P.S. Why we went to Japan was the wedding—Zachary and Akiko’s. At the shrine, where we sat with the other guests on side benches, altar maidens in kimonos flitted like birds and bowed and lifted up silver pots of sake. A priest spoke, too. He wore a fez-shaped hat that tied under his chin. He waved a pompom-like wand, fluffy white. We couldn’t understand a thing, but when it came time we held up our little saucers for the sake like everybody else and swallowed.

We’d been instructed, prior to the ceremony, on how to perform the green-branches offering. Somehow we got through.

Here’s the part I loved—

Zachary had memorized his lines for the bride-and-groom recitation. Akiko had written them out in phonetic English. Now, standing up there like a robber baron in his pleated kimono, alongside ravishing Akiko, he began bumbling through. How off he was, how badly he was mangling the Japanese, we couldn’t tell, but from both of them laughter began bubbling up.

You know how it goes. It’s contagious. One person gets their giggles tamped down, only to hear the other’s erupt, causing another round of helpless shoulder-shaking spasms.

Paulson looked on, aghast. Were the family elders across the room from us—as staid and composed as before—having private fits? Was Zachary wrecking his wedding? But what was so awful? When’s a more perfect time for jollity? I had to squelch the titters rising up, myself.

Later Akiko confessed that she was the one who started it. That mollified Paulson—some.