My Wedding Day Part 2

I did not process down the aisle because there was no music and no crowd.  I just genuflected, strode up to the kneeler beside Ian and waited for our Mass to begin. Ian was being his stubborn, superstitious self and would not look directly at me until Mass had begun.  He made me smile and roll my eyes at the same time. That was my Ian. Father set up and then Mass began. I chanted as fervently as I ever had in my life.  Then the moment came.  We faced each other to offer each other our vows in the sight of God and the Church. Now he was looking directly at me. And suddenly everything was silent and still. The moment before our eyes and hands met, I was struck with a holy fear. It was like the fear and love I had felt every time I had held a new baby brother or sister for the first time. Or the fear I had felt the instant before the Sacred Host touched my tongue at my First Holy Communion.

God, Dear God...I have loved you all of my life and you have loved me all of my life. Help me to love him and love you as I should. Please sustain and strengthen my love every day. Help us to love you and to love each other more and more all of our lives and then forever in heaven. 

I looked into his eyes and saw his love for me. Those dear eyes, brimming with joyful tears, dark as midnight and often red from insomnia. Now they were clearer and brighter than the diamond on my engagement ring. They positively twinkled behind his glasses. Half the fun of getting married is seeing how happy it makes the man you love.  Today his shoulders were not heavy with the weight of a weary, wandering world.  Every familiar and adorable feature on his face was yearning for me. For us. I saw that he was taking his life and heart into his own hands and holding it out to me in offering. And I heard him speak the words.  That he would love me forever. That I had been chosen to be cherished by him for always. That he would "accept our children lovingly from God" whether they were boys or girls, healthy or handicapped, smart or slow, whether the world thought they were beautiful or ugly or whether they were "good" or "bad" or "easy" or "difficult".  That all of him wanted all of me.

And as I answered his vows with the old, familiar and beloved words "to have and to hold, from this day forward, to love and to cherish, for better for worse, for richer for poorer, in sickness and in health, until death do us part" he knew the truth of my heart offered to him and to God. He heard it in my voice, he saw it in my eyes, he felt it in the touch of my hands.  And he smiled at me.

To be truthful, I hardly remember the rest. I was so dizzy with happiness and gratitude. I know we brought up the gifts. The miracle of consecration and transubstantiation happened in a trice. God himself came down on that inadequate altar to become food for us. He gave us His strength to empower our weakness, His life to save us from spiritual death. Ian said afterwards, "That was like a powerful three way hug...Being joined to you in marriage before God, then being united with God, He in Me and I in Him and also joined with you in Him."  And I recognized again, the joy of an orphan who has a Father in God, a Mother in Our Lady, a home in Mother Church, a place in the Mystical Body of Christ, a Lover and Savior and Lord in Christ, a Comforter in the Holy Spirit, and an angel as a guardian. And now Ian and I were a family, a domestic church. Now we were one. Now we were married.

And suddenly we were invited by the priest to kiss and we forgot how to.

Seriously, our first gesture of love as husband and wife and we both went white and froze for a second. We were so nervous as we leaned toward each other. (Are we doing this right? It has something to do with the lips, right?) We found each other of course and then we forgot to be nervous and self conscious in front of that massive crowd of four people. And everyone went "AWWWWWWWWW!" Which was exactly how we felt so we laughed against each other.

We were embraced and congratulated and we thanked everyone and embraced everyone. It felt like an instant and age and then Ian and I were alone together and tucking ourselves into what was now our car to go home. HOME. OUR home.

"I know you told me not to get my hopes up about how you would look," Ian said, "And that this was not the dress that you had hoped for your wedding day...But if you could only see yourself right now. You are radiant. You are so, so beautiful!"

Any trace of nervousness I had felt at my own insufficiency was now forgotten. All I knew was joy and peace and him.  "My husband," I pronounced with all my happy heart.
"Let's go home, my dear wife."

And there are so many other little details about that day that I hope I remember forever. I hope I remember skyping with Ian's brother Z, and his "best man toast" speech to us. I hope I remember the chocolate cake we ate at the lovely steakhouse when we blew out the candle and made our wish for our future happiness, holiness and prosperity. (I do remember it, and my mouth is watering. Velvety, moist, decadent, chocolate love...The champagne! The steak! The spiked mocha latte topped with whipped cream and chocolate curls in the sugar-rimmed giant glass! Wow!) Most of all, I hope that I will remember every smile on his face as clearly as I do now, as if it were yesterday. And I know that I will.  Because he smiles at me like that every day with the same love and longing, gratitude and wonder. But now with more comfort, ease and familiarity. That smile is a shadow of heaven.