Real Wedding: Lindsay & Michael
Lindsay Tarasuk wasn’t in the habit of sneaking into the boys’ dormitory, but she had to make an exception for Michael Aroesty. With 570 snoopy students and 120 curious faculty members around, the occasional “teachers’ conference” was sometimes their only opportunity to spend time together.
That’s what happens when two employees at a small-town boarding school fall in love. Michael, who’d had a crush on Lindsay for some time, had just about given up hope of meeting the girl of his dreams in tiny Watertown, Connecticut, and was starting to think about making a career move to a place with more single women when Lindsay finally accepted his invitation to join the faculty-student softball team Michael helmed. Michael’s silly game reports made Lindsay laugh, and when he invited her to play squash with him one afternoon, the game turned into cocktails, which turned into dinner, which—ultimately—turned into true love.
Lindsay and Michael had been dating for a year when Michael worked up the nerve to ask Lindsay’s dad for her hand in marriage during a round of golf. (He didn’t manage to come out with the question until the 13th hole.) With Dr. Tarasuk’s happy approval, Michael lured Lindsay to New York City for the day with promises of terrific tickets to the impossibly sold-out musical Wicked. Before the show, he suggested that they take a stroll through Central Park together and have a romantic lunch at the Boathouse Restaurant. Lindsay was worried about missing the curtain for the show when Michael made the apparently spontaneous decision to take a rowboat out on the lake. When they reached a particularly picturesque location, Michael asked Lindsay to snap a photo. When she looked away from the camera, he was down on one knee. Back on shore, glowing with happiness, Lindsay found both their families inside the Boathouse waiting to celebrate the engagement.
Lindsay had grown up skiing at Okemo Mountain in Ludlow, Vermont, and from the time she was a little girl, she knew that Vermont was the place where she wanted to get married. Luckily, Michael fell in love with Vermont, too, after he and Lindsay started dating, and they agreed that the Equinox Resort in Manchester was the perfect spot for their special day.
Lindsay also incorporated family tradition for her wedding in another way. Though she chose a dress herself, she had a piece of her mother’s wedding gown sewn into the dress she’d selected.
The wedding day itself was as perfect as Lindsay and Michael had hoped—despite a deluge of rain that exploded during the ceremony. “While I was saying my vows at the altar, I heard a clap of thunder and the rain beating down on the church roof,” Lindsay says. But the weather didn’t dampen the festive mood one bit. The Equinox team waited on the church steps with huge umbrellas to guide the guests to the reception, and Lindsay and Michael basically ignored the downpour.
“There was absolutely nothing we could do about it, so I just went along with it and pretended it wasn’t even there,” says Lindsay. “All the pictures with our wedding party are under umbrellas, and they are still adorable!”
Everything else went seamlessly, thanks in part to the wedding professionals who kept things running smoothly. Tara Pollio’s flower arrangements were so gorgeous that “guests are still talking about them,” Lindsay says.
Most important, Lindsay and Michael enjoyed every minute of their wedding. “Have fun!” Lindsay urges other brides. “And don’t let anyone pull you off the dance floor. It’s the best part!”
Photography by Natural Expressions