#66. Wedding Toast Givers and You

You're going to say that in front of their families???

Feb 12, 2024

Hi everyone,

I am currently in Orlando, where Maris and I traveled for the wedding of our friends Kristen and Kayla. We don’t see K&K often (on account of living a thousand miles apart) but they are (independently and as a pair) wonderful, and they were the first friends we visited out of town once we were fully vaccinated in 2021. They were living in Miami at the time, and we took a quick trip there during a week I had off from Desus & Mero (R.I.P.). Mostly we just looked at the ocean and read books, but one night we went over to Kayla and Kristen’s apartment and sat on their terrace for way longer than we’d intended eating and drinking the incredible spread that Kayla had prepared for us. It felt so good to go places and see people we hadn’t been near in some number of years.

Their wedding, which brought together all sorts of friends from all corners of the country, felt the same and reminded me of how beautiful it is to get to celebrate a happy occasion around so many excellent people. The ceremony was funny and touching. The vows were beautiful and silly and tender. The toasts (only two!) were full of joy. (And it felt especially meaningful to be able to celebrate with so many queer people even amidst the politically repressive environment that is Ron DeSantis’s Florida at large. It’s beautiful to witness and appreciate joy in a place where there are so many attempts to restrict it.) It was even better than the time Kristen snuck beers into the New York Public Library so we could drink them while I interviewed her about her first novel.

Everyone really did it up, fashion-wise, at Kristen and Kayla’s request, and I wore a cardigan that always feels too loud for basically any occasion, and I lost two buttons so maybe it’ll be retired after this wedding. Thank you for your service, cardigan.

A shot of the blazer in question. — I did look a little like I was about to play golf with Hunter S. Thompson, yes.

Anyway! We fly home this afternoon, and I’ll be in St. Paul telling jokes on 3/1 and 3/2, which is weirdly soon! And I was on the most recent episode of The Gargle!

PEP TALK FOR WEDDING TOAST GIVERS

Two glasses of, presumably, champagne. — Have you ever noticed that if you fill a wine glass more than halfway, you look completely out of control?

You’re going to do great! Everyone is rooting for you, and no one will be upset or disappointed if you mess up a little!

That said…you know their parents are going to be there, right? So maybe take it easy on “funny” anecdotes about diarrhea or pregnancy scares or vomiting or widely reviled exes or injuries sustained during sexual intercourse. And even if their parents aren’t there, consider that there’s maybe someone in attendance who will make it awkward if you regale the crowd with tales of fraternity parties or sex tourism or food poisoning (or any combination of the three).

No one has ever gone wrong being too nice or too brief with a wedding toast. It is far preferable to simply say: “What a beautiful occasion it is to gather together to celebrate these beautiful people!” than it is to spend seven minutes explaining why you used to call a groom “One-Ball Paul” or how a bride came to be banned from a local library. This isn’t about how funny you are! This is about the two people getting married! If you say anything that requires either of them to have an uncomfortable follow-up conversation (with each other OR anyone else) you should be required to buy them each an additional gift!

You’re going to be great. Especially if you keep it tight and keep it sweet. Otherwise, you’re on your own, and you deserve whatever fate befalls you.

And yes, I have talked about this before…

(Again, the toasts at the wedding I recently attended were perfect. But this pep talk is based in reality. There is no reason for me to air the business of strangers publicly, but if you are my friend you can text me and I will name names.)

PEP TALK FOR A READER

I did a little editing of this request. Don’t worry about it.

Hi Josh I saw your tweet about looking for encouragement and I could use some!! So far this year my dad was diagnosed with cancer, then died of cancer. Then I had surgery, and now I’m applying for a promotion, but I am TIRED. I would like to hear a nice thing please.
- Lemon, It’s February

Of course you are tired! You’ve had an emotionally and physically grueling year, and we’re only six-ish weeks in. We should get to parcel out our heartache over a manageable time, but we do not. It’s unjust! And It’s a cruel trick we’ve played on ourselves as humans the way we insist on a fresh start at the beginning of a new year, and we often lop off the feeling of the slightly-less-recent past when we do it, for worse or better. Similarly, the clock seems to start on our memory of the recent past with when something stressful happens. When you’re in the thick of bad news, it feels so acute and ongoing that it’s hard to be confident that things will ever be good again. One one hand, that makes sense, right? Like, you can’t just average out all the good and bad things that have ever happened to you, take a deep breath, and feel more or less even-keeled despite recent tragedy. On the other hand: What the hell? Why does a month of terrible news feel like the only history that’s ever happened? Stupid brains!

Here’s the glimmer of hope: Things have been better before, and they can be better again. If they’d always been this bad, you wouldn’t have thought to reach out. You’d just be like…death and injury and professional stress…sounds about right! So let’s get back to things getting better. They can! You will recover from your surgery. You’ll figure out your work situation. The grief I can’t definitively say will get easier, but you’ll never experience it from the same raw starting point as before.

You’ve had a bad time lately. And you’re worn out from the strain. But the good thing about that is you’re absolutely right to feel bad. The people around you know you’re right to feel bad. Everyone, on some level, gets it. Eventually either things will be better, or they’ll at least feel better. It’s not that they can’t get worse (sorry!), but they usually don’t do that forever, and once you start to feel good, you can start the clock fresh once again.

PICK-ME-UP SONG OF THE WEEK:
Warren Zevon - “For My Next Trick I’ll Need a Volunteer”

Once again this is not technically a pick-me-up song in that it is about heartbreak and not knowing how to receive and reciprocate love. It also (to my amateur ear) has a very similar chord progression to “Atlantic City” by Bruce Springsteen, which is a classic feel-bad song (“everything dies, baby/that’s a fact”).

Warren Zevon frequently traffics in downers as well. He’s one of the most sarcastic songwriters ever, and he makes (well…made) up weirdos and sings songs as/about them, which is a quality I enjoy. Did I write about one of his songs during my last Zevon phase a few months ago? Maybe! But it wasn’t this one. The opening couplet (“I can saw a woman in two/But you won’t wanna look in the box when I’m through”) could be a Steven Wright joke and the refrain (“I can make love disappear/For my next trick I’ll need a volunteer”) is the kind of lyric that’s charming if you’re bought in and corny if you’re not. I don’t know…how into a song about stage magic as an allegory for love are you? You get to choose! For some reason, I’m very into it this week!