What I Know About Love

I was honored to be asked to contribute to the wedding celebration of my dear friends Laura Fedele and Rita Houston. This is what I read:

For Laura and Rita

On The Occasion of Their Wedding (9/10/11)

We gathered on the granite steps of Greenwich Town Hall in the January cold, an insistent wind pummeling out of a crystal blue sky, snow squeaking underfoot. It was the kind of day when all the body wants, all the soul wants, is shelter. We gathered together in the full sight of the Universe, we gathered together with flowers and handmade signs and so much joy in our hearts. Sweet tears froze on our faces as we witnessed your bodies, your souls, legally bound in the shelter of marriage.

Now we gather again and again we are in the full sight of the Universe and again there are flowers and handmade signs and so much joy in our hearts. Again sweet tears flow freely as we witness your bodies, your souls, bound together again in this celebration of your love. 

Here is what I know about Love—it is everything. It is, in fact, the only thing, the shelter that our most essential selves require, the shelter built of cumulative moments of Yes. Love says, “Yes, I see you. Yes, I know you. Yes, I will show you who I am so you can see and know me. Yes, I choose you. Yes, I trust you with my heart. Yes. Yes. Yes.”

You are, each in your own specific, individual, magical ways, two of the strongest and most generous women I know and it is a wondrous, wonderful thing that you found one another. It is a wondrous, wonderful thing that you have chosen each moment of Yes from the first to this and beyond.

I rejoice, we all rejoice, that you two—who we all love so much—love one another so much.

You dwell together in the house where Love lives, the home you have built together, the home you fill with great music, great food, great wine, the home you share so generously with the rest of us, your family and friends, the community you have created. And the house where Love lives is the shelter of you, Laura, and you, Rita, and the new creature that is called “Houdele,” the magical co-creation made manifest through the specific alchemy of your shared love and your marriage.

Here is what I know about marriage—a true marriage is the shelter Love builds, a shelter made to hold two bodies, two souls, two minds, while also making space for the infinite distance that exists between even the two closest people. A true marriage requires strength, generosity, magic and a community that believes in and supports that marriage. A true marriage is made up of countless moments of Yes.

I know I speak for all of us when I say, “Yes, we see you. Yes, we know you. Yes, we believe in you. Yes, we support you. Yes, we love you. Yes. Yes. Yes.”