Shitposting

My wife (then-fiancée) and I originally planned to have a wedding in the fall time, but then I got stationed in South Korea for a year with the US military. I wasn't allowed to bring a spouse with me, more or less a fiancée. So she went back to her home state while I went overseas.

She was also interested in joining the military, but I told her, if she joined single, she'd get an assignment to some random place in the world and we may never see each other again.

So we decided to forego the whole ceremony and just knock out the legal stuff. Get married on paper, so the military would recognize our status and keep us stationed together.

My then-fiancée was living in Nebraska at the time, so she went to her local county courthouse and looked up the local laws on marriages. Turns out, in Nebraska your fiancé(e) doesn't have to physically be present for the ceremony, and you can sign the marriage license in advance.

So she mailed a marriage license to me in South Korea. I took it to my base's legal office and got a notary to sign it with me. Then I mailed it back.

One of her friends was an ordained minister, so she agreed to do a quick ceremony for us. We met up through Skype from our respective bedrooms; her in her apartment in Nebraska and me in my dorm room in South Korea.

Her military recruiter showed up as a witness on her end. Once the ceremony was over, she and her minister friend signed the marriage license, then the recruiter took it back to his office to quickly update her status as "married" in his system.

Five days later, my new wife left for Basic Training. It would be 6 months until we first met in person as a married couple. I had moved to Germany as my next assignment and my wife got her first assignment to tag along with me.

About 4-5 years later, we were stationed back in the US and decided to finally have that ceremony; mostly for the relatives that were upset that we just announced we were married.

We had to mark it as a "vow renewal ceremony" because wedding groups online got extremely hostile at us for hosting a "wedding ceremony" when we were already married. Even though we never had an actual wedding ceremony in the first place. Some people are obsessed with their tradition. 🙄

Again, we didn't go into debt to party. One of my wife's aunts owned a farm and agreed to hold a ceremony in her beautiful flower garden. We hired a caterer to provide food, brought in as many folding chairs and tables as we could find, then my wife bought a pretty dress. I wore my military uniform so I wouldn't have to buy a new suit.

Then our reception was held at a local rodeo in town that evening, which my wife's family typically hosted for the town, so it was free for all of us. They also owned a tiny campground on the edge of town, so we were given free accommodations if you wanted to camp for the night instead of staying in a hotel.

We paid out of pocket ourselves for the whole ceremony, although we got enough money in wedding cards to offset a good chunk of it. It cost us a few thousand dollars in total, which was very affordable with our dual military pay.