Margaritas, Laughter and a Wilton Facebook Group Make a Couple’s Unconventional Wedding Joyous

What’s the secret to a good marriage? Ask Wilton residents Michael Allegretto and Melissa Crowther and they may tell you sponteneity, a great sense of humor, kindness and being open to surprises.

At least that’s what their wedding was all about when it took place just last night at Cactus Rose in Wilton Center. It was officiated by Dan Berg, another Wilton resident who until Tuesday evening had never met the couple in person but who had jumped at the chance to get ordained — online — just for the occassion. He did so after Michael posted just last Thursday in the Facebook group “Wilton Righteous Indignation” asking for someone to do the honors.

Wilton Righteous Indignation, or WRI the group calls itself, is a private Facebook group dedicated to an irreverent take on everyday things that people in Wilton complain about online.

“It’s using humor sometimes to say, maybe it’s not quite as bad as you think it is,” said Andy Schlesinger, who started WRI eight years ago when his tongue-in-cheek comments on some well-meaning but (to put it gently) inane or anxious posts on Wilton 411 needed to find a home of their own. Since creating the group, over 1,500 Wilton residents have joined WRI to try to bring a little levity to looking at life in Wilton.

“I don’t let people be mean. But sometimes sarcasm and humor can be a good way to just set people’s minds in a different framework. Like, the fact that the bread you just bought was a little stale or was two days over expiration date — you probably don’t need to post that on Wilton 411. You’re gonna be okay. You’re gonna be okay,” Schlesigner said as an example. “For a lot of people it really resonates. I can’t tell you how many people come up to me and say WRI is awesome because it hopefully puts things in perspective.”

For Michael and Melissa, WRI actually played a part in their Wilton life together. But that’s jumping ahead of the story…

Just like a Rom-Com

Michael and Melissa both grew up in Seymour, CT, and have known one another since middle school. They remember sitting next to one another in computer science in high school.

“I was a huge nerd in high school, and she was the head cheerleader and Prom Queen and everything else. And she was always super nice to me,” Michael recalled, “but we were just friends.”

They wound up keeping in touch through college and beyond, seeing one another when old high school friends got together, or crossing paths after they both started working for CT hedge funds. They even attended as guests at each other’s first weddings.

But by 2020, both Michael and Melissa had gotten divorced from their respective spouses. Melissa was living in Wilton with her two sons, and Michael was in Vermont with his son and daughter.

Early in 2021, Melissa, who typically didn’t share much on social media, made a post about her health that caught Michael’s attention.

“I was diagnosed with breast cancer — early stage and it’s fine now — but for all of 2020 I went through treatment,” Melissa explained.

“I had no idea you were sick, because you didn’t really share it publicly. And you were at the hospital getting your last chemo or far along in your treatment, and you posted something,” Michael continued. “So then I checked in on you, like, ‘Hey, I didn’t know you were sick.’ And then I learned… divorced.”

Michael was headed back to Connecticut to visit with family, and he suggested they get together to catch up. They planned to meet for dinner … at Cactus Rose.

“If you had just asked to have drinks, I wouldn’t have thought it was a date but he made a flirty comment in his message,” Melissa recalled as they both laughed.

“I said, ‘Do you want to do that thing and fall in love 20 years later after knowing each other for so long, or does that only happens in the movies?'” Michael said. “And then she hearted it.”

First Comes Love, Then Comes Marriage

By January 2023 the couple had gotten engaged and Michael had moved to Wilton. One of the first things Melissa did was introduce him to Wilton Righteous Indignation.

“When Mike moved in with me I told him about the group, I said, ‘This is so up your alley, this is hilarious!'” Melissa said.

So how did WRI become a key part of their wedding?

At this point in their lives, with so many friends (going back to high school), coworkers, aquaintances, and families, they’d have to throw a really big inclusive event to include everyone. Their four children, who range in age from six to 12, already consider their family blended as brothers and sister, and didn’t really care one way or another.

So Melissa and Michael decided to do something just by themselves.

The couple had originally hoped to get married on their upcoming vacation in Grenada in a few weeks. And while their resort offers a wedding package, they couldn’t organize things fast enough to arrange an official ceremony there. Nor would the resort allow them to have the wedding package and a “ceremony” — unless they could bring a marriage certificate that showed they were already married.

“So we figured well, let’s just do something fun beforehand, and then we’ll do the ‘ceremony’ there,” Melissa said.

Michael started planning to get them officially married before the trip. “When you go to Town Hall when you apply for a marriage license, they give you a list of justices of the peace. I’m like, that’s boring as heck, I’m not going to do that. So I said to Melissa, ‘Why don’t I just post it on WRI and see.'”

“Mike is full of surprises, which is part of what I love about him. I never know what’s coming and I like it because it’s usually entertaining,” Melissa laughed.

The post read, in part:

“Are any of you a justice of the peace or otherwise able to marry people? Could we just use the list provided by the town hall? Absolutely. Would getting married by a random person in our favorite Facebook group make for a better story? Yes, yes it would. No ceremony, no guests, no religious nonsense — we just need someone to say the thing and sign the marriage license. … Let’s make a weird memory. So, what say you?”

Almost immediately Dan Berg responded with a resounding ‘Yes!’ saying he’d always wanted to get ordained. In literally a matter of just minutes, he was set as an ordained minister of the Universal Life Church.

“I Googled it, I went to the site. The process of getting ordained is: fill in your full legal name, fill in your address, fill in your email. Click here. The next page comes up and says ‘Congratulations!'” Dan said.

While there were a few other administrative details to take care of, Dan could now preside over Michael and Melissa’s wedding. So they set the date for Tuesday evening.

Margaritas, Guacamole and ‘I Dos’

The wedding went off without a fuss or a big production. Seated around a table for five at Cactus Rose, with some Diablo guacamole, chips, and margaritas to celebrate, Michael and Melissa recounted their love story for Dan, Andy Schlesinger and a GOOD Morning Wilton writer. And then it was time. Dan had come up with some memorable mementos to make the ceremony sweetly personal and funny and characteristically irreverent in true WRI style.

Then, very simply, after asking the couple to solemnly swear their vows, he declared the couple married. “By the power vested in me, by the Universal Life Church and the State of Connecticut, I’m delighted and honored to pronounce you husband and wife.”