Honoring a friend with pride, produce

A fluffy white cauliflower bloomed in the center of my husband's boutonniere the day we got married. There he stood at the end of the aisle in his snazzy brown tux, looking sharp as ever, with a veggie tray staple proudly pinned to his chest.

He's not a passionate vegetarian. He's just a guy who misses his best friend, Ben.

Ben Mutnick married his wife, Lindsay, 27 months ago. They had a beautiful, fun-filled wedding. The kind you see in movies. But even the best of weddings has its lulls.

While the bride and groom posed for pictures and the rest of the guests plucked hors d'oeuvres off passed trays during cocktail hour, the bridal party hung out in a conference room where they awaited their cue for the big grand entrance. There were two round tables in the room -- groomsmen at one, bridesmaids at the other -- and vegetable trays in the center of each. Suit jackets draped the chairs and bridesmaids lost the perfect posture with which they walked down the aisle.

Ben's family and closest college friends from Michigan State munched on the veggies to pass the time. The carrots went first, the broccoli next. Not unlike the frail kid in a dodgeball team-picking process, the cauliflower was the predictable last vegetable left.

That's when my then-boyfriend picked up the underappreciated veggie, examined it and made a loaded observation: "These look exactly like the white flowers in our boutonnieres."

You could feel a breeze, the boredom left the room so quickly. When you put a group of men together whose friendships formed during the most immature years of their adulthood, prank-pulling trumps all.

Whose boutonniere could they replace with a cauliflower? Who wasn't in the room with them and who was careless enough to have left his suit jacket behind with all his college buddies? The answer to all of the above: the groom. The man whose big day they were celebrating, a couple of guys argued. The man whose formal pictures were getting shot at that very moment, so no harm and no foul, the majority argued back.

We have photos of the guys and the groom's brother Michael working diligently, and glancing at the door, to detach the original boutonniere and attach the one you could find in the produce aisle at Albertsons. We also have photos of a not-too-happy Ben confronting his best friend, the cauliflower caper, at the end of the night. What we regrettably don't have photos of is the moment the college crew made a toast to none other than "cauliflower," and the groom not only drank to it, but shouted out "cauliflower!" in appreciation of a joke he still didn't know he was the star of.

I don't know how many hours passed before someone finally told Ben his boutonniere was edible. But, I do know there are several shots of him doing the traditional Jewish hora dance while wearing it. I also know that when I became engaged to Ben's best friend, my future husband and I experienced mild anxiety, when wondering what sweet revenge Ben would brew up for our big day.

Unfortunately, cancer had other plans. Ben didn't make it to our wedding. Just 15 months after we watched Lindsay marry him, we watched her bury him.

We got a call almost a year ago from Ben as he lay on his deathbed. The ring of the cellphone woke me out of my sleep. The caller ID showed "BMuttz," Ben's college nickname. I shook my fiancé and told him who was calling. He stared at the phone and kept uttering "it must be a mistake" until it went to voice mail. Even when he saw that he got a voice message, he figured someone had Ben's phone and accidentally called him. Not until he heard Ben's weak, shaky voice did he believe his best friend was in fact placing a call and knew exactly who it was he was dialing.

He hadn't heard from Ben in weeks. Their regular turbo texting had deteriorated from sports debates and chummy chiding to nothing but cancer talk. Updates and words of encouragement, and not much in between. When he was still healthy enough to interact, Ben and my fiancé got into one of their notorious football disputes one day. It got heated. They told each other how stupid the other one was and probably made one of those threatening bets no one ever follows up on.

My fiancé came home and told me how guilty he felt for the argument. I told him no one had treated Ben like Ben for a long time and he probably appreciated the authenticity of the exchange. It takes a true, brave friend to momentarily forget his "boy" has cancer and act the same way he did before ever knowing it. Plus, I'm sure they found a new reason to call each other stupid the very next day.

That's just how they were: the Gayle and Oprah of male bonding. They met in the fourth grade. Ben marched up to the new kid on the bus and introduced himself. They played basketball and football together in high school. When they both declared themselves as future Spartans their senior year, the friendship went to a place only Felix and Oscar, Thelma and Louise or man and dog know about.

The first thing Ben said when my fiancé called him back that night, one week before he died, was what an amazing friend he had been over the years. The second thing he told him was how sorry he was that he wouldn't make it to our wedding. My husband made a trip to Michigan two days before Ben died, to say goodbye. Ever the jokester, as soon as he realized his best friend was in the room, Ben mustered up the energy to greet him: "Let's party."

When my sister and wedding planner, Xochitl, suggested we make my groom's boutonniere a cauliflower, I couldn't think of a better way to honor Ben -- and to help him get the last laugh, of course. We saved it as a surprise for my husband, his college crew and Ben's family. His widow, Lindsay, cousin Brad and mother, Dianne, all attended. After the ceremony, my husband asked Dianne what she thought of his boutonniere.

"I absolutely love it," she said, through a teary smile. "And," she added, "you deserve it."

Contact columnist Xazmin Garza at xgarza@reviewjournal.com or 702-383-0477.
Follow her on Twitter at @startswithanx.