Commitment Ceremony
Jul. 4th, 2015 05:59 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
stormdogDanae and I had a formal commitment ceremony yesterday!
I haven't actually written about this yet for a couple reasons. We wanted it to be a small event, primarily for people who've known both of us in a significant way. I didn't want people who weren't invited to feel at all left out. We want to have a larger, more professional, and more inclusive event later on, but timing and, perhaps more importantly, finances prevented that. Wedding-like events can be expensive!
And because I'm leaving for Syracuse, New York in a month's time, organizing something really big for the Summer would also not have been doable in the time frame we had after deciding we wanted to do this. Our little twenty-fivish person event was about as big as we felt we could handle right now.
We've spent the last couple of months, off and on, working on the ceremony. We essentially wrote it ourselves from scratch, incorporating elements of various traditions that were meaningful to us or connected to our cultural backgrounds, as well as working with the limitations imposed by logitics. (We're going to have the ceremony at 6:30 and then have dinner! Oh, we can't pick food up later than 6 from the caterer? Well, I guess we're doing dinner first!) This has been occupying a large part of my attention for the past while, increasingly so as the date of the event approached.
Everything went beautifully. There were, inevitably, minor snags. We forgot the plates at the condo when we left, for instance. Our friend Sneha saved the day by going out and buying some while dinner was being set up. But I can hardly think of anything else that went wrong.
Independance and considered choice are powerful themes in the conception Danae and I have of relationships. Many of the choices we made in designing our ceremony reflected that. I'm going to write about particular bits of the ceremony in a somewhat disconnected way because I feel a need to record them before they're out of my head. I'm sorry if they lose something for want of context. Please feel free to ask about anything you find interesting or confusing. I loved the ceremony and would enjoy talking about it, plus questions often bring up forgotten or overlooked details. We don't have a video recording of the ceremony, which I feel torn about. I think I really would have liked one, but there's also beauty in the ephemeral nature of the unrecorded. It makes the event feel a little more traditional, connected to so many such events in the past that happened before the ability to record them.
Maybe I'll begin with the text of the program we gave to attendees. That will give you a good sense of how things happened and where the bits I'm going to write about fit in.
More behind
---PROGRAM---
*Welcome
*Something Sweet
Symbolic of sweet beginnings, we hoped that feeding each other something tasty would give this celebration an auspicious start.
*Dinner
The first bell is a five minute warning. The second bell means it’s time for the ceremony!
*Puzzle
Since childhood, we have both loved jigsaw puzzles. We've spent many quiet and contemplative hours assembling puzzles together, enjoying each others’ presence. This puzzle symbolizes the way we are building our relationship through shared effort. By simultaneously placing the final two pieces before this gathering, we acknowledge the importance of hard work, cooperation, and moral support in building our futures.
After the ceremony, we will disassemble and store the puzzle. It will wait in its box until we are once again able to share a living space. When that time comes, we will joyfully reconstruct the puzzle to celebrate our reunion.
*Exchanging and Passing the Rings
Since the rings arrived, we have each carried the other’s ring; yesterday, we also took some time to separately meditate over the rings. It is our hope that in doing so, we imbued the rings with some small piece of ourselves, and that they will serve as tangible manifestations of our love. When we are apart, the rings will remind us that we are not alone -- that we are loved.
Today, before we speak our vows, we will pass these rings around the circle of our guests. When the rings reach your hands, we invite you to lend us your support and blessings in whatever manner speaks to you. It may be a silent moment of prayer, a story, one of our readings, a song, a quote, etc. We see you all as collaboratively officiating this ceremony through this ritual. When you are done, please pass the rings along.
Flowers
To open this portion of the ceremony, we invited our parents to each contribute a flower of their choosing to our bouquet. When everyone has spoken, we will contribute our own flowers, and then exchange vows.
Each flower and leaf is beautiful in its own way. When gathered together as a bouquet, a different sort of beauty arises, in which some flowers serve to enhance and support others. We believe that the love of our family supports our love for each other.
*Donning the rings
Our rings represent our choice to enter into, and remain in, our relationship. Each day, we individually make a conscious choice to be together. We both believe that the fact that we choose, again and again, to stay, is just as meaningful as more traditional vows. By placing our own rings on our own fingers, we hope to represent this choice we are making today, and expect to make for the foreseeable future.
*Ketubah
As we researched elements we could incorporate into the ceremony we each encountered similar customs from disparate sources that inspired us.
