Firefighters crashed my wedding—not once, but twice. My husband and I both had fashion emergencies. I stained a vintage frock and a made-to-order gown with bike grease. He split his custom trousers on our dance floor.
Did I mention his Nana was wheeled out of our reception on a stretcher? Or that we’d wake up as newlyweds to discover we’d been robbed? Or that our honeymoon involved a full-blown fraud investigation?
The 24 hours encompassing our wedding were, by far, the most tumultuous I’ve ever experienced, and I’m a newspaper reporter who covers oddities, tragedies, and heartwarming stories for a living. Neither my journalism degree from Toronto Metropolitan University nor working in eight different newsrooms across Canada prepared me for the chaos of my wedding weekend.
I married Will, my high-school sweetheart, on September 6. The events that took place in the hours after we read our vows resemble the plot of a dark comedy. Even the professional fact-checkers who witnessed the kismet and chaos firsthand—including the journalist who agreed to marry her friends—are still making sense of it.
J.S., a beloved colleague, had successfully prodded my now-husband—on my behalf—to buy a ring in 2024. Will made her swear to secrecy that he was planning to pop the question.
Brat became our fiancé-era soundtrack. Charli XCX’s iconic neon-green album all but certainly influenced us (subconsciously, at least) to use bright green florals. The pop star, also a recent bride, was featured heavily on our dance floor.
J.S.’s only request for her officiant debut was our guest parade, an eight-minute walk from the ceremony grounds to the reception, stopped by a mailbox. She didn’t want to worry about protecting precious cargo after her shift at the Ralph Connor House, the historic home where we were married. An aunt—who, like J.S., also happens to be gay, go by her initials (M.J.), and is incredibly charismatic—took over at Next Door, the obvious choice for our reception because we’re proud regulars, owing to the chef’s spinach-artichoke cheesy bread.
We’d still be single by law if either my husband or I were in charge of the paperwork. Our bad luck streak was impressive. I doubt the thief who cleaned out my husband’s truck while we were at an impromptu after-party—we made a spontaneous, adrenaline-fueled stop at a dive bar—would have left the documents.
We’d stupidly decided to store many key items in Will’s locked vehicle overnight. We planned to retrieve them when we took a morning Uber from our hotel to our wedding venue, where he’d parked, to settle up our tab.
Whoever is responsible for my Will’s bank fraud-alert texts scored cash gifts, as well as various credit cards. They took off with his wallet, tools, nicotine pouches, two cupholder-sized apples we’d picked from our backyard for “a light, hangover-friendly breakfast,” and multiple dress shirts. The police officer who began taking notes about our stolen inventory seemed, perhaps surprisingly, bored by it. Maybe he was just tired. I suspect dealing with petty crime is to him what a slow-news day “weather story” is to me.
But long before we discovered his smashed passenger window, we were preoccupied with a far more serious emergency. It was around 9:30 p.m. when “Dr. Lee,” a cousin who’d graduated med school only months earlier, was called upon. The patient was a woman who is hard to miss in any room she enters. Will’s Nana navigates the world with humble elegance—on display via her earlobes. Oversized silver teardrops are her uniform.
Single guests were too busy gawking at the handsome emergency responders to process the severity of the situation. Some attendees figured it was a false alarm. A firetruck had pulled up at our first venue when burning appetizers set off an alarm.
I am not proud to admit that I, too, was flippant when Nana was unresponsive. I love her dearly—I credit her for raising a grandson who won the Class of 2014’s “Best Dressed Male.”
At the same time, I was hyperaware that most people on the 102-person guest list had flown out. Winnipeg, Manitoba is no one’s dream destination wedding. The Rockies and Canada’s biggest cities overshadow our Prairie landscape. Despite the annual deep-freeze that inspired its nickname (Winterpeg), we fell for this gritty city after moving for my job in 2019.
As sirens wailed in the background, I urged guests to focus on finishing dinner so we could dance. I assured everyone Nana had a wonderful life if this was the tragic end of it—after all, she’d been harping on us for years to “get married before I’m dead!” (It’s okay to laugh now because Nana did, in fact, arrive in good spirits at one after-party, technically—an afternoon picnic we hosted to debrief the previous night’s events.)
My husband was panicking about her wellbeing and the party’s potential shutdown. He’d later confide during our regroup—a shared cigarette—that undercover cops showed up. The servers were just as confused as he was. The plainclothed women who flashed badges and counted heads never explained why they’d chosen to scope out this particular party.
I had been escorting my grandmother-in-law, who was strapped into a gurney, outside. She was frantic and confused upon waking up from exhaustion-related unconsciousness. I complimented her outfit and assured her she was in good hands—Uncle Steven was her escort to the emergency room. “I’ll see you at the after party,” I said. It was only after delivering this cinematic line that I realized it could have a double meaning.
