On Thursday night my family and I attended a beautiful wedding on the beach of Lake Michigan. The bride was a former student of mine, our kids’ babysitter, and a dear friend, so I was especially anxious about being entrusted with the role of “official” photographer. I wanted to make sure that the bride and groom had a photographic record of the event that at least approximated what they remembered.
The night before the wedding I recharged the digital camera’s battery and packed a film camera and an extra set of batteries, just in case something disastrous happened. I unloaded all the photos from the 6GB Hitachi microdrive and set it carefully back into the camera. Two 256MB CF cards would serve as backup. I felt pretty confident that everything would go smoothly.
The beach setting was gorgeous, and the bride and groom and all the attendants and families were gracious as I took some formal shots before the ceremony. Other than a few drops of rain, everything went off without a hitch–unless you count the one involving the bride and groom. The reception, too, was lovely, even during the 30 minutes or so of rain when the guests scrambled back to the cottage for cover.
But then something strange happened…