Our Supra Great Wedding
"But I wanted the greatness that comes when a wedding is memorable, distinctive, and full of love..."
Amid the myriad of emotions swirling in my heart, before my wedding, there was nervousness. Would the wedding be great? I knew, for reasons I’ll describe below, that it wouldn’t be “epic,” or even particularly elaborate. But I wanted the greatness that comes when a wedding is memorable, distinctive, and full of love. So I took a leap of faith.
None of our guests had been to a Supra before, and I had never been to a wedding Supra, myself. But no greatness comes without risk! We were about to find out: can a Georgian Supra can add to an American wedding’s greatness?
It was November 26, the ceremony was complete, and the dim November sun had set. Blustery evening. The restaurant emanated a cozy glow that invited us in. The place gave an aura that suggested secrets told and kept, within its frescoed walls. Our guests trickled into the warmth, and a general hubbub of disparate conversations swirled above the two long tables that stretched almost the entire length of the place, front door to back wall.
After allowing the conversations to flow for a few minutes, a young man near that back wall asked the restaurant’s maitre’d to turn down the music. Then, *ding ding ding* the ring of his knife on a wineglass pierced through the conversations, and every head turned. In the new silence, the tamada introduced himself:
“I’m Daniel, and I’ll be guiding the table as your Tamada, or toastmaster, tonight. Could everybody take a seat and get comfortable?”
One eyebrow raised. Another head cocked quizzically - what is a “Tamada,” and why do we have one? While the guests sat and leaned forward in anticipation, Tamada Daniel remained standing. He paused for a beat to let the gravity lighten up a touch. Then he introduced the structure of Supra dinner and prepared to make the inaugural toast.
By that point, my heart had risen somewhere up above my clavicle. In my mind I was asking the same question as everyone else:
How is this going to go?
As a simultaneous culmination and new beginning, a great wedding is a paradox.
It must be meticulously planned down to the finest details, and it must also delight with spontaneous surprises. It has to establish common ground for the various guests, and also transport everyone to a separate reality, unshackled from day-to-day concerns.
A great wedding shows us deep truths about who we truly are, and also changes us into something new.
And of course, above all, a great wedding must be joyful.
Leading up to our wedding, my fiancé Anne (lithe, raven-haired, charms every person she meets) and I were slightly worried about that joy part. We had discussed our perfect wedding, before: it would be late July, a reception out on a lush pasture, grassy hills behind us clad in summer’s gold, a whole pig roasting over a wood fire, and a dance party that would keep swirling and twirling long after the gorgeous sunset had faded into night.
But in reality, our wedding ended up happening in late November, in a Pacific Northwest town notorious for its rainy cold. So we were all inside, with a smaller guest list. Because of these circumstances, we were relying on a memorable reception dinner, to give the event the greatness that our love, and our families, deserved.
The Supra was going to have to carry a lot of weight, for our wedding’s greatness.
On top of that, we have somewhat complicated family dynamics. Differences of ideology, demeanor, religion – classic stuff. We knew everybody would be civil.
But we wanted more than civility. We wanted memorable joy.
Tamada Daniel began his first toast:
“The first toast is to gratitude. There is a whole constellation of people, places, and stories that had to happen precisely as they did, to bring these two together - and all of us together. In 10 years, we’ll probably look back on this evening with gratitude – so why not start now?...”
As he continued with eloquence, Anne and I glanced at each other in relief – for the first time all weekend, somebody else was at the center of attention, for a moment!
But that relief didn’t last long.
The Tamada’s toast finished, and glasses clinked. The wedding feast table was set with food, Georgian wine, and the theme of gratitude.
I glanced across the table and could almost see the gears turning in my parents’ brains. They were internally practicing their toasts. Oh no, I thought – don’t let them overthink it!
So I glanced over at Daniel and held up my glass. He nodded. I rang my glass and stood.
My memory of that toast is mostly a blur. In fact, even as I gave the toast, I was out-of-body, and not fully aware of my own words. Sometimes the brain steps aside, and the heart lets out its unfiltered message.
According to the pictures, a giddy smile had conquered my face. While I spoke, I saw that smile echoed, on various faces around me. I know I said something like, “She and I will get to spend Eternity together,” at which point an audible “Aww,” was heard.
The only other thing I remember is the smile on Anne’s face, when I glanced down at her, and held her hand… and then people were cheering, clinking, and drinking.
Phew, I thought. A portion of my nervousness had evaporated. At the very least, I had done what I could.
The night was young, but the table was set, with potential for greatness.
More toasts were proposed. First came the classical wedding toasts: My father extolled and exaggerated my virtues. Anne’s mother offered a toast, extolling hers. The wedding Supra makes a prominent place for those sort of personal, heartfelt family toasts, which bring tears to eyes and laughs to bellies, and make us all feel at home.
