Creating Ceremony Together

Summer! High season for weddings, especially in Vermont. Here are three examples of summer weddings I officiated, each memorable and very different from each other.

Emily and Walter were married at home. All summer they worked to create a back yard sanctuary for the ceremony. On The Day, thunderstorms threatened, so Walter hung a huge canopy between the roof of the house and the trees opposite. He inherited the canopy from his father, who passed on years ago. It was a beautiful and practical way for his dad to be present with us that day.

Their ceremony reflected her Jewish heritage and their Buddhist values. After unity rituals with her parents and their five young adult children, the rings were passed to be blessed by all present. Then all thirty guests circled around our bride and groom as they clasped hands. I laid six feet of ribbon over their wrists and read the opening words of their hand fasting: 

Emily and Walter choose each other 

wholeheartedly and unconditionally.  

KABOOM! A huge thunder clap, right over our heads, shook the canopy! We all hollered in awe and cuddled even closer. The rain poured down on the canopy as they joyfully shouted their vows together, at the top of their lungs. As Walter would say, it was EPIC. An equally epic dinner followed, with everyone at one long table.  A truly over-the-top wedding none of us will ever forget.

Earlier that summer, I officiated a ceremony in a fairy tale setting. The bride, an art teacher, could have graced a Vogue cover. She and her groom created the ceremony space at their ski house, in a grove of trees overlooking a pond with seating for 150 guests using simple white washed barn boards on birch tree logs. I love what they chose for me to read before they asked for their parents' blessings:

Today’s wedding is a celebration of family. 
Our bride and groom especially want to thank their parents -- not just for today, but for being there for them so many times in the past.  
They learned how to love because they were raised in loving homes.
They feel secure and confident in their love because their parents allowed them to be independent.
Their parents are their support and have shown them by example what a happy marriage can be.

An intimate ceremony between an older couple, in a sweet cabin deep in the woods. Ahhhh.

This bride and groom spent as much time and care working with me to create a meaningful ceremony as other couples do planning large weddings .... even though, on their wedding day, I would be their only witness.

Their ceremony was tender, deeply honest, and full of joy. We all shed tears, humbled by the love each expressed for the other.

I am honored to have this calling and the skill to support all the special ways couples share their love with each other.