Family photo
Lynnea and Jeremy Warn, with daughter Faith: A timing problem.
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Ronnie Polaneczky: Vow to never ignore a Phils victory
PLENTY OF US will be riveted to the TV tomorrow, hoping that Ryan, Jimmy, Cole and the rest of the Phillies will win their first playoff game against the Colorado Rockies.
Lynnea Warn won't be tuned in. She's still bummed that the Phillies ruined her wedding day last Oct. 31, when the city celebrated the team's World Series championship with a victory parade down Broad Street.
"I can't get excited," Lynnea said yesterday, after taking daughter Faith, 6, to school at St. Katherine of Siena in Torresdale. "I could still cry that I didn't get to walk down the aisle."
If this tale has a lesson, Lynnea says, it's that love conquers all.
I think the lesson is that those who ignore a Philly sports team's success do so at their peril.
It was instant love when Lynnea Ranalli-DelRosario, an artist, met Jeremy Warn at a South Street club in 2002, where he was performing with his industrial-rock band, Organizm. They didn't mind their age difference - she's now 39, he's 29. But it was one of many issues that their families had with them as a couple, says Lynnea.
"We were into the Goth scene; they're more traditional," says Lynnea, a former club-and-party girl who, like Jeremy, once favored a black-vinyl look.
When Lynnea got pregnant with Faith, family disapproval and other pressures split the couple apart.
"The break turned out to be a good thing," she says. "It forced us to get ourselves together."
Lynnea left the club scene to become a doting mommy; Jeremy became a computer-repair wizard. In time, they realized how much they missed each other and owed their little girl a good family.
They reunited, and planned a Friday-night wedding for Halloween, their favorite holiday because of its emphasis on child-centered fun.
They'd dress in Renaissance Faire-style garb (including custom-made gowns and wings for Lynnea and Faith) and trick-or-treat with their 102 guests after nuptials at St. Katherine, the parish where Lynnea grew up. They'd end the night at the Knights of Columbus party hall, then head to Disneyland on Monday with F.aith.
They'd expected to retrieve their marriage license on Friday, Oct. 31, for their ceremony that evening. But when they flicked on the TV before heading to City Hall, they were stunned by scenes of gridlock as a million Phillies fans invaded Center City.
"We're so out of touch; we didn't even know the Phillies won the World Series!" says Lynnea. "We're not into sports."
Panicked, Jeremy called City Hall and learned that the Register of Wills office, which had their license, had closed early for the festivities (a department employee said yesterday that the office had indeed gone dark that day, long before the usual 4:30 p.m. closing time).
"Guests were coming from all over for our wedding," says Lynnea, "but we had no license."
The Rev. Paul Kennedy, St. Katherine's pastor, told the couple he was forbidden to marry them, or even to give a blessing, without the document (an archdiocese spokeswoman confirms that the church can't officiate an unlicensed wedding).
"He was able to cancel the organist and soloist," Lynnea says. "But we still had to meet at the church to tell guests what was happening. He felt so bad for us."
The couple decided to proceed with their celebration, even if it didn't include a wedding, because they'd already paid for the decorated hall, the food and drinks, and the horse-and-carriage that would transport them from to the church.
"I kept saying, 'Love conquers all!'" recalls Lynnea.
The carriage was supposed to get to their condo by 5 p.m. to get them to the church by 6, when guests would arrive. But traffic was so bad, the carriage didn't make it to their condo until 6:30. Their guests, similarly gridlocked, didn't all assemble at the church until 7:30 p.m. The couple, on the front steps, explained that there'd be no wedding, but that trick-or-treating and celebrating would commence.
"They cheered," says Lynnea. "They wanted to let us know how happy they were. They knew all we'd been through."
One guest, a hairdresser with a spiritual bent, led the group in prayer, and the rest of the evening went off without a hitch. But Lynnea was still distraught that it was just a party, not a reception following a religious ceremony that blessed her union.
Three days later, the couple had a small, quiet ceremony at the church, attended by a handful of friends and relatives.
Lynnea felt "the grace of the moment," but she's still heartbroken that she didn't get to walk down a candle-lit aisle to Bach's Toccata and Fugue. She and Jeremy wanted to declare their commitment in a religious ceremony before people whose love helped them grow from a fractured threesome into a real family.
Doing so would honor her folks, especially her dad, Orlando, who died in 2004 of lung cancer and who adored Faith.
"I wanted my dad [in spirit] to see we'd gotten ourselves together and were going to give our daughter the life he wanted us to give her," says Lynnea.
Wherever he is, I'll bet he's already proud.
E-mail polaner@phillynews.com or call 215-854-2217. For recent columns:
http://go.philly.com/polaneczky. Read Ronnie's blog at
http://go.philly.com/ronnieblog.