Chris appreciated aspects of weddings in the Quaker tradition, seeing some practices that seemed in line with our feelings. Quakers have no clergy as such, and ceremonies, rather than being officiated, are simply witnessed by those in attendance. As part of that practice, all present sign a wedding certificate which is hung in the married couple's home as a reminder of their connection to friends and community.
Miriam was intrigued by a couple who chose to honor their own offbeat version of the Jewish custom of the Ketubah. The traditional Ketubah is a wedding contract, beautifully calligraphed and decorated, and signed by the bride, groom, and two witnesses. The signed Ketubah is often displayed in the home as a reminder of the couple’s vows.
We decided to incorporate elements of these traditions into a document that would reflect our own beliefs and feelings about love, commitment, and fidelity. We will sign it first, and then our parents, and then we invite the remainder of our guests to affix their own signatures as witnesses and joint officiants.
-------------
The things people said as their turn came to them were so beautiful. I cry relatively easily; I spent the whole ceremony with tears occasionally rolling down my face and Danae wiping them away. We had a selection of fifteen readings or so that people could look through and choose from to read. Some people chose one of our readings. Some read one of our readings and added their own thoughts. Others read something they brought, or simply said something of their own.
Danae's mother read our selection from Gift From the Sea, adding her own thoughts about the importance of work in maintaining relationships. My mother read a children's book to us, Just Right for Two, that she'd brought from the library she works at. The more I think about the message of the book, the more I feel connected to it. After splitting up with my ex, I felt entirely content being on my own, exploring the world of Chicago, with my own metaphorical suitcase of precious things. And then I met Danae and realized that, though I my world was still my own, there was room in it for two.
My dad had asked for us to find Bleeding Hearts for the flower part of the ceremony, but we couldn't. They were out of season, and I felt bad about that because bleeding hearts were a connection to my great-grandmother, who planted them at the house in Illinois. I can remember them growing there, when I was little. He also asked for tulips, since my great-grandmother was from Holland (I didn't know that) and they connected with her. We told him that we couldn't find them and did our best with his flower; we tried to find something with an interesting shape, since bleeding hearts have such a unique shape. When he stood to talk, he looked at the flower and said that he'd never seen another flower like this, and how appropriate that was because he's never known another person like me or like Danae. That made me tear up. He spoke more about Danae and I and getting to know her too. But he ended by saying he was going to read some quotations that he expected I'd recognize. He read two lines from The Last Unicorn. Two lines that are so close to my heart. The first is a quote itself, from Cyrano de Bergerac, recited by the butterfly to the Unicorn. "Your name is a golden bell, hung in my heart. I would break my body to pieces to call you once by your name." The second was one even more appropriate to the ceremony, and one that I think of, and mentally remind myself of, on a regular basis. "There are no happy endings because nothing ends." That got a little sob out of me. I get misty-eyed just writing about it.
Miriam's father said a few words about Miriam that made me smile and think about how much I love her. About how she's one of the most stubborn people he's ever known, and how great that is. And I completely agree. She sticks to her beliefs, and it's a wonderful challenge to stand up for, and support, my beliefs when they differ from hers. I suspect that's something that comes, at least in part, from his influence in her life, and though we do disagree strongly on several things, I still enjoy talking to him about them. I feel that way about Miriam too; civil, caring, disagreement is a wonderful thing, because it's from there that progress comes.
My brother T simply said that he felt very happy to have had me in his life as someone he could look up to, and happy that Danae makes me so happy. Though I feel like he and I are really close, we have our occasional communication problems as brothers do. His direct expression of love was deeply moving, especially as we both contemplate our respective moves; I to New York, and he potentially to Seattle.
My brother J made a joke about how, since Danae and I were dressing in Elegant Gothic Lolita/Aristocrat fashion, he decided to see what the author of Lolita had to say about love. "That," he said, "was a bad idea." After the laughter stopped, he read some brief selections from Tolstoy and Dostoyevsky, which is so very much him.
Dwarf talked briefly about how long he'd known me and how very much I've changed; from a shy person, nervous about other people, to an extrovert. He talked about how good it was to see that transformation.
Lisa was there, despite being on the tail end of a horrible bout of illness. Her voice wasn't up to saying anything; that made me sad, since she's so important to me. But I'm so glad she was there regardless. Danae commissioned her to make a hairpiece for her and, as a surprise to me, a matching jabot pin so that the two of us could have beautiful, shiny, sparkly things to wear that matched. And they were all of those things. I will post pictures when I can.
