NO GROOM? NO PROBLEM! When Bridget Devaney’s fiancé suffered a medical emergency and their planned elopement, and then the relationship, fell apart, she didn’t quietly close the chapter. She went online and invited strangers to come celebrate the wedding that never happened, BBC News NI reports.
The nudge came in April, when a photographer emailed to check on her postponed wedding plans. A friend suggested advertising a women-only group trip on her anonymous social media profile. Hundreds of inquiries poured in. “When these women signed up for this trip, they didn’t know my name. They didn’t know what I looked like,” said Bridget, who splits her time between the US and Killarney in the Republic of Ireland.
In the end, 11 strangers from the US, Canada and Wales signed on. Janae Pettit, a design consultant from Utah, spotted the post on 1 April and figured it was a prank. “It was April Fool’s Day, but Bridget was like, ‘this is not a joke!’” Shana Johnson of Minnesota signed up before she’d even cleared it with her partner. “It was kind of like we were all long-lost friends,” she said.
Earlier this month the group spent a week on the north coast, hitting the Giant’s Causeway, the Dark Hedges and Londonderry, and capping it with a “non-wedding day” photoshoot. Photographer Rob Dight of Epic Love Photography, who had extended Bridget’s deposit after her fiancé was injured, was “blown away” to learn mid-shoot that the women had met just three days earlier. “It was kind of a ‘jaw-on-the-floor scenario’… It was just so wholesome,” he said.
The group chat is still going, and more trips are in the works. Bridget’s takeaway: “There is community if you want to find it… You just have to keep trying.”
Featured image: AI-generated editorial illustration by Bugle Blast.
Source: BBC News NI
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