groom — Blog — Talia, She Wrote

I have to just gush for a minute. My brother gave the best wedding toast ever. We were incredibly honored by all the toasts our family made. However, in particular, my brother gave a hilarious speech. Here is his speech, minus the hilarious ad libs. He had all of us rolling in the aisles and then tearing up. Oh and that picture? That is the hilarious fellow in the flesh, Ronin A. Davis. Click here to read more of his writing.

If you aren't sure just how amazing it was by reading it, check out the video! Thanks to Matthew Moore of Flat Face Films!

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A Toast to Dan and Talia
How do you write a wedding speech for your sibling? I am not uncomfortable with public speaking, our father’s a Rabbi, all he ever wants to do is talk to large groups of people, you kind of get used to it. But this is new territory for me.

I thought of the typical formula that I had picked up from movies. Funny and/or embarrassing childhood anecdote about the wedded sibling(Remember that time we set up a lemonade stand on our driveway and instead of lemonade we had a polaroid camera and were selling “glamor shots”)

followed by a sentimental nod to your relationship(we’ve always been so close people thought we were twins)

and end with an acknowledgement of the spouse(welcome to family Dan, you really seem like a great guy who clearly hasn’t seen the full extent of our father’s gun collection).

But circumstances conspired that Talia and I didn’t have the typical big sibling/little sibling situations that others had. By the time I would have had her teachers (recognizing my name, asking me to say hi to her, making me feel insecure by regaling me with their constant praise of her) I was attending a different school or living in a different state than my sister.

When i went to high school she went to college, staying in Florida while our family moved to Colorado. But just because I didn’t have my big sister there in person, it didn’t stop me from calling her, with a calling card, from the school payphone whenever I was upset (no cell phones yet, though Talia helped me get my first one four years later!).

Now believe me, Talia and I have fought and argued and it is not fun to be around the Davis siblings when they are stressed out at the same time. But I think the true nature of our sibling-hood can be seen in how we were punished growing up.

After one of our arguments our mother got fed up and made us sit in the center of the living room floor with the soles of our feet touching. Can everyone picture that? She said we had to stay there till we made up. So we sat and scowled at each other, argued some more, complained about this stupid punishment and then silently brooded for a bit. After a while we decided to pull one over on our mother. We’d pretend that we made up and that everything was ok. So we hugged and smiled and Mom let us go back to our rooms... where we angrily shut our doors on each other. Except we were not that angry anymore. And honestly I don’t think we even remembered what we were fighting about. To this day I just recall working together and thinking we were very clever...though looking back I think Mom may have been the clever one.

But when it comes down to it, Talia has been, if I may be so cliche, a lot more than a sister. She’s been my friend, my travel buddy, and my co-worker. We’ve lived together, shared a room...and a sink (much to her chagrin). We’ve been each others co-pilots, counselors, and whatever you call the person who lights a fire under your ass. We’ve shared our toys, our friends, our interests, and perhaps most shockingly, we almost died together (or were almost very seriously injured depending on your vantage point).

Talia, in one of her fearless adventures, traveled to LA to act. Unfortunately it was LA, a place that repels Davises. So I came out, packed CiCi (her Honda Civic) so full you couldn’t adjust the seats and we drove (she drove) back to Colorado.

As we drove through an unexpected blizzard in New Mexico [? - Arizona], her car spun out when we tried to avoid a semi that had gone off the road leaving the giant truck portion blocking half the street. We spun, and spun, and spun. Neither of us are clear on how fast we were spinning, we both just watched the corner of the truck inch closer with every spin.

We were silent. We did not look at each other. I was focusing calmly yet fiercely on the truck in an attempt to will it to hit my side of the car. As I found out later, Talia was trying to will the truck to hit her side of the car. When the car finally stopped spinning we sat in silence. Staring out into the darkness, peppered with the occasionally gleaming flakes of snow as they passed in front of the headlights.

At some point we looked down to the console between us and saw that we had been holding hands the entire time. Only at this realization did we finally look at each other, smile...and begin laughing. Laughing hysterically. Laughing at life, laughing at what was just avoided, laughing at our confusion and skewed perception? I don’t know. But we laughed - then drove very slowly to the nearest hotel.

I should note that neither of us cried, screamed, yelled, or panicked. And I have a feeling that at least one of those actions would have creeped in had we not been together.

Dan, this story was to explain to you that you’re marrying someone whose brain power is so incredible that she was actually able to stop a moving car.

And Talia, this story was to remind you that love works best when it has company. I don’t care about the facts of that near accident, the love we have for each other is what kept us safe. It is amazing when you can find someone to willingly share your love and who will share their love in return.

Thank you, Ronin, for such an amazing toast.