For I Can't Help Falling in Love With You

We arrived at the Las Vegas Chapel to see three brides pour out with their grooms dressed as Elvis. The "real" Elvis, or the one who was being paid to fake Elvis, took some final photo ops with them, they entered a stretch limo, and were gone. Our wedding couple was next, but Elvis had dashed back inside to freshen up, remove thirty years of death somehow.

I went in with modest expectations. I grabbed a tissue to dab at my eyes which were already leaking tears. The tears were not from joy or weeping at the sweetness of another blessed union, I am sorry to admit. They were from squeezing my eyes shut really hard so I wouldn't laugh uncontrollably. Jim, who had raised the lovely bride with Amy, had showed me a photo he had taken of the sign at the counter of the marriage license bureau: People under the influence of drugs or alcohol to the degree that their judgement is impaired will not be issued a license till they sober up.
This was a fitting epitaph for this town.

The crinoline under my poodle skirt was biting into my legs. I had considered carrying a can marked "TIPS" on my walk to the cab stop. I thought it might help pay for this Vegas trip. I thought the sight of a 50 some year old woman wearing ruffled bobby socks was worth at least a dollar. The rest of the wedding group was similarly attired. All the groomsmen and fathers wore 50's style bowling shirts. Even the Playboy bunnies on the corner were noticing us.

Elvis emerged from the chapel. It was our turn. The bride and groom were whisked away while we were all seated. There were only 14 of us, and the baby dressed in a little tux.
"Scatter around the chapel," we were advised.
A silence descended while I bit my lip till it was bloody to maintain the proper facial expression of respect at the solemnity of the sacrament of marriage.
Just then, there was a crescendo of the first few bars from "2001 Space Odyssey" and fake fog began swirling around the wedding party standing in anticipation at the front of the chapel. The groom was not there. The fog billowed and 2001 Space Odyssey theme built in volume and drama. Suddenly the back garage door of the chapel opened, and a pink cadillac arrived, pulling in with the bride and groom in back. They emerged and Elvis danced with them to the altar, singing in a surprisingly excellent voice.

Elvis as wedding officiator was hilarious. By now, it was clear that this was not a mockery or even any longer cheesy. It was so far over the top that the ridiculous had become sublime. It was just plain fun. I stopped biting my lip and like everyone, including the dancing bride and groom, laughed so hard that I almost wilted my crinoline.

And then when Elvis told the bride and groom to dance slowly now with each other, he crooned "I Can't Help Falling in Love with You" with such sweetness that I found I was needing the tissue to dab at my eyes. And this time is was with more somber tears for the hopeful, so often daunting future of learning to live a life of love with another human being. I was, inexplicably, in the midst of all this facade of life that Vegas excels at, touched by the beautiful voice and words of Elvis, and the sweet sincere face of my niece beaming blissfully at her groom.

When we returned to the hotel, my sister Amy, mother of the bride, had created a gorgeous cake reception. She had decorated the room in the beautiful colors of the wedding, and created a cake that was topped by ceramic figures of the bride and groom she had made herself. Elvis stood with them atop the cake with tiny ceramic records as accent points. And the painting I had started a half a year ago now stood at the back of the room, resplendent in a gold frame, waiting for the bride and groom.

I had painted Elvis and the wedding couple on black velvet. It had been much harder than I had anticipated, not having ever painted on velvet before. But Amy had told me that one of the bride Jennifer's life long wishes was to own a black velvet painting of Elvis. She had never found the right one. I hoped this was the right one. Jennifer and the groom entered the room and we all formed a pathway holding aloft blue and green ribbon streamers that swirled above them. The path ended at the painting. Jennifer saw it and then gasped and her hands flew to her cheeks. She stared at it with her mouth open. I had waited 6 months keeping the painting secret from all but my sister, just to see that reaction. She swirled around and crushed me in a wonderful bear hug. Our joint crinoline scratched at our knees.

I leave Vegas this morning, and I can't say I am sorry to go. I will of course miss my beloved family, all my siblings together however briefly, the dear nieces and nephews I haven't seen in so long. However, I will not miss the moral standards of Vegas, the crowds, the noise, the facade and cheesy fakeness of everything on the Strip. But there is one thing that happened in Vegas that I hope and pray doesn't STAY in Vegas, and that is the pledge of a young and sweet couple to remain together in a world that is too often big on show, and short on commitment.

"What God has joined together, let no man cast asunder."

1 John 3:23
And this is his command: to believe in the name of his Son, Jesus Christ, and to love one another as he commanded us.




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