I split the coasts, between Boston and Los Angeles.
I spend roughly half the year in either location, attending to both personal and business matters.
So, having had the good fortune to be invited to a colleague's wedding on the West Coast, I jumped at the opportunity to witness, firsthand, the sights and sounds of a bona fide Marina Del Rey wedding.
Los Angeles entails a massive expanse of real estate.
Everything from the San Fernando Valley to the reaches of Pasadena and south to Long Beach are fair game.
While it may not look like a terribly large cross-section of land, given the limitations of traffic, it could well take you more than two hours to drive from Santa Monica to Pasadena -- and perhaps as much as three from Malibu to Long Beach.
So, when I was presented with an elegant invitation to my colleague's wedding in Marin Del Rey, I was delighted to finally have the opportunity to see this much-vaunted beach community.
To my surprise, however, I would not have the opportunity to see much of the beach -- or the city for that matter.
Instead, I would have to settle for some breathtaking vies of the Marina.
This, of course, was because the wedding and reception were hosted on a luxury, thirty-five-foot yacht.
Though I don't consider myself a squeamish man, I am averse to motion sickness.
So, the prospect of spending an afternoon and long evening on-board a boat, albeit a yacht, was not an attractive one.
That being said, I must say, it was a phenomenal event.
What I discovered was how enrapturing a yacht wedding can be.
Being on-board had the effect of transporting me to another level of consciousness.
The food, the service, the guests -- even the ceremony itself -- were so perfectly balanced, so wonderfully considered, that I had no qualm about staying out to sea for the better part of six hours.
Time at sea, on board a yacht, happens to be time -- if not money -- well-spent.