Love is Love is Love

Love is Love is Love
There is no alternative.

On Saturday I cried. Not the sad cry of heartache, loss or grief, but one of life’s happy cries, a wedding cry. I’m not “The Crier” in my circle of friends. She knows who she is, but a wedding, real or even fictional on TV or in movies gets me every damn time. I get weepy at the bold proclamations of love, the willing vulnerability, the chosen hope and the public promise that two people make in front of friends, family and the world. It’s such a beautiful thing to witness, ranking right up there behind a child being born. Of course it also has its poignant moments, as a parent’s eyes well up with each ushering footstep down the aisle, their jaws slightly shaking as they struggle to contain the emotion of a monumental rite of passage, as that line is crossed from child to adult husband or wife.

Back to Saturday when I cried.

But first Friday, when I left work and a coworker and I were wishing each other a good weekend and inquiring about any plans we each had. I told her we were going to a wedding and conversation ensued about who was getting married. Long story short, my coworker said I’d have to let her know how the “alternative wedding” was. The fact that there would be 2 brides had taken it out of our culture’s “traditional” wedding category.

Bride #1 is a longtime friend we’ve known from my husband and I playing co-ed softball. Bride #2 is the love of her life. The lovely pastoral venue was outdoors, lakeside, on a bright afternoon with radiant fingers of sunlight reaching through Spanish Moss that hung from ancient mighty oaks. Gorgeous shades of purple and white flowers adorned the rows of chairs leading up to a romantic arbor built by one of the bride’s fathers. A harpist strummed elegant, angelic melodies as we waited for the wedding party to arrive.

And then, they did. After the mothers, fathers and grandparents were escorted to their seats Marie entered, her face aglow with the joyful anticipation of the day’s culminating moment. As I observed her, my first teardrop welled up and I know my smile was wide as I laid my eyes upon the pure love emanating from her face. The brides’ ladies and men came next donning dapper grey and white suits and gorgeous bosenberry one shoulder dresses. A precious ginger haired flower girl was jubilantly awestruck, almost forgetting to drop petals upon the burlap runway. An adorable but reluctant toddler ring bearer followed, carried down the aisle by his dad. And then my arms became goose-bumped as we watched Kenzie make her way towards the one she loves. As I remember her face now, my eyes are almost as full as they were then. Their eyes locked and love poured forth. There are times in this life when the love in the air is almost palpable, an energy that joins and envelopes all the electron circles in its vicinity. This was one of those times. As Kenzie and Marie held hands and repeated vows, (some twice because the officiant flubbed up LOL) the love energy created by the two of them flowed throughout the gathering of family and friends. From that day forward, they pledged themselves to each other and their marriage of hearts, lives, and souls. There was joy all around and I cried.

The nature of love precludes there being an alternative or unacceptable kind. Only the lover and the beloved can define their love.

It is the answer.

It never fails.

It never judges other loves to be unreal, unapproved or unholy.

Love is the way, the truth and the light that we each need to shine and follow.  There really is no alternative. And boy oh boy how the world needs it now.

What The World Needs Now

Peace and Love