Best Man

Everyone knows that weddings are supposed to be a wonderful and exciting event. Of course, they can also be incredibly nerve wracking as well, with family expectations, limited budgets, and the sometimes-stressful feeling that the day must be absolutely perfect.

Choosing a Best Man
For grooms who generally have not been imagining and planning their wedding day since childhood, the preparations for the event can be harrowing. For these reasons, choosing their groomsmen can be a relief to many husbands-to-be, as it is a task that they feel well-equipped to do and provides friends who can sympathize in times of frustration. The role of Best Man is an important choice, as best men traditionally have several important roles, including throwing the bachelor party and making a toast at the wedding reception.

Deciding on whom to use as a best man can be a surprisingly difficult process for many grooms. The most common difficulty encountered in the process is when the groom feels that he has to choose between a brother and a best friend, and worries that regardless of which he selects, someone's feelings will be hurt. It may reassure grooms to know that it is widely understood that brothers should properly be the first choice for best man, unless there is a compelling reason for choosing the best friend instead (i.e. the two brothers are not on speaking terms). In situations where the groom has many brothers, the situation can become more difficult, but generally the oldest brother is given preference. In some areas, particularly in the southern United States, a groom-to-be usually chooses his father as the best man. Of course, all of these guidelines are merely tradition and suggestion; the choice is always ultimately up to the groom, who should choose whomever he wants.

Modern Alternatives to a Best Man
The modern wedding is one in which neither the bride nor the groom feels terribly bound to tradition, and choices are made about the wedding and the wedding party however the couple wishes. As with many other aspects of the ceremony, the selection and duties of the best man have been undergoing revision with many couples. Some men prefer not to have a best man at all, or to consider all of their groomsmen as best men, so as to avoid the connotation that one of them is better than the rest. Other men are choosing their sisters or female friends to be their ‘best men / best women’. For these couples, the genders or titles of the wedding party are irrelevant, so long as their loved ones are gathered around to help them celebrate their wedding day.

Duties of a Best Man
There are many traditional duties of a best man, the most well known of which are throwing the bachelor party and giving a toast to the couple at the wedding reception. The best man's toast is a speech: there have been a number of traditional best man speeches given at weddings, and, for the most part, such speeches wish the new bride and groom total happiness and marital bliss. Other, lesser known duties of the best man have traditionally included various tasks to make the wedding day run more smoothly for the couple, such as getting guests to and from the airport, driving the bride and groom to and from the reception (assuming that no limo or other chauffeured vehicle has been hired for the day), signing the marriage license as a witness, ensuring that the groomsmen know their tasks during and after the wedding, and generally helping to ensure that everyone has a good time.

Throwing the Bachelor Party
Another of the well-known duties of the best man is to throw the bachelor party for the groom. The idea of what a bachelor party entails has changed over the years, and continues to evolve in keeping with emerging trends. Of course, far more important than the role of custom or trend is the personal preference of the groom-to-be. There are as many types of bachelor party as there are groom, and it is the best man's job to make absolutely certain that the event he is planning falls in line with the wishes of the groom-to-be and his future wife.

The classic bachelor party, and the one that tends to appear most often, is a liquor-soaked event held at a strip club, or possibly over the course of a weekend in Las Vegas. While it would be extremely naïve to say that this sort of party no longer occurs, it is also certainly true that it has waned in popularity, and is likely no longer the norm. This is due in part to influence from the bride-to-be, who may not want her fiancé embarking on a `last night of freedom' strip club tour, but also because many prospective grooms simply do not want to spend the evening in this manner. Also, more and more men are choosing to include their fathers and brothers in their bachelor parties, and they may not all be comfortable with going to a strip club together. The ultimate point of a bachelor party is, after all, not to look at other women for the last time, but to enjoy and celebrate the bond between the groom-to-be and all of his friends. While this is typically an all male event, in recent years some men are choosing to involve all of their close friends, regardless of gender.

Alternate Ideas for Throwing the Perfect Bachelor Party
Modern bachelor parties are beginning to be more innovative, and revolving more around the hobbies and interests that the groom to be enjoys most, particularly if he can enjoy them with his friends. Group sporting activities are common, whether that involves a full day of golf at a swanky country club, a weekend spent at the paintball range, or getting box seats for a favorite team's home game.

