clean toes

I don't normally bother to read the Times' wedding announcements, which tend to put an excessive emphasis on the resumés of the participants, some good number of whom are generally employed in finance. Hey, look, thirty-five year olds from Goldman Sachs are getting married, and they all have houses in Nantucket.

The photo for the wedding of Pia Awal and Tim Dutta caught my eye, though; the picture was of a Hindu ceremony. Things got weird very fast:

They had a lot in common. Both grew up in Hindu families - Mr. Dutta in New Jersey, Ms. Awal in Manhattan - and both believed in destiny, karma, reincarnation and in judging people by the condition of their feet. "My aunt always said, 'A woman with clean toes is a woman who's well-rounded, well-mannered and well-presented,'" he said.

Then, Ms. Awal gets leukemia. In the end of the article, the bride says that in a previous life, she and her new husband were "cats who knew each other."

I think it would be great if people had to be interesting, rather than blue-blooded, to get their announcements in the Times. We'd see more "the bride wore neon and the guests danced to a punk klezmer band."