Altar Boy Wedding Experiences: James



Figure 1.--

I often assisted as an altar-server at weddings. During the warmer months of the year I served at weddings almost every Saturday; sometimes I served at several weddings on the same Saturday. Altar-servers received a tip of a few dollars from the groom or best man, so Saturdays were very profitable for me. In those days (the late 40s and early 50s) in our working-class neighborhoods in Pawtucket few families could afford a really big wedding celebration.

Costumes

Most weddings had a maid/matron of honor and two or three bridesmaids, and the corresponding groomsmen to pair off with the ladies. Many weddings had flower-girls, rather fewer had ring-bearers, and hardly any had pages.
Flower girls: If the wedding didn't have children in the party, the maid of honor handled the bride's bouquet, veil and train (if any), and the best man took care of the rings. Flower girls wore fancy dress in white or pastel.
Ring bearer: The ring bearer frequently wore a dark suit, or else a miniature rented outfit like the groomsmen. Less frequently, the ring-bearer wore a white lace-trimmed blouse, satin trousers or shorts (white or pastel), white knee-socks or tights, white or pastel mary-jane shoes. Occasionally, the boy wore a plain white shirt and dark shorts, white knee-socks, and black lace-up shoes. Black-patent mary-janes, apparently worn as dressy footwear by American boys in some places up until the 60s and 70s, were very rare.
Pages: The pages at a wedding dressed like the ring-bearer as a rule. Only once or twice in several years did I observe pages in what was considerd overly sissyish page-boy dress: short tunics, very short satin pants, tights, strap-shoes, and perhaps pill-box caps.

Boys' Attitudes

Most of the boys didn't seem to much enjoy the experience. I have to say that as an altar server I was very used to my own ceremonial dress of cassock and surplice, and also very used to being right up there in front of an audience. I knew what I was doing, having done it dozens of times. However, most members of a wedding party are not used to being in fancy dress, and not used to being at the focus of attention. Often enough, they don't really know what they're doing, having rehearsed it only once or twice. It isn't easy for an adult, and it's much more difficult for a child, boy or girl, to enjoy the ceremony itself. Kids are fidgety to begin with, more fidgety in fancy dress, and most fidgety in front of an audience. I'd say, from first-hand observation, that most pages and ring-bearers didn't much enjoy the actual ceremony. Most flower-girls didn't much enjoy it either.

That said, our culture generally teaches girls to enjoy being dressed up, and teaches boys to dislike it. Girls and boys who have the opposite dispositions are exceptional - because people who stand up against social pressure are exceptional: the unusual girl who doesn't like getting dressed up, and the unusual boy who does. Most boys I knew who did duty as pages or ring-bearers did it under duress. They didn't like having to dress up in satin tunics and tights and strap-shoes one little bit. They did what they were told, only under pressure. The exceptional boy, moreover, who did enjoy dressing up in such "sissy" duds would generally deny to his friends that he enjoyed it, out of self-protection.

Comments

Often the adults would comment on the costumes. Most adults, I recall, generally thought that the wedding-party kids were cute. I sometimes heard parents and other grown-ups assuring pages or ring-boys that they didn't look like sissies or girls. You could tell, though, that the adult assurances were not believed. You'd also hear the boys' peers, both male and female, teasing and ridiculing them. Moreover, their fathers and other men sometimes seemed less than comfortable with the way their boys were dressed.

James' Boyhood Assessment

I never had the chance to be a wedding page or ring-bearer, or to dress up in similar costume. I believe that inwardly I would have enjoyed it, but I knew that outwardly I would have had to show nothing but disdain for such sissy clothes. I suspect that some of my friends felt the same. Up until I was 5 or 6 I had long blond curls, and I cried when my parents took me to the barber to have them cut off for kindergarten so the other kids wouldn't make fun of me. (It's too bad, when you're such a small boy, to have to already pretend to be a man.) When I was 4, 5 and 6 my Mom sent me out trick-or-treating on Halloween with my two girl cousins, all three of us done up like little princesses in frilly party dresses and patent-leather shoes and dime-store tiaras. Once I becam a schoolboy, all that sort of fun was closed off to me.

The Wedding Reception

As an altar-server I ordinarily wasn't invited to the wedding receptions, although the priest generally put in an appearance to say grace and wish the couple well, etc. However, judging from other weddings I've been to as a member of the wedding party or as a guest, the pages, flower-girl and ring-bearer were commonly kept in their costumes during the reception. After all, lots of pictures, both formal and informal have to be taken, and all the guests want to see the kids dressed up. Besides, their parents would have inconveniently to carry around a change of clothes for them. Towards the end of the reception, when people were partied out and the dancing was done, then you might see the kids changed into play clothes - but then again, you might not. One feature of a wedding reception is that the women often kick off their (generally brand-new and consequently not broken-in) high-heeled shoes and dance in their stocking-feet; flower-girls and pages and ring-bearers often do the same, kicking off their patent-leather shoes to dance and play.

James





Christoher Wagner

histclo@lycosmail.com



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Created: February 15, 2000
Last updated: February 15, 2000, 2000