Rehearsal Dinner Wedding Toast From an Uncle (Short, 2 Minutes)

The speech

Hello, everybody. I'm Cosimo, Alaric's uncle, his mother's younger brother, and the family has agreed I can go tonight so that tomorrow belongs to the professionals.

The summer Alaric was twelve, he spent in my garage in Tacoma. My neighbor's mower had died, I had said I would look at it, and Alaric decided that meant we. He took the whole engine apart on a bedsheet on the floor. Every bolt went into an egg carton, each cup labeled in pencil with where it came from. It took him eleven weeks. I was ready to give up in week two. He was not. He would come over after breakfast, sit cross-legged on that sheet, and work until his mother honked.

It ran in September. He wheeled it back across the street himself, and when my neighbor asked what she owed him, he said, "It was your mower." That is Alaric. He does not do the fast version of anything, and he does not keep what is not his.

The first time Beatriz came to Sunday dinner, she asked to see the garage. He had told her about the egg cartons. All of it, eleven weeks' worth, and she had listened to every bolt and wanted to see where it happened. I have watched a lot of people meet this family. She is the first one who asked for the garage.

Beatriz, he is slow and careful and he keeps track of everything, so you should know he has been keeping track of you since that first Sunday. We are glad it is you.

Everybody, glasses up. To Alaric and Beatriz. Label the bolts, and keep every one.

Why it works: The story has a place, a season, and a detail only the uncle would know, the groom comes out of it looking good, and the bride is welcomed for something she did, not something she is.