Kate, my former advisor, read another of our selections: Taylor Mali's How Falling in Love is Like Owning a Dog. When I found that piece during my search for readings, I felt an instant and deep connection to it. Sadly, the version I found was missing a few of the lines in the version that link points to. I didn't know there was more of it until now, and they were all so perfect for us. But that's ok; it was beautiful. (I'm using that word a lot, I know. It fits.) She also talked about how much she believes in Danae and I, how much of an adventure we're embarking on, and how we're going to make it through everything.
My dear friend Posi put the camera down long enough to talk about Danae and I. I think there was more that made me cry, but it's so hard to remember details. I'm just so happy he could be there. It's so curious to think back on when I first met him, when he and I were both married to our ex-wives. So very many things have happened to both of us since then. Though we haven't usually managed to get together as much as I'd like, he's known me for so much of my life.
Serin and Todd, as well, are people I've known for a long time. They're getting married themselves this year, in December, and I'm so very happy for them! They've been together for something like twenty years, and o very recently they could not have been legally married at all. Other than my parents, they've been together longer than just about any couple I know. They talked of how happy Danae and I seem to make each other, and how they wish us the same experience of love and growth and togetherness that they've had. It, of course, made me cry.
Danae's friends, and mine more recently, Sneha and Matt spoke about us as a couple. Matt read a short Jim Butcher quotation about love from our selection of readings. I wish I could remember exactly what they said, but as with so much of the ceremony, I primarily remember the strong, beautiful feelings that their words elicited in me. Lissa and Sam (plus their two children), Danae's housemates when I first knew her and she was living in Aurora both talked about their experiences with us and how Danae and I have touched each other's lives. Sam and Lissa each spoke of a different side of me, seeing me in ways that were kind of contradictory yet complimentary. They said wonderfully touching things about Danae too, which I know moved her deeply. She really misses them since moving out, and we both feel bad about not having managed to see them more frequently, and their presence and words of care and affection and encouragement were so wonderful to have. And Sam and Lissa's children, one of whom was only a few months old when Danae moved in with them, both had brief benedictions to offer us.
We chose to pass our rings around the circle, serving as the indicator for whose turn it was to speak, and thus enabling them to receive a sort of blessing from each of the attendees. Once they came back to us, Danae and I each had our own words, written in private, to say to each other before we put on our rings. I'd been thinking off and on about what to say until a few days before the ceremony. I had vague ideas, but things weren't coming together. I took a bike ride up to the Chicago Botanic Gardens last week and spent a while walking through the recreated prairie and sitting on a bench looking over a lake as I worked through ideas in my mind. After an hour or so, I spent the last ten minutes scribbling on a folded-over piece of paper and I had a draft. After a few revisions, I had what I said to her in front of our community of friends.
I even managed to say it all without my voice breaking completely.
I have the notes that Danae made for herself about what wanted to say to me. I have two half poems that she started on, but decided that they didn't contain everything she wanted to say. I also have the paper that she used as a guide for what she did actually say; moving words of great meaning to both of us about how, though we will not walk each other's path, we will light each other's ways. There was more, and I am a bit sad that I don't have the text of what she said to me, as I have the text of what I said to her. But I clearly remember the way I felt as she spoke to me. Though I may not have the words, I will have those clear and powerful feelings, nestled in my heart and mind to come back to from time to time.
And then, there was cake!
----------
Several people told us that this was the most beautiful such ceremony they've ever been to, or that it was the one that they have felt the best about the future of, or that it was the only one that they have felt completely in agreement with every sentiment that was expressed. These things make me really happy. They make me feel like the people who were a part of the day really 'got' us.
I'll have pictures to share once Posi has had time to process them. I may have more to write too, but I think that covers the majority of what I want to get written down.
So many thanks to those who helped make this the magical event it was for us. And apologies to those who were not involved. In a few years, once our location is more stable and once finances allow a bigger event with more people, we want to have a much bigger event that we can share with more of our friends. Watch this space....
I haven't actually written about this yet for a couple reasons. We wanted it to be a small event, primarily for people who've known both of us in a significant way. I didn't want people who weren't invited to feel at all left out. We want to have a larger, more professional, and more inclusive event later on, but timing and, perhaps more importantly, finances prevented that. Wedding-like events can be expensive!
And because I'm leaving for Syracuse, New York in a month's time, organizing something really big for the Summer would also not have been doable in the time frame we had after deciding we wanted to do this. Our little twenty-fivish person event was about as big as we felt we could handle right now.
