A new definition for eloping

We each had our own reason for wanting to elope. Mine was my large family, featuring a variety of religions, divorces, and ongoing feuds; Darren’s was his disinclination to be the center of attention of a large family featuring a variety of religions, divorces, and ongoing feuds. But we didn’t actually mind if people knew we were committed to spending the rest of our lives together. We just figured we’d tell them we were going to elope.

While we were engaged, we embarked on an amazing eight-thousand-mile road trip. When we arrived home on the Vineyard, we were greeted by flocks of friends and family wanting to know nothing about the Grand Canyon, New Orleans, Miami, the Blue Ridge Mountains, or Manhattan. They just wanted to know if we’d gotten married yet. If not yet, when?

If we weren’t trying to avoid a formal wedding, we would have exclaimed, “In two weeks!” But alas, eloping etiquette doesn’t allow for that kind of honesty. However, we did tell Darren’s parents the date and locale, since we’d decided to get married on their property. They responded exactly as he’d anticipated: His father said cheerfully, “It’s about time! How can I help?” and his mother delightedly, energetically, plotted how to eavesdrop on the ceremony.

Friends tried to suss out information, and we became a little paranoid about giving any out. People would ask what I was doing with my time now that I was home, and I had to say, casually, “Oh, nothing really, still unpacking. Life is boring.” They all seemed to take me at my word, which freaked me out a little. Is lying always that easy? You just say something that isn’t true and people believe you? Wow!

We snuck into the Tisbury Town Hall to apply for a marriage license. This required putting the date in writing. The clerk knew Darren on sight, since Darren’s dad had been a Tisbury selectman for nine years. Now the clerk of Tisbury knew when we were getting married! Do the town clerks all over the Island communicate with each other? What if she told the West Tisbury clerk, who knows my dad (a thirty-year vet of that town’s politics), and that clerk told my dad? What if the Tisbury clerk told the whole town of Tisbury? Then everybody would know about it! And somehow they’d figure out the location, and crash the wedding. At least, that was Darren’s concern. Let me say here that Darren does not have the ego of a celebrity – but there really is something about getting married that makes each participant temporarily believe (or fear) that they might, in fact, be the center of the universe.

And so I avoided friends and family, lest the date – obviously the most important date in the history of the world – slip out. Even so, the danger of revelation lurked: When I asked my friend Kate for help regarding my wedding present to Darren, she casually, helpfully, replied, “Let’s see, this is a wedding present? And so you’d be needing it by what date exactly?” – and I almost answered her. Good Lord, she’d nearly wrested the Divine Secret from me!

Kate directed me to Jenni Bick Bookbinding on Main Street in Vineyard Haven – pure heaven for people who are stationerily or albumatorially inclined. A cheerful young woman named Cherish found exactly what I needed and – since we were anonymous to each other – I didn’t hesitate to give her our names and tell her the wedding would be Tuesday, so I needed the personalized album label (for a compendium of our love letters to each other) done by Monday.

Somewhere in the conversation there was a reference made to my childhood. “Did you go to high school on the Island?” asked Cherish, her face lighting up. “Then you probably know my mother-in-law, Marge Harris.”

Suddenly Cherish was not at all anonymous: Not only was Marge one of my favorite teachers, her husband and my dad were co-workers. “If you see your in-laws in the next few days, give them my best but please don’t tell them when I’m getting married,” I begged. Cherish looked a little confused, but agreed. I left the store hoping I could trust her discretion – absurdly certain that such hot gossip would be hard to keep to herself.

The perils mounted further at the Spa at Mansion House in Vineyard Haven. I told the women at the counter – none of whom I knew, so I was safe – that I was getting married the next Tuesday, and I wanted them to help me get pretty for the event. One of the women, although much younger than I, reminded me of my junior high English teacher from West Tisbury. Suddenly I remembered that my junior high English teacher had years ago retired from teachingto buy and run the Mansion House. And have a daughter. I considered making my appointments under a false name. Unlike Paris Hilton, say, or Britney Spears, I did not want to draw attention to myself and my fascinating life circumstances.

When I returned to the Mansion House spa for a French manicure, Susie Goldstein (that former English teacher) came down to the spa to oversee a minor crisis. Like half of the Island, she knew I was engaged.

“What’s the date?” she asked.

I stared up at her like a deer in headlights. “Can’t tell you,” I said.

Perhaps it’s a normal assumption to make of a non-manicure-getting girl who is suddenly getting a manicure, but after a beat, Susie said softly, with absolute knowledge, “It’s tomorrow, isn’t it?”

I was too startled to deny it. “Please don’t tell anyone!” I begged.

She smirked. “C’mon, Nick, you’re back on Martha’s Vineyard now. Did you really think you could keep anything a secret?” But she promised not to tell.

I spent the rest of the day avoiding phone calls from various friends who wanted to see me – all of whom, if they saw my French manicure, would know Something Big was up. Obviously, nothing could be more significant in their personal lives than my fingernails.

It had been a warm week, but the next morning it was overcast, windy, and chilly. I bundled up and went to Tommye Brown, an Oak Bluffs hairstylist who, like everyone else, wanted to know when the wedding was (she’s known Darren since he was young). She thought I was just getting a haircut, but I confessed that today was The Day. She was thrilled, and as a wedding gift, did both my hair and makeup for free. (And let me say my hair received more compliments that day than in its previous forty-two years combined.)

I returned to my soon-to-be in-laws, where Darren’s mother, Ginny – succumbing to tears in her desire to witness the ceremony – helped me put my gown on, and adorned me with a necklace and earrings she and her mother-in-law had bought to match it. She took the first photo of me as a bride. Darren’s father, Jim, helped me into a long winter coat (my dress was not actually fit to be worn in May on the Vineyard). He drove me down to the huge family barn, where our officiator and photographer were waiting with Darren. I slipped the coat off and stepped across the threshold. Jim stepped in behind me, turned on the stereo, and as the sounds of Beethoven’s Sixth Symphony slipped out over the huge oak beams, he disappeared outside, leaving us alone. This was, after all, an elopement.

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