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Illustration by Marley Allen-Ash
I have always enjoyed playing curator – of music, snacks, moods, moments. But part of being a curator means you’re a critic sometimes, too. After all, discerning taste is how I got this self-appointed position to begin with.
In one year, Charlotte and I were lucky enough to be guests at 13 weddings. The easing of pandemic restrictions perfectly coincided with the dawn of our 30s, which led to a backlog of celebrations that littered themselves across the calendar like a confetti cannon. When you attend enough of these events in a short period of time, you can’t help but compare them – taking notes on what you appreciated, and what you’d have done differently. So when it finally came time to plan our own celebration, we set our sights on something different.
“My friends won’t come to Mexico,” my mother told me, dismayed, when we announced a few months later that our wedding would be held in the jungles of Tulum. We prepared for the full spectrum of reactions and we got them. Hosting a destination wedding requires that you not just hear and accept the pushback, but fully and empathetically understand it. The cost, the logistics, the time commitment – all concerns are valid. But as a lover of travel and a believer in best-case scenarios, it was hard not to roll my eyes when a guest expressed concern for their safety. Okay, noted – but how about we put our faith in the odds and try to enjoy our lives?
Planning and throwing a wedding requires that you assume full control … up until the point where you must surrender it entirely. That’s the structure: plan, plan, plan … let go. The secret though – in weddings and everything else – is that stress is a choice. Because you never really had control in the first place. This became clear to me not on the big day, but on the night before – while I was being robbed by the Mexican police on the side of the road.
I was in a quiet state of awe on the drive back from our beachside welcome party; just trying my best to absorb all the love we were receiving. And then, in the distance: blue and red lights. The police had set up a checkpoint along the long, dark stretch of road that connects the town of Tulum to its Instagram-friendly, nightclub-littered beach. I later learned that this is a semi-permanent fixture.
To save a few dollars (a futile gesture – Tulum is just Vegas on the ocean), Charlotte and I joined friends Quinn and Glen as we all crammed into the back of our friend Laura’s rental car. As we reached the checkpoint, four officers directed her to the shoulder. If they noticed Laura was seven months pregnant, they didn’t appear to care. Faces cloaked in bandanas, AR-15s drawn, they searched the car. We inherently sort of understood that they were looking for drugs. We had none. Still, no compartment, pocket or purse was left unchecked. Then, they pulled the three males from the car. They looked – then reached – inside our pants (the front and the back). They held our arms behind our backs, pushed us against the car. Quinn and Glen had nothing in their pockets. In short order, they were allowed back inside the car. I, on the other hand, had a venue deposit of US$1,500 weighing my wallet down. All I could do was repeat the Spanish word boda, which means “wedding,” as they shook my wallet in front of me and responded with the English words “cocaine” and “drug money.” Back and forth. Over and over. We were getting nowhere. Minutes passed in the dark. I got a little scared. Then I got a lot scared. They walked away with the wallet. After what felt like a year, they returned it, saying nothing. I took this as my cue to get back in the car with my wallet … which no longer contained the venue deposit.
Mostly, I felt stupid. I had become the statistic. The story I used to proudly roll my eyes at, the one your mother begs you to take seriously. But I had a big day ahead of me – I couldn’t let this ruin it. Miraculously, I didn’t. I simply … entered “surrender mode” a day early. And though kicking myself for carrying that much cash in a foreign country, I was thankfully smart enough to have an emergency stash back at the villa, which took care of the deposit. My wedding was a success. One of the greatest days of my life. To lift the veil on your bride and on the illusion of civic justice – in a 24-hour period? This is a weekend you don’t soon forget.
And yet – my idyllic vision of a destination wedding was compromised. What to make of this? I’ve decided to walk away with gratitude. I’m not looking for pats on the back by saying this, but more than anything I am grateful this happened to me and not one of my guests. Speaking strictly as a curator, I can guarantee that the vibe would have been off if it had.
Daniel Gold lives in Toronto.