The year was 2001, and my best friend was getting married. The ceremony was being held in a small brick building somewhere in the middle of suburban hell. My best friend looked radiant in her elegant white wedding gown, of course. So why did I show up to her wedding dressed all in black, carrying a machete? No, I was not dressed as a ninja – think of something more like a Victorian era funeral outfit. Complete with black face netting attached to my hat. I realize that Victorian era funeral-goers rarely carried machetes. But I was. I look back on that day and I realize, how much more classy it would have been, had I been carrying a decorative sword from wildweapons.com rather than a rusty $5 machete from the local army surplus.But no, I showed up to my best friend’s wedding with a machete dressed in funeral garb because she was marrying a tool and I knew it.Well, truth to be told it was two machetes, but they were both still old and stained and crappy. At the time, (yes, in a way this was before the internet – or at the very least, it was before internet retail) swords were incredibly expensive and the only way to get one was at the mall – at an overpriced cutlery store. Unfortunately, as a struggling college student, decorative swords were way out of my price range. If I’d had the means, I would’ve brought something far nicer, and I probably wouldn’t have bought used either.In spite of this I was still warmly welcomed at the ceremony by my friend, and by our friends…not by her new husband, though, he never liked me strangely enough. It must’ve been that whole incident with the tying him to the chair and interrogating him under a 300-watt lamp – an incident that again involved the two machetes. Oddly enough, it was another incident that would’ve been greatly accentuated by a decorative sword. But that was college.I had missed the ring ceremony – which was unfortunate, because I was supposed to be a bridesmaid, but was just in time for the cake. I had been waylaid by a Herculean effort to find my misplaced machetes – a problem that would’ve been alleviated had I owned either some form of scabbard, or perhaps even a wall mount. But alas, one of the machetes was inelegantly consigned to the back of my closet, and the other was under my bed.At any rate, I turned over my machete, both of them actually, to the groomsmen, who hammed it up for the camera, and anyone watching. But, then they, in turn, handed them over to the groom. Not the best idea, considering how little he cared for me. But, he and my friend did end up cutting the wedding cake with the machete – much to everyone’s delight. It was a fantastic photo op. Memorable. My friend still talks about it to this day.But, again, it would’ve been far more pleasant had the machete been a stainless steel decorative sword, and not completely covered in rust.As for cutting your own wedding cake with a sword – I recommend planning ahead. Buy your sword far in advance of the ceremony…why not today? That way, you can be sure to have the best experience and all the blade you need for your special day!