Tag Archives: bride

Father of the Bride, Part II

by Woody

STRAW_CoverWoody’s highly anticipated new book “STRAWBERRIES IN WINTERTIME: Essays on Life, Love, and Laughter” is NOW available! Order your signed copy HERE!

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Masterpiece Day of Masterpiece Days

When my son was seven, he and I hiked to the summit of Yosemite Falls where we triumphantly enjoyed day-old pizza, warm soda and a heavenly view of the magnificent valley below. As I tucked him into bed that night, the tired little Mountain Boy said, “Daddy, this was the best day of my life.”

It was a masterpiece day, to be certain, but I have always felt there is no “best” day, no single day that is the ultimate masterpiece above all others. Rather, the very best days are different hues in a rainbow.

That day on the mountain was a beautiful hue of sky blue.

September 4th, three Sundays past, the glorious yellow of a field of sunflowers was added to my life’s rainbow. More accurately, of a church aisle decorated with sunflowers and a matching bridal bouquet.1_daldadaislewalk

I had not planned to do a follow-up column on my daughter’s wedding after having written about it the day before vows were exchanged. But so many people have requested one that, to borrow the signature phrase from the late radio broadcaster Paul Harvey, here is “the rest of the story.”

A friend, who had already walked a church aisle in my wedding wingtips, told me it would be one of the top five days of my life. By evening’s end, I realized he had understated matters. Indeed, contrary to my earlier proclamation, I dare say it was the best day of my life.

I say this without diminishing my other all-time favorite days, the gorgeous reds and blues and golds in my life’s rainbow. I say this because this single masterpiece day had me reliving many, many masterpiece days.

For example, walking my 29-year-old daughter down the aisle, her hand in my arm, brought to mind walking her to the first day of kindergarten; our hand-in-hand evening walks around the neighborhood when she was young; our own hikes in Yosemite when she was a little older.

Seeing her holding the bridal bouquet of sunflowers, which have always been her favorite, had me reliving her 16th birthday when I surprised her at school with a bouquet of 16 sunflowers.

It was not only hues relating to my daughter that enveloped me. That “best” day climbing Yosemite Falls also resurfaced as the Mountain Boy, now 26, stood tall at the alter beside his big sister as her Man of Honor. The masterpiece day when he delivered the commencement speech at his college graduation flashed to memory as he charismatically gave a heartfelt toast to the bride and groom.

All weddings remind me of my own, but this one did so far more than all others because it was on my wife’s and my anniversary date. Too, the two brides – 34 years past, and present – share the same beauty and radiance.

On and on, my life’s rainbow hues shined everywhere on this masterpiece of masterpiece days.

As I walked my daughter down the aisle, not only did countless images of her – from the day she was born, through her youth, now into young womanhood – flip through my mind’s photo album, but the emotions of each page resurfaced as well. My eyes, like my heart, overflowed as this collage of moments made this the best moment of all.

And then came our father-daughter dance, 3 minutes and 50 seconds of just she and I alone on the dance floor as Tim McGraw’s “My Little Girl” played, and somehow this was an even greater moment still.

A number of people asked me afterward what my little girl and I were talking about, crying about, laughing about intimately out there on the dance floor, and my answer was this: “Everything.”

I will share one specific thing Dallas whispered to me a little earlier, in the church as I escorted her down the aisle to her new husband, because I think there is something universal in the personal: “Daddy, of all the walks we have taken, this one is my favorite.”

Mine, too, Dally. It was a walk on a rainbow.

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Woody Woodburn writes a weekly column for The Ventura County Star and can be contacted at WoodyWriter@gmail.com.

Wooden&Me_cover_PRCheck out my new memoir WOODEN & ME: Life Lessons from My Two-Decade Friendship with the Legendary Coach and Humanitarian to Help “Make Each Day Your Masterpiece”

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Words From Father of the Bride

by Woody

STRAW_CoverWoody’s highly anticipated new book “STRAWBERRIES IN WINTERTIME: Essays on Life, Love, and Laughter” is NOW available! Order your signed copy HERE! 

