The bride walked out of the locker room and onto the pool deck wearing a tutu over her swim trunks and white water shoes. She kissed the groom — who also wore swim trunks — before the couple held hands to descend the stairs into lukewarm water. They would exit the indoor pool as husband and wife.
Three years earlier, Marlene Parsons, 78, and Edward La Rue Sr., 83, met in the same pool during water aerobics classes when they playfully splashed each other. Both their spouses had recently died, and neither one had an interest in remarrying — a condition they agreed upon when they started dating.
But things change when you fall in love. This month, they got married in the shallow end of an Illinois pool, where their scheduled water aerobics class was canceled for the wedding ceremony, as Missouri news channel KMOV first reported.
Women wore corsages on their swimsuits, and shirtless men wore ties. A lifeguard carved white foam pool noodles into the shapes of roses. Parsons and La Rue danced in the water to 1950s R&B songs — all while a man swam laps in the adjacent lane, and the scent of chlorine filled the air.
“We just told everybody in the pool: Just come and have fun with us,” Parsons told The Washington Post.
“We just don’t take life seriously,” she added. “I mean, life’s too short.”
When they met in 2022, Parsons and La Rue were still grieving their respective partners: Dale, who died in 2020 of complications from chronic obstructive pulmonary disease, and Georgia, who died in 2019 after suffering from a blood disease.
Between stretches and jumping jacks during water aerobics classes at a YMCA facility in Maryville, Illinois, La Rue got a kick out of splashing the other 30 class members. While some people didn’t appreciate it, Parsons laughed and splashed him back.
They visited a Chinese restaurant for their first date in December 2023 — the first date either had been on since their spouses died. They had similar hobbies: Cooking soup, reading and completing word-search puzzles. At water aerobics classes, they kissed when they didn’t think anyone was looking.
In March, La Rue asked Parsons to marry him. Parsons was unsure how to respond, she said, but she thought about how La Rue made her laugh again after she struggled to get out of bed following Dale’s death. A few days after La Rue’s proposal, Parsons accepted.
“We just seem to be a good fit,” Parsons said. “We both like the same things. We both like to kid each other. … It was like it was meant to be.”
A few weeks later, Alie Morgan, a senior aquatics director at the YMCA facility, jokingly suggested that Parsons and La Rue get married in the pool because they met there. She added that she could wed them; she became ordained in 2023 because she planned to officiate her son’s wedding.
Parsons and La Rue laughed, feeling no rush to get married.
But in October, Parsons recalled walking into Morgan’s office and asking “Does the offer still stand?”
“Are you serious?” Morgan, 54, recalled replying. “In the pool?”
For the Nov. 12 ceremony, a lifeguard hung foam pool noodles covered in white carnations and pink roses — the couple’s favorites — from windows before family members and friends entered the water or stood on the pool deck.
When La Rue emerged from the locker room, wearing a long-sleeve shirt featuring a tuxedo design, guests cheered. He waited at the pool stairs for Parsons, who emerged holding a bouquet to Etta James’s song “At Last.”
They read their playful vows — Parsons agreed to marry La Rue if he obeyed her — from a laminated piece of paper. A classmate wearing a swimsuit, Cindy, then handed them rings.
“I give you this ring as a symbol that I will love you and cherish you, and that I’ll let you have the remote every once in a while, and I’ll try to clean up after myself,” La Rue vowed.
Parsons followed with: “I give you this ring as a symbol that I will love you and cherish you, and that I’ll try not to nag you about spending too much time with the guys, and I may even make you dinner once in a while.”
After La Rue and Parsons kissed, La Rue dove to fetch a white and blue garter from Parsons’s right thigh that he threw to the lone single man in the pool. Parsons tossed a bouquet into the water.
Twenty-five women then threw their arms around each other to circle Parsons and La Rue as they danced to “Only You (And You Alone)” by the Platters.
At one point, Parsons took a step away from La Rue and splashed him. La Rue retaliated before they embraced.
The ceremony took about 15 minutes, finishing with plenty of time before the 10 a.m. exercise class.
While some of their friends took the class, Parsons and La Rue cut a marble sheet cake in a different room and finalized their marriage certificate. They couldn’t party too hard because they planned to celebrate their honeymoon the next day — back at the YMCA for the 9 a.m. aerobics class.
The post A widow and widower fell in love during water aerobics. They wed in the pool. appeared first on Washington Post.
