Melanie Arougueti/Staff Writer
A couple of months ago, my boyfriend of two years bent down on one knee and proposed. I said yes, and since then, we have been planning a huge, international wedding. His family lives in France and mine lives in Argentina. Everyone would meet in Miami, and the summer would be spent partying and celebrating our marriage.
But then, COVID-19 happened and we had to rethink everything.
When our university closed and conversations began to revolve around social distancing and sanitizing our hands, I took things seriously. I stopped going to work, I continued my studies online and I only left my house to buy groceries. But how long could this lifestyle last, I wondered.
As the date to my wedding approached however, I began to realize that this might not end as soon as I had thought. My fiancé and I started thinking about canceling the wedding and postponing it. Many of our guests—childhood friends, grandparents, cousins and more who were supposed to fly in—would no longer be able to come. Everything was put on hold: all the preparations, food tasting, floral appointments—everything.
The hardest part was that everyone looked to my fiancé and I for answers. They asked us, “what are you going to do?” We had no idea.
Needless to say, the pandemic has put the world in a deep state of uncertainty. All the news stations had different projections, and all we could do was wait.
It’s hard to find joy when the world has become a funeral home.
Many brides and grooms have been holding their weddings in balconies or in the middle of empty streets. Others are postponing theirs in order to celebrate with everyone as planned. For me, there was no right answer. I didn’t know what to do. Then he came over, and we looked at each other through our masks, standing far apart, and made a decision.
We’re not going to let the pandemic stop our religious ceremony. We could always party another day, but the tradition of marriage is important to us both: the white dress, the aisle, the people. The pandemic could stop us from dancing with each other, kissing each other, embracing each other with tears of happiness, but it wouldn’t be able to stop us from going forward with the wedding.
My fiancé and I will be getting married in June. No, we won’t be wearing face masks when we do it, but we have limited the number of guests in order to not put anyone at risk. We care about our friends and relatives, and we know they care about us.
There is no way around the truth: it’s hard to plan something as grand and as emotional as a wedding and having to change everything just fleeting moments before. It’s hard to find joy when the world has become a funeral home. The reason I’m still getting married is because I remember the true importance of life: love.
As we made our decision and updated our friends and family, the world began looking up. Miami-Dade announced phase one of reopening, people began eating at restaurants within reasonable distance and universities are looking towards reopening in the fall. Everything is starting to work out.
We’re actually getting married now. Hope sat in the pits of our stomachs as I went to pick up the dress and he spoke with the venue and food service. Everything was falling into place again, and I couldn’t be happier.
My giant wedding will be turned into an intimate gathering. It feels like a silver lining and the perfect choice for me.
I’ll be a wife in June, and I couldn’t be more grateful for that.
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