I was twenty-six when I got married. It was undoubtedly the best day of my life. But the bachelor party that preceded the wedding remains as one of the worst experiences of my life.
I can look back now and laugh. My children find the story amusing too, and of course there are the infamous photos as well. Given the highs and lows of their own puberty and adolescence, it is not surprising that my family revels in the public humiliation that Dad once endured too. However much your children may love you, they will still enjoy seeing you cut down to size occasionally - proof that Dad is human and not infallible after all.
The first mistake was my choice of best man. Faced with a choice between two guys - John and Rick - both of whom were very close friends of long standing, the clincher came down to height. I am well over six feet tall, as was John. Rick, however, stood several inches short of that mark - he was even shorter than the bride and the bridesmaids - and my wife-to-be suggested that the wedding group photos would look better if we were all of reasonable stature. A silly reason perhaps, but then I could not separate my friends on any other criteria. By way of atonement, Rick was appointed chief usher for the day.
Like me, John was a Pom by birth and had spent a considerable time in the SAS. As a result, he was a supremely fit, hard-drinking guy who occasionally took time off from serial fucking and boozing to play outrageous practical jokes on his friends. Ours might seem an unlikely friendship, but we shared a passion for water-skiing, golf, tennis and surfing and, if ever one felt down in the dumps, one could rely on John to care and to do his utmost to dispel the gloom with humour.
As the best man, John was naturally charged with arranging that big pre-wedding event - the stag party or (as it is more commonly known in Australia) the buck's night. I suspect many grooms feel as I did about the stag night - it's something that has to be endured; awful things will happen to you, and it is inevitable that the night will end with the groom naked, exposed and extremely drunk. I was resigned to any or all of these things, but I had underestimated my best man's determination to make this bachelor party a spectacular of biblical proportions.
My own experience of stag parties was limited. I had attended just two, both of them relatively staid affairs where some twenty or so guys enjoyed a barbecue and an enormous quantity of beer before settling down to watch a porn movie. It astonishes me that porn, a lap dancer or a stripper are so integral a part of such affairs. I cannot watch a blue movie without developing an erection as some woman is slam-fucked by guys with huge cocks which inevitably spray cum all over the girl's face and body at the film's conclusion. It almost embarrasses me that my hard-on and I sit meekly in the company of other testosterone-laden men who are undoubtedly nursing raging hard-ons themselves. In many ways a conventional guy, I have always seen porn as either a prelude to or an accompaniment to sex. At the parties I had attended, the movie was a prelude to the groom being grabbed and stripped naked by his friends. In one case, he was held down while his pubic hair and armpits were shaved. In the other case, things went a bit further and the poor guy had boot polish applied to his balls. Not my idea of a fun evening, but something I thought I would be able to endure as my own big day loomed on the horizon.
I first began to feel a little nervous when John started regaling me with stories of bachelor parties he had attended in England during his SAS days. I heard about guys who were placed unconscious in a train that would place them in Scotland just hours before they were due in a church in London. I heard about guys who awoke to find an arm or a leg encased in plaster and who were led to believe they had a fractured limb. I tried to dimiss these as a cross between urban myth and John's desire to scare me witless. But mere nervousness turned to healthy apprehension when he told me about the groom who was suspended naked from a tenth-floor window and left there to dangle while his "friends" trooped down to the street below to snap pictures!
It was a relief to discover that John was planning to stage my stag party in the sand dunes of a very quiet beach just a few miles south of where I lived. I mentally ticked off the various pluses to this locale - no train stations, no tall buildings and no general public at hand to witness my degradation. I began to relax and even felt the glimmerings of eager anticipation. In hindsight, perhaps it would have been better to get it out of the way sooner, but this bacchanalia was scheduled for the very night before my wedding.
The wedding eve arrived. The bride-to-be was having a hen's party with her bridesmaids and female relatives that same night but - as this was being held at her parents' home - it was certain to be a very sedate affair with the central themes being clothes, shoes, hair and make-up for the following day. As mere males, my own clothing and that of my best man had been sorted out long ago. My buck's night was to prove far from sedate and there would be scant regard for clothing.
Now the wedding was to be a rather splashy affair, with some 350 friends, relatives and work colleagues attending the reception afterwards, so it was no surprise to find more than a hundred guys assembled at the beach when John and I arrived. It was a warm spring night and I deliberately wore just shorts and a T-shirt so it would be no great loss when my clothing disappeared. I also left my wallet at home, simply tucking a hundred dollars in a zippered shorts pocket in case of emergency.
I have never been a great drinker and I loathe the smell and taste of beer, but I realised that this was one night when alcoholic oblivion might be a good option. Those around me were already well on their way to intoxication so I too started tossing down beer after beer while we lolled about on the sand, kidding and joking in the glow of a gas barbecue. The beer tasted vile at first, but I was in dire need of anaesthetic and scarcely cared what passed my lips after the first dozen beers or so.
