Observations that dive deep into life and come up with treasures for all

E-mail to one of last year’s brides: Just remember this, having been married to the same woman three times (once was a renewal), that a rich marriage is like a wedding cake. You start out on the bottom (physical layer) and work your way up to the peak where the little couple stands. The way to get through each layer, which is the physical, mental, and then finally, the spiritual layer, is to understand marriage as a spiral staircase upward. When you come to the ceiling of the first layer, you will recognize it through the stress discovered in the marriage. You begin to feel trapped or not able to be your true self. You want to grow.

Many people never get past this first layer because they assume that it is the other who is creating the stress and suffering. So they leave looking for another who will not cause any suffering. They rarely find one because the stress and suffering is always rooted in each of us. So the way to get through the layers is to understand that marriage is the place in which to transform ourselves, and in that inner transformation, the stress and suffering disappear without effort. You’ll start singing: “We’re moving on up.” Remember that TV show?

I have gone through all layers in my marriage, and now I can look back as if the first marriage was made by two entirely different people. “Who was that guy,” I wonder. So, Heidi, you and your husband just eat your way up through that cake….With this understanding even the stress and suffering that are bound to come as you grow will taste sweet. Bon appetit.

Posted under General Observations, weddings

Yesterday’s wedding was so perfect. The earth came prepared with perfect blue sky and powdered clouds and a gentle breeze to cool the sun drenched air. The church filled with beautiful people, family and friends, who had all come to celebrate this wedding, this perfect moment where in the deepest level of our existence, even time stands still to open it’s mouth and say silently, “Oh..so perfect. I can’t even move.”

And yet, this story, this wedding which is every woman’s story from her earliest memories–her wedding and how perfect it will be–was not for this bride, perfect. The cake was falling. The bride heard reports that great efforts were being make to shore up the leaning tower, and she even cried before her wedding in fear that her story would not be perfect.

But the perfect ceremony happened, despite cake falling, and the church grew as still as a mouse watching a mouse hole, and the eternal vows were made, and time was there too, but being very quiet and standing to the side, maybe thinking about that cake, but not letting it disturb eternity who was now in control.

At the reception, ah, the cake was there, even worse then before, and the bride, standing in front of her beautiful house that her parents had made perfect for her wedding, said in despair as the bridesmaids couldn’t get the bustle fixed, “Oh, nothing is going right.” Her story was finished. But, even here time had no dominion, because she laughed, and her laugh was perfect.

So the cake fell. All the cooks and mothers couldn’t put it back together again. But inside the cake, inside the story, oh, it was so delicious. Just perfect. Then the bride and her groom, who fit her story perfectly, cut the cake and fed each other perfectly, and then the music started, and everyone danced, perfectly.

And now the story, the story that had included the perfect cake, began not to matter so much anymore. The wedding was perfect, anyway. And now the bride danced. but she didn’t just dance, she danced perfectly. She was so there, that time couldn’t get on the dance floor. She was so there in her prefect wedding that only eternity could dance with her.

She had not let her story, her fallen cake story, write her wedding, ruin her wedding. Her wedding was real. Her wedding was more than a story. Her wedding was….not the story she imagined. It was even better, because it was perfect.

This was not a story book wedding….Thank God. And He was there too. I saw Him dancing.

Posted under up lifting, weddings

Everyone needs to be foolish, at least once a day. Without foolishness the pain would take over the world. Without foolishness the knots would never be untied. Without foolishness the serious would destroy the world. The choice is obvious to all but the unfoolish: be foolish or be mad.

These thoughts came to me while looking at this picture of some foolish guests at last Friday’s wedding who were singing into broccoli microphones.

Posted under up lifting, weddings

We can make a wedding happen, but love won’t come in unless it’s invited. We can plan the day and execute it perfectly, but the BrideGroom won’t be there unless there is a space that is unplanned. We can make the perfect cake and flower arrangement, but the wedding feast will not be bring fulfillment unless there is the absence of control.

Sometimes, as with this weekend’s wedding in Williamsburg, serious illness in a family member can make this space for love to happen. The threat of death, the possibility of loss, and the build up of a pain-body inside can bring a state of powerless to the mind when it is faced with something that is beyond control. With the loss of control and its acceptance comes surrender, and with surrender comes new possibilities. This is what happened to Bill Bailey, father of the bride, and husband of his beloved Ginger, who was diagnosed with a life-threatening cancer three months ago and is currently undergoing chemotherapy. Her daughter Catherine (see previous blog about the sailing bride) moved the wedding up to April so her mother would be able to attend.

The wedding happened with such joy that I, a wedding photographer of 19 years, was powerfully touched. You can see pictures from the wedding on my site, but pictures really can’t describe the celebration of life that this family offered to their guests. And they taught me a deeply felt lesson.

