with my sister-in-law and my sister just after I'd put on my dress and was admiring myself in the mirror
Tarah Coonan Photography
Tarah Coonan Photography
Oh man - thank you a million times to everyone who shared the links to their own wedding recaps in the comments of my post last week! It was so much fun to read some new stories and I have to admit that I got a little choked up when I revisited the posts I'd already seen back when the bloggers posted them after their weddings. Somehow, looking through those photos felt like reliving the happiest memories. Isn't that silly? I wasn't even there and yet I feel like I experienced the joy of those weddings. I guess it's because we bloggers eventually become a sort of family, in a way, because we share so much.
And there's my segue, dear readers, to the topic of family. I wanted to write about family anyway in the context of our wedding day, but I've changed direction in large part because I wanted Jon to be comfortable with what I published here and he wasn't keen on specific details being shared. (To be totally honest, he's not crazy about this being posted, either, but he knows how much this blog and you, my readers, mean to me, so he's graciously said okay.) Therefore, instead but no less meaningfully, I'm going to be guided by the questions that LC left on my I'm Married post a few days after our wedding:
I've been pretty insistent all along that I didn't feel like getting married would change our relationship. We lived together on and off for two years when I was in London; we'd navigated different attitudes towards money, discussed conflicting priorities in regards to lifestyle, and managed not to kill each other when we couldn't agree on TV shows or movies to watch. (I hear these are the major points of tension in marriages. Is that true? I hope so, because then we have a head start on compromising!) Getting married was the next natural step for us, but, for the most part, it didn't feel momentous when I only thought about it meaning something to the two of us.
However, when I considered what it meant for us in the larger context of our families - and furthermore what it meant for our families - the scale of what we were doing became breathtaking.
Jon and I wanted to get married not because we felt that it would validate our relationship but because we wanted to celebrate our love for each other before and with our family and friends. Although we had a civil ceremony, there was absolutely a spiritual element to the day, and I think everyone present would agree that there was something sacred about the commitment we made over clasped hands.
That's where our wedding day transcended our marriage and became about the broader relationships that were being formed. In many ways, I'm not any more family to Jon's aunts and uncles and cousins, many of whom I'd only met for the first time at the wedding, than I was before we said "I do." But I don't think that becoming a family is about signing a piece of paper. It's about sharing the experience of a wedding as an active part of the union that is being formed.
Of course it takes time to truly feel like family. Even a wedding can't make that happen instantaneously. But, at least for us, August 24 was a crucible moment; it was a day wherein we were all bound together by all the love that we shared as Jon and I stood before our assembled guests. No, Jon doesn't know my extended family much better now than he did before our wedding, but we were brought together by the passion of the ceremony and the exhilaration of the reception. Yes, we are simply stuck with each other now and so we might as well make an effort to start being one united family. But I do think that experiencing our vows and the celebration that followed with each person having an emotional stake in the day certainly invigorated the process. I don't think you can share in that sort of love, so powerful on a wedding day of all days, without beginning to feel like family.
candids of both our families from the weekend - thanks especially to Lucy and Sarah for the photos!
Edited to add: Jess wrote about something relevant on her wonderful new blog yesterday; as declaratory as I am here, I do wonder if there's a right answer when you're asked if you feel different now that you're married. And what kind of woman does your answer make you?
