Joint Wedding Speech From the Couple (Funny, About 3.5 Minutes)

The speech

Leander: Hi, everyone. We're doing this together because we were told one speech from the couple is plenty, and we couldn't agree on who should give it. This is a theme.

Katarina: Thank you all for being here. Thank you to my parents, Idony and Rafferty, and to Leander's mom, Philippa, who between the three of them made about ninety percent of the decisions in this room, and all the good ones. And thank you to Cosima, our maid of honor, who is relevant to what comes next.

Leander: We'd like to tell you how we met. Katarina has a version. I have the version that happened.

Katarina: We met at Cosima's thirtieth birthday dinner, at the Thai place on Hawthorne, October, three years ago. I was seated across from Leander. He ordered the same curry as me, said "good choice" to himself, out loud, and I decided that was either charming or a warning sign and that I would find out which.

Leander: That was the second time we met. The first time was two weeks earlier, at the laundromat on Clinton Street. A woman came up to me with a twenty-dollar bill and asked if I could break it for the machines. I could not. She said "thanks anyway" and walked off, and I spent the whole spin cycle thinking about it.

Katarina: I have no memory of this.

Leander: She was wearing a green coat.

Katarina: I own a green coat, which proves nothing. Half this room owns a green coat. Cosima, how many green coats do you own?

Leander: At the dinner, when she sat down across from me, I said, "Did you ever get change?" And she said, "For what?" And I let it go, because I am a gentleman and because the curry had arrived.

Katarina: He has told this story at four Thanksgivings. The details move. Last year the coat was blue.

Leander: The coat was always green. The laundromat was always on Clinton. The woman was always you.

Katarina: Here's what I'll give him. Whether or not there was a laundromat, there was a dinner, and at that dinner a man I'd never met noticed I'd stopped eating because the curry was too hot for me, slid his water across the table without a word, and kept talking to Cosima's brother so I wouldn't have to say thank you. I didn't notice him noticing. I noticed the glass. Three years later I'm still noticing the glass. That's the whole thing about him.

Leander: And here's what I'll give her. She's right that I ordered the same curry. I didn't want it. I wanted something to say to her.

Katarina: Leander. You can keep the laundromat. I'll keep the glass of water. Between us that's one complete story, and it's ours.

Leander: Everybody, glasses up. To Katarina and Leander. We met at least once.

Why it works: The disagreement gives the speech a shape and a running joke, and each partner ends up telling the version that makes the other one look good.