We've spent the last couple of months, off and on, working on the ceremony. We essentially wrote it ourselves from scratch, incorporating elements of various traditions that were meaningful to us or connected to our cultural backgrounds, as well as working with the limitations imposed by logitics. (We're going to have the ceremony at 6:30 and then have dinner! Oh, we can't pick food up later than 6 from the caterer? Well, I guess we're doing dinner first!) This has been occupying a large part of my attention for the past while, increasingly so as the date of the event approached.
Everything went beautifully. There were, inevitably, minor snags. We forgot the plates at the condo when we left, for instance. Our friend Sneha saved the day by going out and buying some while dinner was being set up. But I can hardly think of anything else that went wrong.
Independance and considered choice are powerful themes in the conception Danae and I have of relationships. Many of the choices we made in designing our ceremony reflected that. I'm going to write about particular bits of the ceremony in a somewhat disconnected way because I feel a need to record them before they're out of my head. I'm sorry if they lose something for want of context. Please feel free to ask about anything you find interesting or confusing. I loved the ceremony and would enjoy talking about it, plus questions often bring up forgotten or overlooked details. We don't have a video recording of the ceremony, which I feel torn about. I think I really would have liked one, but there's also beauty in the ephemeral nature of the unrecorded. It makes the event feel a little more traditional, connected to so many such events in the past that happened before the ability to record them.
Maybe I'll begin with the text of the program we gave to attendees. That will give you a good sense of how things happened and where the bits I'm going to write about fit in.
More behind
---PROGRAM---
*Welcome
*Something Sweet
Symbolic of sweet beginnings, we hoped that feeding each other something tasty would give this celebration an auspicious start.
*Dinner
The first bell is a five minute warning. The second bell means it’s time for the ceremony!
*Puzzle
Since childhood, we have both loved jigsaw puzzles. We've spent many quiet and contemplative hours assembling puzzles together, enjoying each others’ presence. This puzzle symbolizes the way we are building our relationship through shared effort. By simultaneously placing the final two pieces before this gathering, we acknowledge the importance of hard work, cooperation, and moral support in building our futures.
After the ceremony, we will disassemble and store the puzzle. It will wait in its box until we are once again able to share a living space. When that time comes, we will joyfully reconstruct the puzzle to celebrate our reunion.
*Exchanging and Passing the Rings
Since the rings arrived, we have each carried the other’s ring; yesterday, we also took some time to separately meditate over the rings. It is our hope that in doing so, we imbued the rings with some small piece of ourselves, and that they will serve as tangible manifestations of our love. When we are apart, the rings will remind us that we are not alone -- that we are loved.
Today, before we speak our vows, we will pass these rings around the circle of our guests. When the rings reach your hands, we invite you to lend us your support and blessings in whatever manner speaks to you. It may be a silent moment of prayer, a story, one of our readings, a song, a quote, etc. We see you all as collaboratively officiating this ceremony through this ritual. When you are done, please pass the rings along.
Flowers
To open this portion of the ceremony, we invited our parents to each contribute a flower of their choosing to our bouquet. When everyone has spoken, we will contribute our own flowers, and then exchange vows.
Each flower and leaf is beautiful in its own way. When gathered together as a bouquet, a different sort of beauty arises, in which some flowers serve to enhance and support others. We believe that the love of our family supports our love for each other.
*Donning the rings
Our rings represent our choice to enter into, and remain in, our relationship. Each day, we individually make a conscious choice to be together. We both believe that the fact that we choose, again and again, to stay, is just as meaningful as more traditional vows. By placing our own rings on our own fingers, we hope to represent this choice we are making today, and expect to make for the foreseeable future.
*Ketubah
As we researched elements we could incorporate into the ceremony we each encountered similar customs from disparate sources that inspired us.
Chris appreciated aspects of weddings in the Quaker tradition, seeing some practices that seemed in line with our feelings. Quakers have no clergy as such, and ceremonies, rather than being officiated, are simply witnessed by those in attendance. As part of that practice, all present sign a wedding certificate which is hung in the married couple's home as a reminder of their connection to friends and community.
Miriam was intrigued by a couple who chose to honor their own offbeat version of the Jewish custom of the Ketubah. The traditional Ketubah is a wedding contract, beautifully calligraphed and decorated, and signed by the bride, groom, and two witnesses. The signed Ketubah is often displayed in the home as a reminder of the couple’s vows.
