GETTING MARRIED, MAKE CHEQUES PAYABLE TO..

It's mildly Ironic after, all that has happened ,that I get a letter from my bank offering me financial advice when I go mildly overdrawn at the end of the month. My bank recently got handed it's share of a £37 bn bail out for not being able to manage it's own finances...and yet I dip into my agred overdraught and all of a sudden i'm in need of help. Im paying to clear off their debts, you'd think they could say thankyou by not charging me £5 a month just to have an account at their bank.

 I say this because my next step after Paris, or rather OUR next step after paris was to arrange our wedding. Costly things weddings. Having been molly-coddled and handheld through my first marriage arangements by both sets of parents, I had little idea of how much this was going to cost...Alison's plans were specific, and had clearly been worked on and improved over many years in readiness for this day.

One thing that I was particularly set on was that we receive no gifts. I didn't want to celebrate our marriage and commitment to eachother by geting STUFF, it's not about the stuff you get. Stuff is all that is left when marriages break down. Stuff confuses the issue and dilutes the union. How can you celebrate something like a lifetime promise to another Human being by asking for or willingly receiving financial and material gifts?

     BOB AND HARRIET ARE GETTING MARRIED. PLEASE GIVE GENEROUSLY.
   TOM AND TINA LOVE EACHOTHER. NEED NEW MICROWAVE AND CUTLERY.
      SIMON AND SUE BECOME ONE. NEED CASH FOR NEW HOUSE AND CAR.

It just seems so bloody wrong to me.

With my Dad now passed away, and Alison's ill and unable to attend any wedding due to severe Alzheimers we decided to direct those commited to spending money on us to a charity site set up to recieve donations for Prostate Cancer research and Alzheimers. We had our own page, with pictures of us both and a nice little message. It worked well for us and Alison's acceptance of the idea without any reservations just served to further convince me that she was definately the one.

 There was only mild resistance to the idea..and after everything was done, we managed to raise a fair bit of cash for both charities.

The venue was sorted, Dresses ordered from the States, suits arranged, cars..photographer, menues, entertainment, flights and of course the when and where of the ceremony.

 I think my Brother in law and sister in law to be would have wanted us to be married at their church by their minister..but as I have already mentioned, he was  (when viewed outside of the distorted bubble of his church) quite clearly mental. He had a strange little sidekick too...the whole thing was spooky and frankly I would have rather been marrried by Herman from the Munsters and Cousin IT.
 The church, and Minister we settled on were perfect. I was required to have a discussion initially with the minister, and then possibly later with a pannel of 'judges' who would decide if I was able to be married in their church given that I was a Divorcee.

It transpired that being a Divorcee is a pretty bad thing. Marriage is for life, not just for Christmas..and initially I was worried that I may have to settle for a Registry office ceremony because of my Evil and Ungodly status as a divorced man.

  It turns out though, and I thank the Bible in it's many forms for it's narrrow minded hate mungering, that one of the few things more evil and unworthy than a divorced man or woman, is a Gay one!! talk about get out of Jail free..my sins were not just lessened but I was all of a sudden a VICTIM of an agent of evil! There was a point where I thought that the whole event was going to be paid for by the church and that I may just get made a saint into the bargain. There was no need to see any jury or pannel, and the wedding was a go! If I had not chosen to share my suffering at the hands of the great evil that was my ex wife with the Minister..who knows what would have happened.

Now all we had to do was pay for everything. Surprisingly, we did..just the two of us, ourselves. And although we felt poorer by the end of it..it felt damn good. It was a 'Proper' wedding, because we designed it, and we paid for it. I took out a small bank loan just prior to the big day to settle a few outstanding bills, but apart from that..we had settled everything. And although I do say so myself, the event was no 'quiet affair' we did nothing on the cheap and nor would I have wanted to.

Alison deserved the day she had dreamed of, and If I had had to rob banks to fund it, I would have...no real harm there, the banks had clearly been robbing us for years and are clearly going to continue to do so. I'll discuss them again perhaps when I tell you about how we moved from the rented penthouse apartment on the Hill town to a mortgaged home of our own...