A Healthy Marriage - REALLY?
These past few days yet another politician is publically apologizing for marital infidelity. Yikes! Between media coverage of celebrity marriages, divorces, and all the associated drama, and the many other images of struggling marriages in film and on TV, it would be easy to get the idea that real, live, healthy marriages don’t actually exist. Well, rumor has it, they do!
Recently I met with an engaged couple at a local coffee venue to talk about their wedding ceremony, as I do so often at the beginning of a collaboration with a bride and groom. In our conversation we covered a lot of territory. I took copious notes and after we had finished they left, only to turn around in the parking lot and promptly return. Oh, yeah, they said, “We want to include an acknowledgement and expression of gratitude to our parents for modeling what healthy marriages looks like.”
How cool is that? Not only that both sets of parents have been able to model healthy relationships for their children, but that their children, who are now adults planning to be married, recognize the powerful influence that their parents have been in their ability to choose marriage with confidence. "We can definitely work that into the ceremony!", I told them.
Meanwhile, do you think we could get some media coverage? I suppose there’s always YouTube…
The Gift of Waiting
Wow, a lot of us are in a hurry these days! We rush from here to there and from there to someplace else, multi-tasking as we go along, hardly stopping to take a breath. A brief but important episode at Leah and Kyle’s recent wedding served to remind me of the value and gift of slowing down and, yes, waiting!
I was standing with Kyle as Leah and her father approached, walking down a beautiful long path through Rau Garden in St. Charles. Pachelbel’s Canon was being played by the musicians. When Leah and her dad arrived at the front, the musical piece was only about half finished. I recalled that we had briefly discussed this possibility at the rehearsal. At that time the bride and groom had agreed that the music should just run its course; they would be in no hurry.
And, so, here we were, waiting, waiting, and waiting for the music to end. Awkward giggles, sweat, sideways glances, and a few tears were shed. Although a little uncomfortable, this waiting, it also provided an opportunity for the wedding ceremony’s participants to soak in the moment, THIS MOMENT, and to be a little more aware of the momentous shift that was taking place in their own lives and in the lives of one another. Come to think of it, isn't that one of the purposes of a ceremony in the first place?
When the music ended and Leah released her father’s arm to take Kyle’s hand, the symbolic moment of moving from one way of being as single people, to a new way of being as a married couple, was very likely more deeply appreciated because we had been required to wait for it. And it was definitely worth the wait!
Home Is Where the Heart Is
As a child growing up in the days before VCRs, DVD players, and cable TV, I looked forward to the yearly opportunity to watch The Wizard of Oz when it was broadcast on network television. Besides the fact that the tornado footage frightened me even more than the witch and her flying monkeys, I always got completely caught up in Dorothy’s adventures as she and her friends followed that yellow brick road.
Near the end of the story, Dorothy is sent back from Oz to Kansas after she closes her eyes and repeats, “There’s no place like home. There’s no place like home.” When she awakens in her bedroom surrounded by her family, one of the lessons Dorothy says she has learned is that if she ever wants to go looking for her heart’s desire, she will look no further than her own backyard. As a child I never knew what she meant by that. Recently, though, I thought of Dorothy, her heart’s desire, and of what we can find in our own backyards. And then I thought of Katie and Jered’s wedding.
This past weekend, I officiated at a wedding ceremony for Katie and Jered. During the months in which we discussed their ceremony script, there were many things I learned to enjoy about them as a couple. But one of the loveliest things about the ceremony itself was the significance of the location.
Katie and Jered had decided early on in their planning that they wanted to have their wedding ceremony in the backyard of her parents’ home, which used to be her grandparents’ home. They decided to do this, at least in part because this is the same backyard where, thirty-three years ago this month, Katie’s parents Bob and Maggie were married.
At wedding ceremonies we celebrate, among other things, that two people have found someone with whom they can share their hearts and make a home. Of course, Katie and Jered and Bob and Maggie did not find their heart’s desire in that backyard, but it was there that they celebrated the treasure, the desire of their hearts, found in one another. What a fabulous reminder that our love for one another is truly sacred, right in the midst of our everyday lives, even in our own backyards.
Just An Old-Fashioned Love Song?
It seems that everyone has an opinion to offer regarding wedding songs. While listening to National Public Radio this afternoon, I heard listeners invited to submit stories about inappropriate songs heard at weddings. When I visited the blog, it turns out that they are interested in your favorite wedding party songs, as well.Join in the fun at http://www.npr.org/blogs/allsongs/2009/05/top_ten_wedding_party_songs_1.html
