Wedding of the Century Part Deux

When Boy#1 married Lovely Girl, I remember feeling a little sorry for his three brothers. She was so funny, so smart, so very kind--she was all the qualities we prize in the House on the Corner. And she clearly loved our Boy.

"The only thing that worries me," I told Husband, "is that she's setting the bar so high for other daughters-in-law."

And I continued to be a little concerned as the years passed. The bachelor brothers dated, although few of the young women reached the critical stage of meeting the rest of the raucous, nerdy, pun-loving crowd that grew up in the House on the Corner. Were our Boys looking for perfection that might not exist?

But then friends of Boy#2 decided he was not getting out nearly enough as a graduate student, and they signed him up for an account on a computer dating site. On the other end of the computer screen was M., a beautiful third-year medical student whose friends had done the same for her--and the two of them were a 99% match. They decided to meet; it was the first and last computer date for either of them.

I'm guessing Two fell in love within two sentences. He introduced himself  and asked how her day was going.

"It's going great!" she sighed happily, her eyes crinkling in a smile. "I just got a haircut!"

How could you not fall in love with that? Is that not the most wonderful, revealing, nerdy opening you've ever heard? Everything that followed was just added detail, but it turned out she was funny, smart, hard-working, and so very kind.

As the father of the bride explained to their wedding guests, he suspected right away that the two might have something special so he called his son (who was studying at the same university and had met Two) for a report. The brother described our son as kind and thoughtful and smart.

"What you have to realize," he explained, "is that he's just M. in a big-boy body."

Saturday afternoon, in a ceremony that was surreal in its beauty, our Boy#2 married his own Lovely Girl. As I witnessed their vows and saw the intense love with which they spoke about their new life together, I realized I had completely underestimated any new members that might join our family.

I've learned that while we value kindness and puns, we only require love. These women will not even be looking at the bar set by Lovely Girl#1: They are setting their own bars.

Welcome to the family, Lovely Girl#2. You are perfect.