If you can’t bring Grandma to the wedding, then you’ll just have to bring the wedding to Grandma.
Well, almost.
David Saavedra of San Diego wanted his grandmother to be there for his July wedding in Long Beach, but the 97-year-old Jewish Home resident simply couldn’t make the trip down south.
So, he came up with a novel idea: Stage an “almost a wedding” ceremony at San Francisco’s Jewish Home for her.
Joining Mary Bader Nagan for the March 4 ceremony were Saavedra and his fiancée, Sherry Parmet; his parents, Guillermo and Rita Saavedra of San Bruno; his younger brother, Mark; and his uncle Ray Nagan. Rabbi Sheldon Marder, spiritual leader at the Home, officiated.
It was unlike any other ceremony the rabbi has ever conducted.
“When I typed up the service, what I wrote on the top of the page was ‘before a wedding.’ I couldn’t think of a name for it. It doesn’t exist,” said the rabbi with a laugh.
“It was a taste of kiddushin. A taste of a wedding.”
For Marder and the gang, it was also a taste of Nagan’s legendary apple pie. The family dusted off her old recipe and brought in a celebratory pie, impressing the rabbi after the ceremony.
The pie wasn’t the only personal touch. Rita Saavedra brought along the loving cup her mother won in a 1930 beauty contest in Wadowicz, Poland.
“We found and polished off her beauty cup,” said Rita Saavedra. “We just used it for her to hold when we took pictures. We wanted to see if she remembered back that far.”
Nagan left her native Poland in the early 1930s for what was supposed to be a brief visit to America. But she met her future husband, Joseph, in Detroit, and never left.
Nagan “really enjoyed” the ceremony, said Rita Saavedra. “She really pepped up a lot.”
Added David Saavedra, “Like a lot of grandmothers, she wanted to see her grandson married. I’m 40 years old and I’ve never been married. So I think she got a lot out of it.”
Meanwhile, Marder is just hoping he can classify the service he led.
“We don’t have a good name for it yet,” he said.
“I’d love to come up with something.”