*   *   *

Old ‘Two Trees’ and One Young Couple

For the past 34 years, come Sunday afternoon, my wife has been The Most Beautiful Bride I Have Ever Seen – in person, in photos, in the movies.

But at 4 o’clock tomorrow, on our Sept. 4 anniversary date, my much-better-half will relinquish this title – or, at the very least, now share it. And she will not at all mind me saying as much.

1DalAlTble

Dallas and Allyn, Hollywood name “Dallyn.”

Our little girl is getting married.

I say “little girl” purposely instead of “daughter” because I am reminded of the toast my wife’s father gave at our wedding. Actually, he sang his toast, the

song “Sunrise, Sunset” from “Fiddler on the Roof.”

Here are a few key couplets:

“Is this the little girl I carried, / Is this the little boy at play?

“I don’t remember growing older, / When did they?

“They look so natural together. / Just like two newlyweds should be.”

I, too, don’t remember growing older, but I have not forgotten this wedding-related memory of the little girl I carried. When she was very young, she once asked my wife, a hint of hurt in her voice: “Mommy, why wasn’t I at yours and daddy’s wedding?”

Since we couldn’t share our wedding day with her, it seems only fair to do so with our charmed anniversary date.

Returning to music, another lyric has been stuck in my head leading up to The Big Day. This lyric is from the Jason Mraz song “Quiet,” which my soon-to-be-son-in-law – who, it should be noted, had never before played the guitar – spent months learning to strum, and sing, for a proposal serenade.

The album is appropriately titled “Yes,” which was my daughter’s happy answer.

The lyric goes: “Heartbeats rise, heartbeats fall / Will you be my constant through it all?”

“Through it all” – that is the key for love, isn’t it?

“Through it all” also reminds me of a metaphor I once heard that employs two trees to illustrate a successful marriage. Even though her wedding is in the Bay Area rather than her hometown, the specific image I conjure up is our beloved landmark “Two Trees” holding sentinel high atop their hill overlooking Ventura below with the Pacific Ocean and the Channel Islands in the distance.

The metaphor goes like this: Newlyweds are like two trees growing beside one another. The trees will enjoy sunshine and their leaves will blossom.

Even the best of marriages, however, will sometimes experience fierce winds – and this is good because the two trees learn to lean upon one another.

More sunshine and gentle rains will bring more blossoms, and perhaps the two trees will bear fruit, and their leafy canopies will provide cooling shade, and their branches may even cradle a nest or three.

But sooner or later drought will arrive – and this, too, is good because through the adversity the two trees will dig their roots deeper into the soil.

Eventually, with the truest love, the two trees will grow tall and strong with roots that not only reach deep and wide, but actually entwine and fuse together. And the day comes, after years and years of a wonderful marriage, when the couple realizes they are one tree, not two.

And so, after their vows have been pledged and their rings exchanged and their first kiss as husband and wife shared; after they walk down the aisle together and dance together and ceremonially cut the wedding cake together; when it is my time, as the father of the bride, to offer a toast to the newlyweds, here is what I am going to say:

“Dallas and Allyn, I wish you glorious sunrises, and warm afternoons, and evenings with Pacific Ocean sunsets as breathtaking as those that Ventura’s ‘Two Trees’ enjoy.

“Also, however, I wish you some challenging winds along your life journey together, and days of drought too, so that your roots will grow deep and strong and spread wide until they entwine and fuse.

“But mostly, of course, I wish you gentle rains and moonlit nights and warm sunshine – lots and lots of sunshine.”

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Woody Woodburn writes a weekly column for The Ventura County Star and can be contacted at WoodyWriter@gmail.com.

Wooden&Me_cover_PRCheck out my new memoir WOODEN & ME: Life Lessons from My Two-Decade Friendship with the Legendary Coach and Humanitarian to Help “Make Each Day Your Masterpiece”

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