CLEARFIELD — Laura Dickey Walker wouldn’t be the least bit sad if someone told her that her wedding ceremony was nerdy.
That was her goal from the beginning. “Nerdy” is the word she and her new husband, Calvin Walker, use to describe themselves. And that’s how her mother-in-law describes the couple.
“They are both kind of nerdy,” said Kursten Martinez. “I like it that way. It beats the alternative.”
“They wanted this to be kind of a nerdy thing,” said Cliff Dickey, father of the bride.
Laura and Calvin wed Thursday at the End Zone Hobby and Gaming Center in Clearfield because, they say, they are gaming nerds.
“I couldn’t imagine a better place for these two,” Martinez said of the wedding’s location.
The ceremony was quickly followed by the happy couple and their guests playing Dungeons & Dragons in their nerdy clothes.
“How many weddings do you get to come to where they say, ‘Wear something nerdy,’ instead of, ‘Dress up?’ ” said Martinez.
Instead of a wedding cake, the couple had cupcakes decorated to match the bride’s Mario Galaxy and Super Mario Brothers game-inspired bouquet.
The “altar” was a police box from the game Doctor Who.
The short ceremony began with the Rev. Cavan Rhodes, of the nondenominational Universal Life Church in Riverdale, repeating a line from the movie “Princess Bride”: “Marriage. Marriage is what brings us together today.”
Then he didn’t waste time.
He pronounced the two husband and wife faster than a top video gamer could change levels.
The couple’s engagement was what some might describe as whirlwind.
The groom is serving in the Navy as an information technology seaman and is stationed in Fallon, Nev.
Calvin came home on leave last week and decided he’d like to take his sweetheart home with him.
“He knocked on our door Saturday and said, ‘I’m home. We’re going to get married on Thursday,’ ” Martinez said.
Laura said she agreed right away but told her sweetheart she wouldn’t marry him until he formally proposed.
The two went to an arcade on a date and then to Clark Planetarium, where he asked her to marry him at a moon exhibit.
“I was over the moon with happiness,” Laura said.
The new bride will be moving as soon as the couple can work out military housing benefits.
The two dated all through high school, their parents said. They graduated in 2010 from Clearfield High School.
“We’ve been dating for four years,” Laura said. “I’m happy to finally be married to him.”
Martinez said she has already accepted her daughter-in-law as part of the family. “It’s like they’ve been married forever already.”
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