By this point in history, weddings are pretty predictable. No matter how unorthodox you may think your wedding plan is, it most probably fits the basic pattern. You can’t escape that kind of cultural gravity, not completely. So, the moment you start naming your wedding party, people have some idea what their role will be. Maid of Honor gets to plan a shower and a Hen Night of some sort, and she gets to play a little bit of the therapist when the bride inevitably panics, packs a bag, and is caught halfway out the bathroom window. The Best Man knows he’ll have to come up with a Bachelor Night that walks the delicate line between rowdy and Bride-acceptable, and he has to make a speech where he actually admits to feelings.
Everyone else knows they’ll just end up in uncomfortable clothes and that they’ll have to practice looking solemn while hungover in church.
The Best Man, though, has an unknowable number of other duties. Unknowable because he is, most likely, a man, and most men do not spend much time thinking about weddings. The Maid of Honor has far fewer Unknowables because she’s probably been planning her own wedding in her spare time since the age of four. For men, every moment of a wedding is an amazing discovery, fraught with danger.
Here then are the first five Unknowable Duties of a Best Man. Note these barely scratch the surface and are not in any particular order.
1. Ring management. Aside from having to somehow carry expensive symbols of someone else’s love safely, the Best Man must also stand ready to assist the Groom when he places the ring on the wrong finger and then cannot get it off.
2. Vow prompting. When the Groom suddenly stares off into space as if having some sort of seizure, the Best Man must be prepared to lean over and prompt him. It doesn’t matter, really, if it’s an actual vow. Any song lyric from Coldplay will probably suffice.
3. Bride liaison. As the Big Day approaches, things can get strained. Sometimes the Best Man must insert himself between the lovers to ensure nothing is said that can’t be unsaid.
4. Killjoying. Sure, you planned the Bachelor Party. But the Best Man must also be prepared to call the cops on his own party if things start heading towards The Hangover territory.
5. Groomsmen organization. The Groomsmen are like The Dirty Dozen, misfits who will get into mischief if left unsupervised for any period of time. Whether they are all old friends with deep bonds or a bunch of disparate relatives and friends who’ve never spent more than two minutes together before, someone has to make sure they behave. Otherwise you’ll turn around at the ceremony and find them all playing craps behind the altar or something.
It literally goes on forever. Every wedding, despite following a predictable pattern, is a living organism, and the most amazing things can happen. If you’re going to be the Best Man at a wedding, my best advice is to look to the Boy Scouts and be prepared.