Our wedding was a multi-day reunion of relatives and chosen-family that began on Friday with a mixer. We didn’t hire a wedding planner—our biggest regret—so we made a lot of eleventh-hour decisions. My built-in maid of honor—my sister—ended up very overbooked. (She was already my personal receptionist, make-up artist, and stylist.)
I’m also a control freak and sentimental to a fault. I wanted the day to embody our 13-year love story, from displaying yearbooks to incorporating our shared love of road biking. I cut out headlines from the newspaper that brought us to Winnipeg to collage signs and name cards. I planned a flower farm visit so my closest girlfriends could make arrangements—an homage to a would-be bridesmaid, a full-time florist whose life was cut tragically short in 2020. We reserved a seat for my eternal 23-year-old best friend. It was a reminder of an incredibly special person whose absence was glaring on our wedding day.
I gave bud vases to colleagues after the wedding. On the day itself, in lieu of traditional favors, I handed out Goodland apples. These edible gifts were distributed when the DJ played “Apple.”
We were stressed about logistics for the better part of the summer. So in retrospect, it’s hardly surprising we left our hotel room keys, among other things, in Will’s truck. Before the wedding, we’d hastily cleaned up the ceremony grounds and mounted our bikes to catch up with the crowd. It was the first time I’d ever pedaled in a poofy dress, so now black sludge is a part of my wedding wardrobe.
I had four outfit changes. I surprised my husband with each one, as well as a mid-reception haircut. Blunt bangs were a staple throughout my childhood and early 20s.
My husband declined my suggestion he do a late-night outfit change, citing the price tag of his custom suit. The irony is not lost on either of us that he would rip his twice-tailored Indochino trousers while dropping it too low during our first dance.
The boyfriend of one of my bridesmaids is the unlikely hero of our wedding weekend. We once considered leaving Sean off the guest list due to space constraints and a strict plus-one policy. We’re so glad we didn’t. Sean had stopped at a vintage market earlier and purchased pants—and thankfully, they fit Will perfectly.
Sean and Maddie are also responsible for retrieving our ditched suitcase. The cash, cards, and crisp-white dress shirts were long gone by the time they stumbled upon it while reminiscing about Sean’s first trip to Winnipeg on a stroll up trendy Sherbrook Street. (For context, non-Winnipeggers: Sherbrook Street is mine and Will’s favourite strip. There is a protected bike lane, as well as beloved dive bars and coffee and vintage shops.)
It’s shocking we didn’t run into the thief head-on. The addresses of our reception, after-party, and where the suitcase was ditched are 116, 61 and 125 Sherbrook St., respectively. Ralph Connor House is on nearby West Gate. In order to get to Next Door, we likely took the same path as the person who robbed us. Whoever committed the crime left our lost-then-found luggage on a grassy boulevard, but there was one item left inside: a Goodland core. (Another apple was squashed in a nearby bike lane.)
I made it known to anyone who’d listen over the last five years that I couldn’t wait to get married. At times, I resented Will for making me wait. Our relationship had been tested—and passed—countless times in teenagehood and adulthood.
Our initial days as newlyweds brought about unique challenges. I was livid he’d forgotten his wallet. He was livid that his now-wife, a known workaholic, had assigned herself an investigative journalism project as a result.
My frustration only furthered my resolve to go full Nancy Drew and find out who committed this heartless crime. While Will was getting a new vehicle window installed, I snuck off to scope out the crime scene. I knocked on doors in the heritage district surrounding Ralph Connor House, made phone calls to people who had door-cameras, and even did Sherbrook “streeters” (a journalistic practise that involves stopping strangers in public to ask them to weigh-in on a timely topic; I did a lot of these as an intern).
I was desperate for any leads. On Monday morning, when RaY opened, I happily accepted rubber gloves from a woman working the front-desk so I could sort through their outdoor garbage bins.
By Tuesday, Will was exhausted. But he’s nothing if not supportive, so he agreed—reluctantly—to drive me to the main police station in Winnipeg. We arrived at the front desk, where we were asked to take a number and wait.
Will rolled his eyes when I insisted on packing “evidence” for our visit to police headquarters. Neither of us could help but laugh, though, when I presented security-camera locations, contact for a neighborhood watch group, and a rotting apple core. I can only imagine the intake officer — who did not laugh—thought we were wasting his time. The Winnipeg Police Service received upwards of 6,600 “theft under $5,000 from motor vehicle” reports last year. Only 0.4% of these cases were solved, police data show.
Winnipeg is also notorious for its violent crime rates, both of which are consistently among the worst in Canada. City police triage their limited resources, understandably. However, we were a little shocked when an investigator called us to say it was extremely unlikely he’d be able to recover any footage from the convenience store where a thief had tapped all of Will’s cards. “These stores don’t usually cooperate,” he told us, alluding to the fact the shopkeeper had clearly turned a blind eye.
Neither of us had cold feet even for a split second—but we’ll probably have a cold case until death do us part.