We decided to incorporate elements of these traditions into a document that would reflect our own beliefs and feelings about love, commitment, and fidelity. We will sign it first, and then our parents, and then we invite the remainder of our guests to affix their own signatures as witnesses and joint officiants.
-------------
The things people said as their turn came to them were so beautiful. I cry relatively easily; I spent the whole ceremony with tears occasionally rolling down my face and Danae wiping them away. We had a selection of fifteen readings or so that people could look through and choose from to read. Some people chose one of our readings. Some read one of our readings and added their own thoughts. Others read something they brought, or simply said something of their own.
Danae's mother read our selection from Gift From the Sea, adding her own thoughts about the importance of work in maintaining relationships. My mother read a children's book to us, Just Right for Two, that she'd brought from the library she works at. The more I think about the message of the book, the more I feel connected to it. After splitting up with my ex, I felt entirely content being on my own, exploring the world of Chicago, with my own metaphorical suitcase of precious things. And then I met Danae and realized that, though I my world was still my own, there was room in it for two.
My dad had asked for us to find Bleeding Hearts for the flower part of the ceremony, but we couldn't. They were out of season, and I felt bad about that because bleeding hearts were a connection to my great-grandmother, who planted them at the house in Illinois. I can remember them growing there, when I was little. He also asked for tulips, since my great-grandmother was from Holland (I didn't know that) and they connected with her. We told him that we couldn't find them and did our best with his flower; we tried to find something with an interesting shape, since bleeding hearts have such a unique shape. When he stood to talk, he looked at the flower and said that he'd never seen another flower like this, and how appropriate that was because he's never known another person like me or like Danae. That made me tear up. He spoke more about Danae and I and getting to know her too. But he ended by saying he was going to read some quotations that he expected I'd recognize. He read two lines from The Last Unicorn. Two lines that are so close to my heart. The first is a quote itself, from Cyrano de Bergerac, recited by the butterfly to the Unicorn. "Your name is a golden bell, hung in my heart. I would break my body to pieces to call you once by your name." The second was one even more appropriate to the ceremony, and one that I think of, and mentally remind myself of, on a regular basis. "There are no happy endings because nothing ends." That got a little sob out of me. I get misty-eyed just writing about it.
Miriam's father said a few words about Miriam that made me smile and think about how much I love her. About how she's one of the most stubborn people he's ever known, and how great that is. And I completely agree. She sticks to her beliefs, and it's a wonderful challenge to stand up for, and support, my beliefs when they differ from hers. I suspect that's something that comes, at least in part, from his influence in her life, and though we do disagree strongly on several things, I still enjoy talking to him about them. I feel that way about Miriam too; civil, caring, disagreement is a wonderful thing, because it's from there that progress comes.
My brother T simply said that he felt very happy to have had me in his life as someone he could look up to, and happy that Danae makes me so happy. Though I feel like he and I are really close, we have our occasional communication problems as brothers do. His direct expression of love was deeply moving, especially as we both contemplate our respective moves; I to New York, and he potentially to Seattle.
My brother J made a joke about how, since Danae and I were dressing in Elegant Gothic Lolita/Aristocrat fashion, he decided to see what the author of Lolita had to say about love. "That," he said, "was a bad idea." After the laughter stopped, he read some brief selections from Tolstoy and Dostoyevsky, which is so very much him.
Dwarf talked briefly about how long he'd known me and how very much I've changed; from a shy person, nervous about other people, to an extrovert. He talked about how good it was to see that transformation.
Lisa was there, despite being on the tail end of a horrible bout of illness. Her voice wasn't up to saying anything; that made me sad, since she's so important to me. But I'm so glad she was there regardless. Danae commissioned her to make a hairpiece for her and, as a surprise to me, a matching jabot pin so that the two of us could have beautiful, shiny, sparkly things to wear that matched. And they were all of those things. I will post pictures when I can.
Kate, my former advisor, read another of our selections: Taylor Mali's How Falling in Love is Like Owning a Dog. When I found that piece during my search for readings, I felt an instant and deep connection to it. Sadly, the version I found was missing a few of the lines in the version that link points to. I didn't know there was more of it until now, and they were all so perfect for us. But that's ok; it was beautiful. (I'm using that word a lot, I know. It fits.) She also talked about how much she believes in Danae and I, how much of an adventure we're embarking on, and how we're going to make it through everything.
My dear friend Posi put the camera down long enough to talk about Danae and I. I think there was more that made me cry, but it's so hard to remember details. I'm just so happy he could be there. It's so curious to think back on when I first met him, when he and I were both married to our ex-wives. So very many things have happened to both of us since then. Though we haven't usually managed to get together as much as I'd like, he's known me for so much of my life.
