All weddings need a backup plan

Marriage is the sunset of love.

- French proverb

Cedric the Entertainer, one of my favorite comedians, was cracking them up Saturday night in Washington at the annual foreign correspondents' dinner (televised on C-SPAN).

With President Bush and most of the nation's journalistic heavyweights in the audience, he paused for a moment to acknowledge that the war in Iraq and Social Security were indeed important, but he wanted to discuss what everyone was really talking about - what that woman down in Georgia was thinking when she faked her kidnapping and fled her pending marriage.

I think he's right.

And I say that because most of us have been there - the week or night before a wedding, and a friend about to walk down the aisle is talking about a walk down to the bus station.

Years ago, one of my best high school friends invited us all to Colorado, where Air Force duty had taken him and a local girl had eventually agreed to be his wife.

The sacrifices we, his friends, made on our meager savings to get from Georgia to Colorado were enormous, but we went. And when we got there we found a couple who argued so much, we assumed they had secretly married years before.

It grew particularly heated right after the rehearsal dinner, when they began to call each other names and escalated a variety of threats until both agreed the wedding should not be held.

Well, what we should have done was agree. What we should have done was suggest they needed to take a few days or weeks to cool off, maybe even reconsider a life together.

But we didn't.

The consensus of the wedding party, as articulated by its lone journalism major, was, "We didn't spend half our summer earnings to buy plane tickets all the way out here for you two to decide you're not ready!"

The wedding went off the next day without a hitch and the marriage lasted little more than a year with the groom in jail for failure to pay child support. (His excuse to the judge was professed uncertainty of participation in the parenting process.)

Well, stuff like this happens all the time, but now - perhaps inspired by a runaway bride in suburban Atlanta - everyone will wonder whether the bride or groom ran away or met with foul play.

Here's what I propose: Make pre-wedding bachelor or bachelorette parties a forum for flight. Have the groom or groomette share with his or her confidantes whether they "want to go through with this."

If they don't, let them run. At least they'll have a head start.

You've got to admit that such an understanding of the new matrimonial protocol will add a sense of suspense to the wedding.

When the Wedding March begins, everyone will turn around not to see what the gown looks like, but to see whether the bride is coming.

And, if not, the best man or maid of honor will be expected to make an announcement that one half of the wedding couple has decided to respectfully withdraw.

You're right if you point out that this might not seem fair for those who got dressed up and bought expensive gifts, so let's do something else.

The maid of honor or best man must offer to take the place of the no-show.

One way or another, somebody's getting married and the cake and caterer won't be wasted.

Sounds a lot more fun than catching a bouquet, doesn't it?

Reach Bill Kirby at (706) 823-3344 or bill.kirby@augustachronicle.com.