. Perhaps it’s because,
historically, whenever I’ve been the center of attention, it hasn’t been such a
wonderful experience. Part of this discomfort stemmed from a general feeling of
self-loathing. It was as if being in the spotlight would reveal to others the
person I really was, the person I worked so hard to keep hidden.

It’s also true that I was concerned that some
guests, especially those of an older generation, might not know how to react to
the sight of two men publicly engaging in this hallowed ritual. What if they
remained silent, but spoke volumes with looks of reproof? Or worse, if they
betrayed their disapproval and snickered?

So yes, I was experiencing a twinge of
internalized homophobia, fearing that reactions of discomfort or disdain might
be deserved, because I might, in fact, look ridiculous doing this.

DOUG   
I wanted to know one thing.

Was he
embarrassed
to marry me?

And if he should answer yes, I contemplated the
possibility of asking a question with more serious repercussions.

Which part was embarrassing?

The
marry
part?

Or was it marrying
me
in front of a
roomful of people whose approval or rejection weighed heavily on him?

As I quickly played out the possible variations,
like plotting out a chess match of emotions, Andrew’s eyes searched my face.
Without deciding how far I’d go to learn the truth, I swallowed hard and asked.

“Are you embarrassed to marry me?”

He put his arms around me, then pulled away and
looked me in the eye. “No way.”

“You’re sure?”

“Absolutely. That’s not what it’s about at all.”

So while I still didn’t like the idea of a
separate and therefore invisible ceremony, I didn’t want to push Andrew into
something he didn’t want. And by the time I was on the plane to Montreal that
Fourth of July weekend, I had made peace with the separation of ceremony and
soiree.

ANDREW   
It was my first trip
home since our engagement. No decisions had been made yet about what city the
ceremony or the reception would be held in, so Doug and I had no definite
indication of how my parents were acclimating to our plans.

When I arrived at the airport, my mother picked
me up and we went straight to a Chinese restaurant. My father met us a few
minutes after we’d sat down. What surprised me was, we didn’t speak about
anything related to the engagement. I was hurt, and confused. I showed my
father the ring, and he changed the topic.

My brother Mitchell showed up for dinner late,
upset about some problem at work. The focus became my brother and his
difficulties. Here I was, coming in for the first time. I thought it would be
exciting, talking about the engagement, our plans. Instead, whenever I brought
it up, it would get dropped like a bad habit.

There was much more support when I got together
with Lorne and some of his friends later that evening. And somebody made a
suggestion that sent our wedding journey on a whole new course.

DOUG   
Andrew had just met me at the
airport, and he was already pitching a place he’d just discovered. An out of
town reception was one thing, but I wasn’t prepared to have Andrew make all the
decisions before I’d even arrived. I have a nickname for him, well earned: The
Steamroller. When he sets his sights on something, move aside, or get mowed
down.

“We still have places to visit tomorrow with my
mother, but you have to see this!” he cooed. “Lorne told me we should stop at
Eaton’s. A friend of his had been there for an AIDS benefit. The top floor is
called Le Neuvieme. That means ‘The Ninth’, so guess what floor it’s on?
Anyway, it’s almost never used for public functions. I had a little time after
my haircut, and before my dentist appointment...” - I laughed over Andrew’s
need to migrate four hundred miles to tend to his personal hygiene - “... and
I’m just telling you, it’s everything we’ve been talking about, but didn’t know
how or where to find. Nothing I say will do it justice; you have to see it with
your own eyes.” I was not about to be swayed, but I didn’t say a word.

We left our bags in the car, and pushed through
the store. Andrew had warned me that the first floor didn’t make much of a
first impression, filled as it was with handbags, scarves, umbrellas and other
department store goods. But as we stepped out of the elevator on the ninth
floor, rounded the first right turn, walked past the ersatz marble fountain in
the foyer, and yanked open the unassuming door to the hall, I felt every hair
stand on end.

This really was it.

It was rare for Andrew and I to share immediate
and total enthusiasm for an experience. Usually one needs to be wooed into
approval by the other. As we stood together and surveyed the room, our silence,
and the knowing look we shared, said we both knew we’d found one perfect thing.
And it was just as well that Andrew hadn’t wasted breath trying to describe the
feeling of being in that room, with its magnificent deco detail, soaring
ceiling, romance pouring from every inch of its marble and alabaster. I’d never
seen anything like it. And no wonder, since the manager later described it as
the only remaining original art-deco restaurant in North America.

But how much would the space cost? I fretted
that such a room couldn’t possibly be in our price range.

“Don’t worry,” Andrew used his soothing psych
voice. “I’m sure it’s not so bad. Just wait until tomorrow. We have an
appointment to come back with my mother.”

ANDREW   
The next morning, my
mother, Doug and I set out for downtown like we weren’t really the first family
to shop for a gay wedding reception hail in Montreal history. But of course we
all knew it would be an unorthodox series of meetings.

As we tooled toward our first appointment, my
mother stated matter-of-factly that she hadn’t clarified the nature of the
couple in question when she made our appointments. And while I didn’t expect
any banquet managers to faint directly upon meeting us, I was certainly
concerned over whether any would break into an uncontrollable sweat when they
realized there were two grooms, and no, there weren’t two brides waiting
outside in the car.

The Ritz Carlton Hotel would be our maiden
voyage together into this uncharted territory. We strode into the lobby, and
surveyed the various rooms unaccompanied by hotel personnel. When my mother
asked to meet the banquet manager we were introduced to a pleasant looking man
who displayed refreshing candor by expressing mild surprise - yet without
judgment. Acknowledging that this was an unusual arrangement, he stepped up to
the challenge by treating us all as I imagine he would any other family.

Since money had always been the main motivation
behind moving the reception to Montreal, the answer to the question of cost was
absolutely key. And the answers were very good. Not only was the per head cost
of catering startlingly low, by New York standards, but the lodging costs were
a fraction of the price as well.

DOUG   
The banquet manager took us to
the main ballroom, a large, attractive, somewhat upscale version of the generic
reception hail good for Bar Mitzvahs, weddings or a fancy business affair. As
Andrew and the banquet manager discussed catering details, Roslyn and I
surveyed the room in detail.

“Where would you like to have the ceremony?”
Roslyn asked.

Suddenly it hit me that neither Andrew nor I had
ever discussed this with his mother.

“Oh. Well, actually, we were thinking of having
the ceremony... in New York.”

Roslyn’s face recoiled as if from a foul smell,
the exact same reaction I’d seen on Andrew’s face a thousand times. “I don’t
like that idea at all. The reception won’t have any context; it’ll be devoid of
meaning. There won’t be any connection. People won’t understand - or at least -
people from around here - won’t understand what they’re here to celebrate.
It’ll be as if we have something to hide. And wouldn’t it be much nicer to do
it all together, at the same time, with the same people?”