Monday Meanderings - 1.18.2016

Trust me. This is not about politics.

A local journalist made a statement this week about the current political happenings that jogged my memory. After the recent Republican Candidate debate, the writer commented that the here-to-fore amicable relationship between Donald Trump and Ted Cruz had come to an abrupt end.

"The breakup of The Donald and The Ted was inevitable. You knew it would happen. If it were a wedding, this would have been one of those where somebody would have been tempted to stand up and say, Now that you ask, I do in fact know a reason why this couple should not be joined together.”

One summer, back in the college days, I roomed with a guy who also worked in radio in Abilene. In fact, he went on to have a long and stellar career as a broadcaster, but that summer he was all about getting married.

He had met a "townie" and fallen in love. The feeling was mutual and the wedding was eminent. The only problem was that the roommate's mother was not happy. She did not like the girl and was dead set against the marriage. There was, to say the least, a lot of tension in the family. To make matters worse, the mother decided I could be her instrument of change, and she tried diligently to get me to persuade my soon-to-be-ex roommate to change his mind.

I couldn't, he didn't and on the day of the wedding, I was tasked with the role of escorting his mother during the service. That sounds nice, but my real job was to be by her side, so that when the minister said. "If there is any who has reason why this couple should not be joined together..." I was to physically restrain her from jumping up and shouting, "You betcha!"

Thankfully, I didn't have to fulfill that role. The wedding went off without a hitch, and the couple got married. Turned out that mamma was right, though; the bride dumped my ex-roomie in record time, but that's another story.