Spinster at the Wedding

I've been down in Cornwall for the last few days with all of my British relatives for a cousin's wedding. The weather has been, well, British... bloody cold and raining. One of my cousins mocked me for not taking off my coat in the church at the wedding, but it quite a fashionable coat (I got it in Rome last year, therefore it must be fashionable), and all those other women with just a shawl wrapped around their shoulders were freezing, and I was quite happy. The nice thing about being a foreigner is that you can blame all manner of ills on the fact that you ARE a foreigner. They can just assume that in the (backwards) colonies, we all wear coats all the time (or at least we do when faced with bone-chilling English weather).

I am staying in some cottages with almost all the relations. (One family isn't here, and number of the children weren't invited.) It's lovely to see them all, and even more fun knowing that I'll see them all again soon, so I don't have to worry about doing all my catching up right now. I have noticed a few things while being here with all of them though.

1) They all smoke like bloody chimneys. In my world at home I have no close friends who smoke (that I know of-- they know better than to tell me!), no family members, and really can only think of a couple of relations. Here, about half of them smoke. There is always a group huddled outside puffing away. (Disgusting it is, but at least they do it outside!)

2) I sound like a rube. I have worked so hard in the states to portray myself (totally true, of course) as an erudite person. But here I just open my mouth, and this godawful twangy accent comes out, and no matter what I say, I sound (to myself at least) like an uneducated boob. (Yes, I'll be working on my accent.)

3) The Brits, at least those in my family, are so good about social formalities. Another cousin is getting married in a month, and the invitation said that they "would like to invite you". They "would", but they can't apparently. I guess that's a grammatical no-no over here. (Think off all those weddings I've crashed over the years, because I wasn't actually invited...) At the reception last night, people were wonderful about introducing me. I was talking with one gentleman whose son I would be sitting next to at dinner, (we had assigned seats, boy-girl-boy-girl, of course, but also couples were split up so that you would be able to meet and chat with someone new) who later, as I was approaching the table and his son, made a mad dash from I don't know where so that he could properly introduce us.

4) A couple of people thought I was Canadian. I took this as a compliment (and patted myself on the back for that good practice on my accent). Perhaps they just assume that Americans don't travel. (I was asked a couple of times if it was true that only 5% Americans have passports. How would I know?)

5) I am, officially, the only single person left in my age group. I normally don't mind this at all (and actually, I still don't), but last night for the first time I wished I had a date so that I could have a dance partner. At home I have no qualms about stealing a friend from his wife and dragging him out to dance, but I thought that might not go over so well with strangers. "Hi, I'm Lucie, the American cousin, and I'd like to just borrow your hubby for a bit..." The husband of one of my cousins (aged 55, I would guess) did take pity on me at one point and took me out to the floor. I supposed I could have just gone out on my own and started dancing, and everyone would have just assumed that that is what they do in Canada.