My recollections of all that transpired that night are understandably hazy, but I do recall standing up and taking all my clothes off. My reasoning was that it would spare people the trouble of grabbing me and ripping my attire to shreds. In any case, I have never been greatly concerned about nudity; I don't cower in locker rooms and try to cover my nakedness. So that was one ritual over and done with. I collapsed back on my bed of sand and continued to gulp down beer while I teetered on the brink of insensibility.
I can recall being lifted up with guys holding me by my feet and arms and I can recall being carried over the crest of the sand dune while a drunken, howling mob followed. I even remember seeing the large cross that had been hammered into the sand. I am told I started singing: "Christ, you know it ain't easy ... They're going to crucify me". It sounds like something I would do at such a moment, but I have no recollection of it.
I was lifted aloft and my arms were lashed with rope to secure me to the arms of the cross. My thighs and ankles were similarly tied to secure me to the upright. My best man had thoughtfully provided a small ledge on which my feet might rest to support my weight. Sadly, I soon lapsed into unconsciousness and so there was no way I could continue to use the footrest.
Photographs were taken and the assembled masses shook their cans to spray me with beer. And then they went back to the barbecue area , leaving me alone on the cross with my entire bodyweight sustained by the ropes around my biceps and armpits. I hung thus suspended for a considerable time. I made no protest because my mind had already ascended to some beer-sodden Valhalla. Fortunately, one of my friends - a final-year medical student - decided to come back and check on me. What he saw shocked him into immediate action and he called a general alert. I was swiftly cut down and carried to John's car for transport to a hospital while a few guys tried to massage life into my useless arms.
I came to after a few minutes and, though my arms did feel paralysed, I demanded to be driven home so I could have a hot shower. This was done. Two guys showered with me because my arms could only hang uselessly at my sides. I could not use the soap and obviously needed futher massage anyway. And then, though not in the best of shape, I insisted we return to the party. There I drank some more beer and also discovered that my clothes had been set alight. Bye-bye to my hundred dollars but I was beyond caring.
The wedding went ahead as scheduled and we all looked gorgeous. My outfit hid a multitude of sins and - heaven knows why - I did not even have a hangoever; I just felt weary and my arms were like lead. Only on our wedding night did my wife discover that my body was covered with red and yellow food colouring, that my toenails had been painted a brilliant red, and that my upper torso and legs were festooned with what looked suspiciously like rope burns or lash marks from a whip. And I continued to look like some dominatrice's whipping boy for the first two weeks of our honeymoon at a tropical beach resort.
Weeks later, my boss told me that I had looked very Christ-like on the cross and then, with a nod at my groin area, he added that God had indeed been generous toward me!
I can look back now and laugh. My children find the story amusing too, and of course there are the infamous photos as well. Given the highs and lows of their own puberty and adolescence, it is not surprising that my family revels in the public humiliation that Dad once endured too. However much your children may love you, they will still enjoy seeing you cut down to size occasionally - proof that Dad is human and not infallible after all.
The first mistake was my choice of best man. Faced with a choice between two guys - John and Rick - both of whom were very close friends of long standing, the clincher came down to height. I am well over six feet tall, as was John. Rick, however, stood several inches short of that mark - he was even shorter than the bride and the bridesmaids - and my wife-to-be suggested that the wedding group photos would look better if we were all of reasonable stature. A silly reason perhaps, but then I could not separate my friends on any other criteria. By way of atonement, Rick was appointed chief usher for the day.
Like me, John was a Pom by birth and had spent a considerable time in the SAS. As a result, he was a supremely fit, hard-drinking guy who occasionally took time off from serial fucking and boozing to play outrageous practical jokes on his friends. Ours might seem an unlikely friendship, but we shared a passion for water-skiing, golf, tennis and surfing and, if ever one felt down in the dumps, one could rely on John to care and to do his utmost to dispel the gloom with humour.
As the best man, John was naturally charged with arranging that big pre-wedding event - the stag party or (as it is more commonly known in Australia) the buck's night. I suspect many grooms feel as I did about the stag night - it's something that has to be endured; awful things will happen to you, and it is inevitable that the night will end with the groom naked, exposed and extremely drunk. I was resigned to any or all of these things, but I had underestimated my best man's determination to make this bachelor party a spectacular of biblical proportions.
My own experience of stag parties was limited. I had attended just two, both of them relatively staid affairs where some twenty or so guys enjoyed a barbecue and an enormous quantity of beer before settling down to watch a porn movie. It astonishes me that porn, a lap dancer or a stripper are so integral a part of such affairs. I cannot watch a blue movie without developing an erection as some woman is slam-fucked by guys with huge cocks which inevitably spray cum all over the girl's face and body at the film's conclusion. It almost embarrasses me that my hard-on and I sit meekly in the company of other testosterone-laden men who are undoubtedly nursing raging hard-ons themselves. In many ways a conventional guy, I have always seen porn as either a prelude to or an accompaniment to sex. At the parties I had attended, the movie was a prelude to the groom being grabbed and stripped naked by his friends. In one case, he was held down while his pubic hair and armpits were shaved. In the other case, things went a bit further and the poor guy had boot polish applied to his balls. Not my idea of a fun evening, but something I thought I would be able to endure as my own big day loomed on the horizon.
