Wedding Season Is Dating Season

Weddings can be great places to meet guys. When my sister attended the nuptials of her college friend's brother, she ended up meeting, falling in love with, and marrying the bride's brother. They celebrated their seventh wedding anniversary a couple of months ago.

My friend's husband's sister was seated next to the future COO of a major Wall Street firm at the "loser" table at a wedding. These "losers" have been married 23 years, have three children, reside in well-to-do Greenwich, Connecticut, and hire a helicopter on summer weekends to fly them out to their other home in Amagansett, Long Island.

On Tuesday evening, Peter and I attended a lovely party given by some neighbors. Over drinks, I asked them where they met. The answer?

At a wedding.

The wife (let's call her Carol) attended with a date; the husband (we'll call him Roger) went by himself. At the party after the reception, everybody except Carol and Roger went to the parking lot to schmooze and smoke cigars.

Carol and Roger got to talking. Turns out he was the cousin of the bride, Carol's friend from childhood. She knew much of Roger's family, and so they had plenty to talk about. His family assured her he was a great guy.

They said goodnight around 4:30AM. Roger lived in a faraway state, so Carol offhandedly offered to make him breakfast at her apartment. Since she knew his family so well, she felt safe enough to invite him over before he had to hit the highway.

He showed up at her door four hours later. She made omelets. Sparks flew, but so did the time. He had to get home for work the next day.

He left. He liked her. She liked him. He wanted to see her again, but she had a trip to Cancun coming up. A reunion would have to wait.

Which gave him plenty of time to think about her, how much he liked her, and how different she was from other women he'd met so far. He couldn't wait to see her again.

When she got back from Cancun, he made it a point to call her. They got together once. Twice. Again and again. And now they've been married 12 years.

I wonder if things would have worked out differently if they had cell phones (not everybody had a cell phone back then), and they called each other incessantly. I wonder if too much contact too soon would have prevented their feelings from percolating.

Cell phones (and email and texting) are great in emergencies, but my guess is that they've killed many a romance due to overaccessibility.

What I love about Carol and Roger's story is this: She showed interest in him, and then she went away. While it's important to be available, it's even more important not to be too available.

Everyone--both men and women--wants to think they're getting a prize.