SHELBY, N.C. — Most people who plan a springtime wedding in North Carolina worry about rain or maybe an unusually warm day.
If it happens, all you can really do is smile and laugh and move on. What you don’t expect is something to happen that would cause you to cancel the wedding before it even begins.
“You can’t make these odds up, that our wedding would be postponed by a worldwide pandemic,” said Will Gamble.
In 2018, Will Gamble and Carrie Hamrick got engaged. The next year, they settled on a date for this coming May to have their wedding.
“I already had the colors picked out and everything,” said Hamrick.
When the virus hit, at first, they thought they may be able to still get married on their original date.
But as it kept getting worse, the couple quickly realized they had to postpone the big day.
“We realized we couldn’t do it, and we also wanted to enjoy everything in between now and then, too,” said Hamrick.
The couple sent out postponement announcements and spent a few days calling the venue and vendors to notify them.
"This came out of nowhere, so we had to pivot and make new plans. May was our ideal date. Now, we are going to have a great time in September,” said Hamrick.
There really is no silver lining to canceling a wedding, but the couple was fortunate to get a date in September when the venue and all their vendors are still available.
“We got lucky stars aligned,” said Gamble.
Their story is not unusual as dozens of couples across the state are making the same difficult decision to postpone a day they had their hearts set on probably six or more months ago.
“We will make the best of it,” said Hamrick.