I first began to feel a little nervous when John started regaling me with stories of bachelor parties he had attended in England during his SAS days. I heard about guys who were placed unconscious in a train that would place them in Scotland just hours before they were due in a church in London. I heard about guys who awoke to find an arm or a leg encased in plaster and who were led to believe they had a fractured limb. I tried to dimiss these as a cross between urban myth and John's desire to scare me witless. But mere nervousness turned to healthy apprehension when he told me about the groom who was suspended naked from a tenth-floor window and left there to dangle while his "friends" trooped down to the street below to snap pictures!
It was a relief to discover that John was planning to stage my stag party in the sand dunes of a very quiet beach just a few miles south of where I lived. I mentally ticked off the various pluses to this locale - no train stations, no tall buildings and no general public at hand to witness my degradation. I began to relax and even felt the glimmerings of eager anticipation. In hindsight, perhaps it would have been better to get it out of the way sooner, but this bacchanalia was scheduled for the very night before my wedding.
The wedding eve arrived. The bride-to-be was having a hen's party with her bridesmaids and female relatives that same night but - as this was being held at her parents' home - it was certain to be a very sedate affair with the central themes being clothes, shoes, hair and make-up for the following day. As mere males, my own clothing and that of my best man had been sorted out long ago. My buck's night was to prove far from sedate and there would be scant regard for clothing.
Now the wedding was to be a rather splashy affair, with some 350 friends, relatives and work colleagues attending the reception afterwards, so it was no surprise to find more than a hundred guys assembled at the beach when John and I arrived. It was a warm spring night and I deliberately wore just shorts and a T-shirt so it would be no great loss when my clothing disappeared. I also left my wallet at home, simply tucking a hundred dollars in a zippered shorts pocket in case of emergency.
I have never been a great drinker and I loathe the smell and taste of beer, but I realised that this was one night when alcoholic oblivion might be a good option. Those around me were already well on their way to intoxication so I too started tossing down beer after beer while we lolled about on the sand, kidding and joking in the glow of a gas barbecue. The beer tasted vile at first, but I was in dire need of anaesthetic and scarcely cared what passed my lips after the first dozen beers or so.
My recollections of all that transpired that night are understandably hazy, but I do recall standing up and taking all my clothes off. My reasoning was that it would spare people the trouble of grabbing me and ripping my attire to shreds. In any case, I have never been greatly concerned about nudity; I don't cower in locker rooms and try to cover my nakedness. So that was one ritual over and done with. I collapsed back on my bed of sand and continued to gulp down beer while I teetered on the brink of insensibility.
I can recall being lifted up with guys holding me by my feet and arms and I can recall being carried over the crest of the sand dune while a drunken, howling mob followed. I even remember seeing the large cross that had been hammered into the sand. I am told I started singing: "Christ, you know it ain't easy ... They're going to crucify me". It sounds like something I would do at such a moment, but I have no recollection of it.
I was lifted aloft and my arms were lashed with rope to secure me to the arms of the cross. My thighs and ankles were similarly tied to secure me to the upright. My best man had thoughtfully provided a small ledge on which my feet might rest to support my weight. Sadly, I soon lapsed into unconsciousness and so there was no way I could continue to use the footrest.
Photographs were taken and the assembled masses shook their cans to spray me with beer. And then they went back to the barbecue area , leaving me alone on the cross with my entire bodyweight sustained by the ropes around my biceps and armpits. I hung thus suspended for a considerable time. I made no protest because my mind had already ascended to some beer-sodden Valhalla. Fortunately, one of my friends - a final-year medical student - decided to come back and check on me. What he saw shocked him into immediate action and he called a general alert. I was swiftly cut down and carried to John's car for transport to a hospital while a few guys tried to massage life into my useless arms.
I came to after a few minutes and, though my arms did feel paralysed, I demanded to be driven home so I could have a hot shower. This was done. Two guys showered with me because my arms could only hang uselessly at my sides. I could not use the soap and obviously needed futher massage anyway. And then, though not in the best of shape, I insisted we return to the party. There I drank some more beer and also discovered that my clothes had been set alight. Bye-bye to my hundred dollars but I was beyond caring.
The wedding went ahead as scheduled and we all looked gorgeous. My outfit hid a multitude of sins and - heaven knows why - I did not even have a hangoever; I just felt weary and my arms were like lead. Only on our wedding night did my wife discover that my body was covered with red and yellow food colouring, that my toenails had been painted a brilliant red, and that my upper torso and legs were festooned with what looked suspiciously like rope burns or lash marks from a whip. And I continued to look like some dominatrice's whipping boy for the first two weeks of our honeymoon at a tropical beach resort.
Weeks later, my boss told me that I had looked very Christ-like on the cross and then, with a nod at my groin area, he added that God had indeed been generous toward me!