Tamada Daniel’s second theme toast was about wisdom. He told us the story of a mysterious old man named Sylvester, who would appear uninvited at various weddings, offering marriage advice with hilarious consequences.
With this, Daniel had opened some sort of emotional gates, and the dinner began to feel different from any other wedding I have attended. You could tell something supra-normal was happening, from the way the restaurant staff leaned up against the bar at the back wall, watching and listening, so absorbed that the manager had to remind them to bring the next course to the table.
The Supra began to extract unexpected eloquence from the gathered guests. Seasoned veterans of marriage raised their glasses and offered un-rehearsed, but well-seasoned wisdom about nurturing the bond: both of us would always change, but not always at the same pace; enjoy; forgive; never go to sleep angry.
Each aphorism was tinged with the distinctive personality of the friend or relative who gave it, and so none of them felt cliche. Finally, my grandfather stood:
After all my years of marriage, I find myself with less and less advice to give, except for this. It’s very simple, but it takes a very long time, to get it right. Focus on the good times. By this I mean: tell each other when the other does something that makes you happy. Celebrate it. And when the other does something that makes you upset, give it time before you bring it up, because it’s probably less of a big deal than you first think.
“Gagimarjos!” the room resounded with cheers to the venerable man. And then Daniel brought out the horns.
He summoned my grandfather, 90 years old, and my step-grandma for the Vakhtanguri. This is a special Supra tradition that you have to experience, in person, to understand. The drinking horns were filled with a strong shot of something, the elderly arms locked, and the table chanted while the grandparents chugged.
GagimarJOS, JOS, JOS!
The party was on.
Our Tamada, tuning the energy like a DJ of emotion and energy, continued to guide us through the themes of human life: parents, siblings, departed ancestors, friendship, sports…
Around the table, we began to surprise ourselves. Anne stood and toasted off the cuff about her siblings and best friends. Somehow, she perfectly summarized each relationship, in a matter of seconds, on the fly. Her tears of love watered the ground of all our hearts, and many then sprouted tears of their own.
Now the energy of the toasts swooped around the table, catching people up into itself like a flock of starlings.
My good friend warned Anne about a few challenges of my personality, wishing her strength to deal with my strong will. (With friends like these…)
Another friend listed some ways in which Anne is the perfect balancing companion, for my “relentless and almost inhuman” curiosity.
My brother admitted never-before-spoken ways he had always looked up to me. My sister took credit for connecting Anne and I – she was the visionary who saw who we could be, together.
Anne’s soul sister Casey shared childhood stories.
Her godfather offered an unusual political theory.
Improvised poetry emerged from unexpected people who were usually introverted and quiet.
More pairs were united by the Vakhtanguri horns. My sister and Anne’s brother were bonded forever. Anne and Casey celebrated their lifelong connection, for everyone to see.
In the love-affirming context of the Supra, our assemblage of family, friends, and neighbors went from a kaleidoscopic collection to a coherent communion. While we showed ourselves to one another, we became a “we.”
Tamada Daniel summarized the effect with a toast to unity:
In ancient times, warring tribes would send a champion to fight together in battle, each one an icon of their respective tribe. The winner takes all. Ancient tribes would also make marriage bonds, where each side sent a champion, and both sides could claim a victory of love. That’s what we’re seeing, with this wedding – it’s about more than just Anne and David, this is two tribes coming together.
With imaginations loosened by the impeccable Georgian wine, we could vividly see how each heart, whether reticent or enthusiastic, poured something out, for the table. Our marriage bond echoed out from between us two, connecting all of our connections to one another, and creating something greater than the sum of its hearts.
I realized that the venue, the music, the food, the flowers… all of the wonderful niceties of a wedding celebration… they aren’t the essence of a great wedding. It is the multiplication of love, radiating out from the wedding couple, that truly makes a wedding great. And the great power of the Supra, perfected by centuries of loving tradition, is to magnify this radiation.
Anne’s brother John remarked that he wanted to do this sort of dinner every week. He wanted to meet strangers at Supras. He wanted to fill a cellar with Georgian wine. And 10 or 12 toasts in, while dessert was cleared from the table, John shared the secret family operating rules, passed down from his father. I would share them here, but you’d have to swear to secrecy for life.
At most weddings, the toasts are a spectacle, performed by a few for the many guests. At our Supra, everyone was invited to participate, whether they planned to speak, or not. Amazingly, almost everyone gave a toast. I myself gave three – and I could have given more, with all the gratitude overflowing in my soul.
All together, every attendee contributed their voice to a sort of song. The harmony still resonates for my wife and me.
In the Republic of Georgia, nearly every wedding has a Supra at its climax. My own great wedding showed me that those Georgians know what they’re doing. Like our marriage itself, the pairing of wedding and Supra seems like a match that is simply meant to be.
Where did you get those glass drinking horns? Beautiful.