I Took the Leap Into Marriage—and Landed in the Shallow End

In the blink of an eye, my wedding party went from raucous revelry to a frantic emergency room visit—and a ruined honeymoon. Please don’t ask me if I’m laughing yet.

Illustrations by Dale Crosby Close

I am laying on a gurney in a Palm Springs emergency room when I see my wife for the first time since our wedding reception. Christina has changed out of her soaked wedding gown. She has been crying, her usually bright smile replaced by concern, disbelief, and what I mistake for anger.

In a few hours, we are supposed to fly to Hawaii on our honeymoon. We are supposed to embark on a great romance, but a nightmare has upended that dream. So instead of the usual wedding-night bliss, we are waiting for a doctor to tell us what we already know, that my badly-broken ankle will require surgery. Unable to look Christina in the eye, I ask if she’s angry. She says no, but later she admits that she was mad at herself. “I know you, honey,” she says a few weeks before our first anniversary. “No way you’d jump in the pool, if I hadn’t gone in first.”