Rain on our wedding day

Rain on your wedding day is good luck

I’m not sure who said that, but I suspect it was someone who wanted to make a bride feel better about rain on their wedding day.

We got married in Port Douglas in North Queensland in early February. That’s the wet season up there. That’s cyclone season up there. There was a cyclone off the coast a week before the wedding and it rained in the week leading up to our wedding.

My bride was anxious and worried about rain ruining our wedding. Some people weren’t helping, with comments like “who decides to get married in monsoon season?” That wasn’t helping my soon-to-be wife’s anxiety. In the end, I sent a message to everyone that was coming to the wedding:

Hi there, I just thought I’d send everyone a quick message. We know that the weather isn’t looking promising, and feel free to talk about how crappy the weather is. But, when talking to my new wife, please only say things like “You look beautiful” or “It was such a lovely service”. If you feel the need to deviate from these words, and then upset my wife. I will ensure that the seating chart for the reception is rearranged, and you will be placed in a new outdoor seating area.

This quick message certainly stopped the negative talk in the prelude to our happy day. It allowed us to concentrate on getting ready for the day and dealing with all the other anxiety including annoying families and drunken friends (one of my oldest friends flew in from London, he went drinking and we only found him an hour before the service).

On the morning of the wedding, it was a brand new day. The sun came out and it was beautiful. We got through the service and it was amazing. Then we went outside for the group photo in front of the church. Our friends and family are pretty hopeless, and they were milling around. I looked and saw the black clouds heading our way. So I corralled everyone to get a great photo, and then, the heavens opened.

We ran inside the church while everyone else scattered and headed back to the resort to get a start on pre-reception drinks. Our wedding photographer was great, she took a few more photos in the church, but then she showed us her iPad with the rain radar. “There isn’t anywhere in a 50-mile radius that I can take you that it’s not pouring rain” were her words. I think she was more upset than my wife was.

We’d had a small wedding without a big bridal party, and everyone that was central was staying for a few more days. That’s when I had the idea. I suggested that I was happy to pay to get my wife’s hair and makeup done again and do the outdoor photos when the sun was out. The photographer said she’d love to do that if we didn’t mind.

So, we got back to the resort, took a couple more photos and then went on to see our friends and family as husband and wife. It really took the stress out of the afternoon. I’ve been part of bridal parties before where the photos are rushed and you’re trying to get to the reception but also wanting the perfect photo. Which often leads to more unnecessary angst and not enough enjoying the day.

We got to the reception in a happy mood knowing that we’d get our photographs later. Everyone was really positive and my wife even commented that nobody had said anything to her about the rain. That told me my little message had done its trick.

Three days later, we got back dressed in our wedding attire again. I got a full appreciation for the work that went into my wife’s hair and makeup. The photographer went above and beyond, she took us to some great locations and got some amazing photos. I was even able to convince my wife to take some fun photos, like us both riding a tandem bike, because she was less worried about the dress getting dirty.

The lesson we learned was that while the rain wasn’t our initial plan, it allowed us to adapt and get something that worked out even better. Don’t worry if you have something that doesn’t go to plan, it might lead you to something even better.