At the brunch after the wedding today, I talked to Bill to thank him for having us as his photographer. We had known Bill and Ginger through my wife’s sister, Delle, and over the years had seem them occasionally, but I had never stopped to talk to Bill as I did today. We talked about death and how much life means when what you take for granted is threatened. Bill told me how much his wife has taught him about life and it meaning as she faced her own mortality. “I was a mess when I first got the news,” he said. And on top of that there was the stress of putting the wedding together in this horrible race with time.

Yet, the wedding did come together, and so did Bill. I was struck with how completely he threw himself in his daughter’s wedding. You can see this in the photographs. I asked him if he was experiencing a great release from all the pain, and he said, “Yes, now that he looked back on it. I think Ginger and I can just enjoy each other now.

“Cancer doesn’t play favorites, “ he continued. “Ginger was always a model of healthy habits.” Yet in neither Ginger or Bill was there any crying of “Why us.” Especially with Ginger. She was so present at the wedding, tired, but joyously present. No victim here. And because of their presence, they created the space for their daughter and their guests to be present.

I feel that this family through this trial and surrender gave their daughter and new son a true foundation for their marriage. They gave them the gift of love….or let me say, love gave them all the gift of life.

Posted under up lifting, weddings

The jewel was set in a breath taking setting where all the earth seemed to gather its best elements to celebrate the wedding of Meghan and Jason last Saturday on the eve of Easter. Held at Kingsmill in Williamsburg, the wedding sparkled from every facet as it turned in the light of the love this couple were consecrating.

Tilly and I were very happy to be a part of this celebration. May it continue always. A wedding is more than a one time event….truly it should be a place where the couple can always return, a well spring, if you will, of their love from which they can drink whenever their world begins to dry from the winds of time. A drink from this living water will immediately awaken that love once more that was celebrated here at Kingsmill on Easter weekend.

Posted under General Observations, weddings

Today we have a Williamsburg wedding and we’re looking forward to the beautiful drive in this gorgeous spring foliage, sneezing all the way. After doing weddings now for 20 years, I feel as though I’m still doing my first one, only without the fear and trembling. You burn out in this business if you are full of fear and doubt over your ability to get the job done. It becomes just what you do. This is the way I play.

In that way you can ride the energy of the wedding and let it refresh you as you go along. Any other way can exhaust you, and make you dread the next one. So weddings give to me as I give to them. We are a happy couple.

Posted under General Observations, weddings

There is a bride coming for a portrait this afternoon, and I would love to be able to post something from the session on this blog….but I don’t dare. Why?…The groom to be might see his bride before the ceremony. For most brides, this would seem to be the end of the marriage, from the degree of fear they pump into this custom.

I’ve had some brides almost have a heart attack when they thought the groom was going to peek through the dressing room door and see them before the ceremony. But I must say, after 19 years of doing weddings, I have never had a groom who wanted to peek. They must have all read the Greek myth of Actaeon and Diana.

Briefly, this was the sad account of a young hunter out with his friends and dogs, when he strayed from the group and came upon a spring where the goddess Diana was bathing with her maidens. Like any young buck would do, he peeked through the bushes, but Diana, being a goddess, sensed his presence, turned and saw him gazing upon her nude body. Unable to reach her bow, she threw water in his face, saying angrily: “Now you are free to tell, if you can, that you have seen the goddess nude.”

Antlers suddenly sprouted from his head, and he became a stag. And before he could grasp what had happened to him, he heard the dogs, his own dogs, and they chased him down and killed him. Such is the fate of any man who peeks at the goddess before she is ready.

And every groom knows, as if by ancient instinct, that he dare not peek at his bride before she is ready. And most grooms around here know what deer hunting is all about.

But this is not just a convention or a superstition, for those who look deeply. You see, every bride really is a goddess, no kidding. And the Goddess of all the goddesses is Nature or Truth, if you will. And Truth is Beauty, according to the poet Keats, .

But, you have to be chosen by Truth–or the Goddess–in order to experience Truth and Beauty. Some call this Grace. To steal grace is fraught with danger, and you may become an animal–a brute of an ego.

So the goddess–bride chooses who she will reveal her truth and beauty to. She tests the aspirant’s love and character, and if he passes the tests, she comes down the aisle hidden behind a veil, and at the moment of sacrifice, when the groom gives up his young hunting ego, and choses her above all other goddesses…she lifts her veil and allows his eyes to gaze upon her true nature.

When you see the beauty and truth of a goddess, you become like her, a god. You too become truth and beauty.

So…Truth….Beauty….don’t peek.