Serin and Todd, as well, are people I've known for a long time. They're getting married themselves this year, in December, and I'm so very happy for them! They've been together for something like twenty years, and o very recently they could not have been legally married at all. Other than my parents, they've been together longer than just about any couple I know. They talked of how happy Danae and I seem to make each other, and how they wish us the same experience of love and growth and togetherness that they've had. It, of course, made me cry.
Danae's friends, and mine more recently, Sneha and Matt spoke about us as a couple. Matt read a short Jim Butcher quotation about love from our selection of readings. I wish I could remember exactly what they said, but as with so much of the ceremony, I primarily remember the strong, beautiful feelings that their words elicited in me. Lissa and Sam (plus their two children), Danae's housemates when I first knew her and she was living in Aurora both talked about their experiences with us and how Danae and I have touched each other's lives. Sam and Lissa each spoke of a different side of me, seeing me in ways that were kind of contradictory yet complimentary. They said wonderfully touching things about Danae too, which I know moved her deeply. She really misses them since moving out, and we both feel bad about not having managed to see them more frequently, and their presence and words of care and affection and encouragement were so wonderful to have. And Sam and Lissa's children, one of whom was only a few months old when Danae moved in with them, both had brief benedictions to offer us.
We chose to pass our rings around the circle, serving as the indicator for whose turn it was to speak, and thus enabling them to receive a sort of blessing from each of the attendees. Once they came back to us, Danae and I each had our own words, written in private, to say to each other before we put on our rings. I'd been thinking off and on about what to say until a few days before the ceremony. I had vague ideas, but things weren't coming together. I took a bike ride up to the Chicago Botanic Gardens last week and spent a while walking through the recreated prairie and sitting on a bench looking over a lake as I worked through ideas in my mind. After an hour or so, I spent the last ten minutes scribbling on a folded-over piece of paper and I had a draft. After a few revisions, I had what I said to her in front of our community of friends.
We've talked a lot about the meaning of this ceremony in terms of independence. We've talked of choice, uncertainty about the future, and the finite nature of life and life events. What I want to express to you now is the inverse of that; something intimately entwined with those concepts, but offering another insight into them.
My choice to be with you is an expression of hope in an uncertain world and faith in human potential. It is a statement that my feelings for you overcome preoccupation with endings. Everything ends, but my feelings for you are deep enough that I choose to commit to you for the foreseeable future in spite of that.
My first expectations about relationships were formed of social norms and fantasy faction. Everything else should be willingly sacrificed on love's altar, and soulmates will inevitably find each other and live happily ever after. Life experience impressed on me the need for, and value of, rationality with which to temper those feelings. I took a realistic approach to relationships, seeing their inherently finite nature as both unavoidable and as a critical part of their beauty.
My relationship with you combines romance with rationality and realism with wonder. Rational and romantic feelings wrap around each other in ways that perfectly reflect the way you fit into my life. I make this commitment to you cogniscent of the uncertainty of any long-term relationship; particularly one between two human beings who will be far away from each other and deeply involved with their own paths. I also make this commitment confident in the ability of our connection to, in our own small way, defy universal entropy and last long into a future that we will build together.
I even managed to say it all without my voice breaking completely.
I have the notes that Danae made for herself about what wanted to say to me. I have two half poems that she started on, but decided that they didn't contain everything she wanted to say. I also have the paper that she used as a guide for what she did actually say; moving words of great meaning to both of us about how, though we will not walk each other's path, we will light each other's ways. There was more, and I am a bit sad that I don't have the text of what she said to me, as I have the text of what I said to her. But I clearly remember the way I felt as she spoke to me. Though I may not have the words, I will have those clear and powerful feelings, nestled in my heart and mind to come back to from time to time.
And then, there was cake!
----------
Several people told us that this was the most beautiful such ceremony they've ever been to, or that it was the one that they have felt the best about the future of, or that it was the only one that they have felt completely in agreement with every sentiment that was expressed. These things make me really happy. They make me feel like the people who were a part of the day really 'got' us.
I'll have pictures to share once Posi has had time to process them. I may have more to write too, but I think that covers the majority of what I want to get written down.
So many thanks to those who helped make this the magical event it was for us. And apologies to those who were not involved. In a few years, once our location is more stable and once finances allow a bigger event with more people, we want to have a much bigger event that we can share with more of our friends. Watch this space....
