Thirteen (Today)
My middle girl, the blondie with the soft heart, spent much of today looking at old photos with me.
She's taken by all the flowers, the long dresses and especially, oh especially that veil. After all, she's the one who recently ripped it during a non-sanctioned dress up session.
She points out people she knows; Papa and Mamo, Grandpa and Grandma...that little flower girl that is now grown up, "what's her name again Mama?"
But the picture she keeps flipping back to, the one that's got her curiosity piqued is not one full of fancy or elegantly staged. It doesn't have good lighting or practiced smiles...no one's even looking at the camera.
I don't even know who took it. A cousin? A friend? Mailed to me weeks after.
"What were you writing at your wedding Mama? Were you drawing a picture?"
I look at her pointing finger and I see it. I might even remember it. And that says a lot, because I remember very little. So little. So little even seems important anymore.
Did I tell you last year the dress cost $60? Well, the material that is. The time and talent of my lovely aunt, the fact that she crafted it by her own hand...well, you can't put a price on that, can you?
I wanted it small. In the tiniest church ever that couldn't even fit Ryan's family but at least would make for cute pictures. I gave in to the more convenient location and to this day I couldn't care less about the basketball nets in the reception or the shadowed pictures in the candlelit sanctuary. What I'm thankful for most is that all of you were there. Some of you I didn't even know until years later. But you were there that day. I don't remember if I talked to you or had a moment to say thank you, but I am. So very thankful.
Those girls that carried the lanterns, they nearly burnt their hands holding those through the entire ceremony...but I think they would've done it for me anyway.
And one other thing I remember is that at one point, mid-ceremony, I thought to myself, "enjoy this moment, cherish it...don't forget this moment!"
It was then that I let go of his sweaty palms and we walked to that little table. I sat down I guess and I picked up the pen and I wrote at my wedding.
And somewhere in that sanctuary a camera must have flashed.
Oh that? That is when I sat down and signed my name on a piece of paper that said I promised to be married to your Daddy forever my whole life. That is the moment our family happened. The moment a covenant was cut. You know what? That just might be the most important picture in this whole book...because that covenant, that promise we made to God? That is what holds our team together. See, those flowers are all shrivelled and brown in a shoebox somewhere downstairs, and that pretty dress is covered in soot from the sparklers, and the veil?...well, we know what happened to the veil...
And I get it. The candles are long thrown away, programs packed in a box, lights and tulle and that trellis all given away. The pictures? Even those pictures mean so little. While it's good to remember and celebrate, the majority of them capture the same shot: two people totally uncomfortable with getting their picture taken, let alone getting all fancied up under some false notion that this day is all about them.
But that paper we're signing. That promise? That covenant cut? God did that. He. Made. It. Forever. It will not shrivel, it does not end and even the toughest little hands cannot tear it apart, although my dear, you try your hardest at times. And that moment right there in that picture is what makes today so amazing.
That moment is the soil that this family is rooted in.
I still maintain that the worst part of that day was all the picture taking. But here in this moment, in this today with this tribe of mine, living our crazy life, following after our chief as he follows after The Chief...? I'm really thankful that someone took this shadowy picture.
We slide it out of the album and tack it to the fridge with a big orange fish magnet.
And if the worst part of that day was the picture taking...then the best part of that day has to be Today.
The Today that exists by the Grace of God...because of something significant that happened when I sat down and wrote at my wedding.
Thirteen years ago today.
She's taken by all the flowers, the long dresses and especially, oh especially that veil. After all, she's the one who recently ripped it during a non-sanctioned dress up session.
She points out people she knows; Papa and Mamo, Grandpa and Grandma...that little flower girl that is now grown up, "what's her name again Mama?"
But the picture she keeps flipping back to, the one that's got her curiosity piqued is not one full of fancy or elegantly staged. It doesn't have good lighting or practiced smiles...no one's even looking at the camera.
I don't even know who took it. A cousin? A friend? Mailed to me weeks after.
"What were you writing at your wedding Mama? Were you drawing a picture?"
I look at her pointing finger and I see it. I might even remember it. And that says a lot, because I remember very little. So little. So little even seems important anymore.
Did I tell you last year the dress cost $60? Well, the material that is. The time and talent of my lovely aunt, the fact that she crafted it by her own hand...well, you can't put a price on that, can you?
I wanted it small. In the tiniest church ever that couldn't even fit Ryan's family but at least would make for cute pictures. I gave in to the more convenient location and to this day I couldn't care less about the basketball nets in the reception or the shadowed pictures in the candlelit sanctuary. What I'm thankful for most is that all of you were there. Some of you I didn't even know until years later. But you were there that day. I don't remember if I talked to you or had a moment to say thank you, but I am. So very thankful.
Those girls that carried the lanterns, they nearly burnt their hands holding those through the entire ceremony...but I think they would've done it for me anyway.
And one other thing I remember is that at one point, mid-ceremony, I thought to myself, "enjoy this moment, cherish it...don't forget this moment!"
It was then that I let go of his sweaty palms and we walked to that little table. I sat down I guess and I picked up the pen and I wrote at my wedding.
And somewhere in that sanctuary a camera must have flashed.
Oh that? That is when I sat down and signed my name on a piece of paper that said I promised to be married to your Daddy forever my whole life. That is the moment our family happened. The moment a covenant was cut. You know what? That just might be the most important picture in this whole book...because that covenant, that promise we made to God? That is what holds our team together. See, those flowers are all shrivelled and brown in a shoebox somewhere downstairs, and that pretty dress is covered in soot from the sparklers, and the veil?...well, we know what happened to the veil...
And I get it. The candles are long thrown away, programs packed in a box, lights and tulle and that trellis all given away. The pictures? Even those pictures mean so little. While it's good to remember and celebrate, the majority of them capture the same shot: two people totally uncomfortable with getting their picture taken, let alone getting all fancied up under some false notion that this day is all about them.
But that paper we're signing. That promise? That covenant cut? God did that. He. Made. It. Forever. It will not shrivel, it does not end and even the toughest little hands cannot tear it apart, although my dear, you try your hardest at times. And that moment right there in that picture is what makes today so amazing.
That moment is the soil that this family is rooted in.
I still maintain that the worst part of that day was all the picture taking. But here in this moment, in this today with this tribe of mine, living our crazy life, following after our chief as he follows after The Chief...? I'm really thankful that someone took this shadowy picture.
We slide it out of the album and tack it to the fridge with a big orange fish magnet.
And if the worst part of that day was the picture taking...then the best part of that day has to be Today.
The Today that exists by the Grace of God...because of something significant that happened when I sat down and wrote at my wedding.
Thirteen years ago today.
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