Posted under General Observations, up lifting, weddings

Saturday we did our first wedding of the season, a beautiful wedding in LaCrosse at a historic Methodist Church. I love weddings, and despite my physical irritations like bad knee and back, I find that I can ride a wedding pretty good.

By riding a wedding I mean putting your foot in the stirrup and climbing on the energy of the wedding. It builds slowly, but in three easy to manage stages. First there is the Getting Ready stage where the energy is fragmented and nervous. “Where are the flowers? Look at that wrinkle!. Oh, my God, am I making the right decision? What am I going to be like after the wedding?” And so the nervous energy goes. So many little and big fears being herded through a shoot heading towards….the Ceremony.

Second stage. Now the energy smoothes out with the music in the sanctuary. The quiet before the storm, so to speak. All is hushed. The minister comes out, the groom comes out, the guests turn their heads, the music heralds the opening of the door, and finally, at the peak of anticipation, the bride. Ah…..so beautiful. In this stage the energy seems more like potential energy, hardly making a ripple at all, but such great power coiled like a spring ready to be released. You take a deep breath and tighten your grip.

And then, BAM, like the bull gate at the rodeo…it gets released into the third stage, the Reception. Here the energy builds and builds as the wine flows and the dance music pumps up. Finally, before the Bride and Groom leave, the energy is at its peak in the center of the dance floor where bodies and bodies hurl themselves together in waves of abandonment. Shoes and inhibitions are left on the floor. Now there is only the dance..the dance. If the bodies rubbed together any faster there might be an explosion of light and oblivion there is so much energy.

Then the Bride and Groom leave and the energy crashes to the floor, exhausted. All that remains are the rose petals and the tears of the parents waving goodbye…goodbye.

I love weddings. I can ride these babies forever.

Posted under General Observations, weddings

One of my bride’s from last year congratulated me on renewing my vows at Christmas. (see earlier blog) I wrote back:

If you are in the wedding business it is good to stay current, right? After photographing so many weddings in the last decade it was very good for me to remember how it was or is on the inside of the vows.

I have discovered that wedding vows are like a wedding cake. The first vows are usually at the first layer, then as the marriage bakes in the heat of love, the vows deepen as the rest of the cake becomes available to the heat of maturing consciousness. Now the vows expand to include all the layers of the cake. And here is the icing: a fully baked marriage is very, very sweet…..but not too sweet…it’s just right.

We were divorced for a year in the 70′s, but failing at divorce, we remarried. So with this renewal, that makes three weddings for us. Divorce (and I should know) is when the cake is taken out of the oven before all the layers have finished cooking.

But Love is a great cook, so the best recipe is to surrender to the cook and let Her bake the cake. One must have faith in the Master Cook when you can’t see what is going on in the oven.

Posted under General Observations, weddings

Weddings in Southside Virginia are great celebrations and offer our entertainment starved inhabitants something that city people take for granted: a night out on the town. However, being in the country has it’s perks–our “night on the town” is free.

But I’ve come to realize is that a wedding is not just about separate people coming together in a big party. It is really about a network of family and friends making itself visible…like a spider web suddenly caught in the sun light, or a map where all the roads are drawn that connect each and every town.

At the center the network are the Bride and Groom, which, like the hub in a wheel, hold the extending spokes together. The wedding starts like the big bang that started the universe. A wedding is a network that expands outward in a complex of relationships of friends and family until it gets so far from the center that the pull of gravity is not strong enough to bring those in the far reaches to the wedding.

A wedding is like a great magnet–or a hole in space–that draws all caught in its pull back into its source, where each part of the network forgets its separateness in a moment of joy when they hug and kiss the bride and groom. Like moths they come to the light and wait their turns to kiss the bride.

The coming together of opposites, the creation of a new unity, the sacrifice and death of individual egos for Love, and the two families merging and mixing to make an even greater family..this is the dialectic of life. This is the way we grow. When two become one, conflict is resolved, uncertainty and separation ends, and peace overcomes us all. A whole is created that is greater than its parts. The struggle of love to overcome itself is over.

This is the mystery from which the Bride and Groom draw their power to call this network of family and friends back from their separate worlds. Here they are seen and strengthened so that the links that hold them together will never break. A wedding is a beginning of the new, and at once the renewal of the old.

Each hug and kiss with the Bride and Groom are like tiny stars blinking in a great galaxy. Here is the source of their light.

And when the wedding is over and the last shrimp is eaten, the network fades into the next day. Gone to be only remembered. But another wedding will come and a new expanding network of happy connections will be discovered.

Weddings are like worlds being created from and then dissolving back into the bliss of the Lord’s sleep.

Posted under General Observations, weddings