It’s been more than 25 years since my brother got married, but I was reminded of a ‘shenanigan’ I pulled at that wedding while attending my niece’s/goddaughter’s wedding this past weekend.
I always used to look up to my brother when I was younger. He was cool, you know? Boys of any age play a lot of shenanigans on each other, and that is a fun time — especially for a teenager. I feel like he has always had the upper hand in the tricks we’ve played on each other, current day not excluded.
There was one day I remember pulling a fast one over his eyes, and I guess the time I invested in acting on stage, even in the late 1990’s, must have paid off.
When my brother’s wedding came along, I knew I wanted to do something funny but not something that would ruin the day. I already knew my sister-in-law-to-be at the time was well aware of his/our antics given that we had already disgusted her to the point of not eating a spaghetti dinner with us after filling her head with doubts about the meatballs actually being Rocky Mountain Oysters.
A thought occurred to me after picking up my tuxedo for the my brother’s wedding that I already had a different a formal set from being in New Prague High School’s Emotion’s Show Choir. The colors were drastically different - wedding colors being a light pink and the school’s show choir colors being a deep red and black. Also, the school outfit had a vest and bowtie instead of a cummerbund and bowtie like the wedding set.
So, come wedding day, I shoved the rented cummerbund and bowtie in my pocket and threw on the vest and bowtie I had from show choir. I then casually walked up outside of church acting surprised like, “Do I have the wrong stuff? This is what the rental place gave me. I thought this was what I was supposed to have.”
The look of terror on my brother’s face was priceless. He said, “That’s not the right color and you are supposed to have a cummerbund, not a vest.” Visibly upset, he was going to call the rental place, supposedly to have them get me the right one, and that’s when I had to reveal my prank.
I felt pretty smug though, pulling that over on him. It felt good to have the upper hand. We had a good laugh about it.
I had similar ideas about my niece’s wedding this past weekend, not with a wardrobe “mishap” but maybe a butter sculpture at their reception. That’s maybe a story for another time. I was not motivated enough to do so though. I guess that leaves more shenanigans in my future…
Schoenecker's Shenanigan's Column: Sibling wedding prank