A camping trip can also be a good idea for a groom who enjoys the outdoors, as it provides ample time for catching up with old friends and thinking about the future. Rarely is a bachelor party actually thrown the night before the wedding anymore, as that evening is generally a very busy night already, what with the rehearsal dinner and possibly even decorating duties to attend to. Also, it is generally frowned upon for the groom to show up to his own wedding so hung over that he can barely recognize the bride. A well planned bachelor party will be an event remembered fondly for years, and should strengthen the bonds of friendship among all those who attend it.

The Day of the Wedding
Throughout the process of planning and preparing for the wedding, the best man can have various small duties to assist the groom-to-be with his tasks. The most important part of the best man's job occurs on the actual wedding day, however. It is vital that the best man maintain a clear head, because it is unlikely that the groom will be able to. Should the groom lose his wallet, forget the notes he made for reciting his own vows, or suddenly forget how to tie his tie, the best man must be there to help him out in his time of need.

The best man is also traditionally in charge of holding the wedding rings until they are needed, and getting the groom to the church on time. As with everything else, these duties do not have to apply to every wedding (for example, if a limo will be taking the groom to the church then the best man does not have to worry about it), but it may be a good idea to keep them in mind. After all, even if there is a chauffeured vehicle waiting to take the groom and the groomsmen to the wedding chapel, it is still a good idea for the best man to keep an eye on the time so that he can let the groom know when it is time to leave. In general, the best man's task on the day of the wedding is to keep the groom sane and help him to get through the day. Ironically, some men feel that they are so numb and nervous on the day of their wedding, they don't get to enjoy it until they serve as best man for someone else.

The Importance of the First Toast
According to tradition, it is the best man who gives the first toast, and this task is by far the most important and time-honored traditional duty of the best man. Many men are nervous about making a speech in front of a crowd of friends and family members, or worried that they will say something inappropriate and embarrass the bride and groom. In most cases, these fears are unfounded. More than anything else, the crowd is assembled to share in the love of the newly wedded couple.

Anything that the best man has to share in his speech, whether it is humorous or sentimental, is a valuable contribution to the beauty of the day. In fact, most speeches are a combination of humor and sentiment, with a dash of pragmatic advice thrown in for good measure. A good toast breaks the ice at the start of the reception, putting everyone at ease and setting the tone for the rest of the event. The best man should mingle thereafter, making all of the guests feel welcome and comfortable, and ensuring that the atmosphere throughout the reception is one of love and joy, and genuine happiness for the union of the bride and the groom.

Topics for the Best Man’s Toast
Often best men will share a short anecdote or two about the couple, perhaps relating the first time he met the bride or how he knew that the couple was really meant to be together. If the best man is the groom’s brother, he might share a memory or two of what the groom was like as a child, and how great it is to see his brother finding such happiness.

A best man who has been a friend since childhood could share similar stories, or a more recent friend might focus on what a great couple the bride and groom have always made. If it is done tastefully, it can also be appropriate for the best man to make a memorial comment about a loved one, generally to mention how much the deceased loved the bride and groom, and how happy he or she would be to see them getting married. It is of the utmost importance for the best man to remain sober throughout the reception; at the very least, he should not begin drinking before he makes his toast. A best man who has begun hitting the bottle far too early has ruined many a wedding in real life as well as in the movies.

Advice for the Best Man
The ultimate goal for any best man is to make sure that the wedding goes off without any difficulty for the bride and groom. This means that the best man should be prepared for any contingency, and has tools at his disposal to make sure that he can solve it without bothering the bride and groom, or their families. In order to take of most of these issues, it is a good idea for the best man to carry extra cash and a credit card, in case there are any unexpected expenses which crop up as well as a fully charged cell phone with emergency numbers for the catering company, the bride and groom’s parents, the church or officiator, and the groomsmen.

The best man should be a friend who is mature and organized enough to take responsibility for getting the groomsmen ready on time, and making sure that they know what to do during the ceremony and at the reception. It can be a good idea for the best man to cooperate with the maid of honor in the matter of keeping the events of the day running smoothly. A good best man can make all the difference in whether a wedding is a successful and stress-free day enjoyed by all, so it is imperative that the groom knows he has made the right decision in choosing his best man.


Local Articles
Weddings
Home