Weddings!

Like many 30-somethings I've been on the wedding circuit for a while.  Some seasons are a little hotter than others and this spring/summer was particularly "big."  Partially due to quantity (four), partially due to location (Baltimore, Portland, NYC, Portland) but mostly due to importance.  Two of the four weddings were for siblings and the NYC one was for my dearest friend in the universe.

I'll give a few highlights of each and then get to my favorite.

My bro and his bride before the ceremony

April.  Baltimore.  Brother.  I'd never met the bride!  She and my bro met last summer, got engaged in February, announced in March a date for April and then they moved to Tanzania in June.  As in East Africa Tanzania.  Big year for the guy!  The wedding was lovely, as they always are, but my favorite part of the wedding was seeing how happy my brother was.  Like a lot of little brothers he was, and is, a total booger on a reliable basis.  Like many of us flawed humans the degree of his boogerness has a direct correlation to his happiness.  Happy brother = nice brother.  Unhappy brother = jerk wad brother.  Since meeting his bride this brother has been so incredibly nice and thoughtful that I don't even recognize the boy!  Overall it was nearly a week of events morning, noon and night (hello pirate ship party!), responsibility, obligation and the inevitable family stress but was really a great week.

The groom awaiting the bride

May.  Portland.  Friend.  Ultra low key.  If it hadn't been for the enameled cast iron dutch oven we brought as a wedding present we would have ridden our bikes.  It was a simple reception/party at a cool venue near our home.  The bride and groom made almost all the food and the glasses and plates were all vintage and mismatched with 10 of this type, 8 of this other, etc from the groom's mother's extensive collection.  The food was amazing, the dancing way fun, and the bride and groom were both positively radiating happiness.

Portland brother's ceremony

July.  Portland.  Other brother.  A bewildered, overwhelmed and incredibly happy groom may have been the only sober man in the wedding party.  Yeah, it was that kind of wedding!  Rented suits collected the day of the big event were not those that had been fitted.  Bridesmaids were running to and fro with no evident intent.  No one was really sure what was supposed to happen when.  At the rehearsal dinner my Christopher barrel cooked chicken and tri-tip for 50 people.  I made five full cakes (three chocolate and two lemon) and two giant trays of marionberry crisp.  Best story of the weekend: A certain groomsman got so drunk the night of the wedding that he lost his room key, his wallet, his cell phone and his rented shoes.

Peas in a pod

And my favorite wedding...  Also July, but in NYC and a mere six days before the Portland brother's wedding.  The simple & amusing way to describe the wedding is:  Sunday 8:30am, a Jewish/Hindu wedding at a Quaker meeting house.  Shoulda made the NY Times wedding section by that alone.  It was, however, an amazing, beautiful wedding and I feel so honored that I was a witness and participant.

Beautiful beautiful Sweet Pea

Sweet Pea and her groom are extremely beautiful and wonderful souls.  The one works for the Broncs Public Defenders and the other the Criminal Justice Project.  The Quaker meeting house, with their long and consistent dedication to peace and justice, was extremely fitting.  I've mentioned to some that the ceremony was more than an hour and they shirk in horror, but the ceremony managed to blend the traditions of both cultures in a way that was very meaningful and significant.  Every moment was intentional and engaging.  A friend of ours was the officiant (a lay person but a Harvard Divinity School grad!), I read a poem, an aunt & uncle gave a Hindu blessing, brothers & a cousin brought in the chuppah, friends and family scattered in the crowd read the seven blessings, Sweet Pea's parents washed the groom's feet and the groom's father read a blessing.  It ended with an Irish blessing so all the bases were covered.  And the best part?  Five years ago I could never ever ever have imagined there would ever be another person worthy of her.  She is the most beautiful, brilliant, caring creature I know.  However, as I've gotten to know her husband I realize he radiates kindness and compassion.  Despite the clear surface differences of their flesh they are made of the same stuff and it was beautiful to witness.

Love
by Roy Croft

I love you
Not only for what you are,
But for what I am
When I am with you.

I love you,
Not only for what
You have made of yourself,
But for what
You are making of me.

I love you
For the part of me
That you bring out;
I love
For putting your hand
Into my heaped-up heart
And passing over
All the foolish, weak things
That you can't help
Dimly seeing there,
And for drawing out
Into the light
All the beautiful belongings
That no one else had looked
Quite far enough to find.

I love you because you
Are helping me to make
Of the lumber of my life
Not a tavern
But a temple.

Out of the works
Of my every day
Not a reproach
But a song.

I love you
Because you have done
More than any creed
Could have done
To make me good.
And more than any fate
Could have done
To make me happy.
You have done it
Without a touch,
Without a word,
Without a sign.

You have done it
By being yourself.