This was completely out of left field for me but early in 2012 my friend Addison called me because he was getting married and said he had something to talk to me about. I was thinking he was just going to see if I wanted to treck it out to Colorado for the wedding. There was more to it than the trip out there though. He asked if I would officiate his wedding for me. Like I said left field.
This was the first time in my life I was literally speechless. I sat on the phone before I could barely manage to get out “I don’t know… Can I even do that?”
It turns out I could do it. Addison had already done the research and in the next couple weeks we decided I would do it. And it actually happened. I wrote the whole ceremony out, got a suit, flew out to Colorado, and showed up. We practiced the ceremony but still I was nervous. It wasn’t until sitting with Addison the half hour before the wedding I calmed down for the both of us. My leg still shook almost the whole ceremony but the words came out, people even laughed at the joke I tried to make. Besides all that it was probably the most humbling thing ever to be asked to do. It was really a great privilege to be able to talk, in front of people who mattered to them, about Addison and Kali. At the end was the coolest part of getting to pronounce Addison and Kali Haynes; husband and wife. It really felt weird for me because I never expected to do it and because they thought I would do a good job.
It was interesting after as people came up and told me it was a beautiful ceremony. One guy even asked about how many weddings I do a year. I was worried I would be terrible at it but thankfully, hopefully, for Addison and Kali’s sake it was a good time.
Then about 3 weeks later when I had truly just started to de-stress from the wedding, bike trip and week at Young Life camp my friend Josh asked me to officiate his wedding. This was also un-expected. The second time around was easier because I had done it a first time already. The writing came easier and the day approached with less stress. The day of I showed up early to run through the ceremony a couple times and got soaked by a flash rainstorm as I sprinted back to my car. I ran through everything again while drying my hair with the vent fan on high in my car.
Eventually the rain died down and things went as planned. During the ceremony my leg didn’t even do the shaky leg thing it did at Addison and Kali’s wedding! I was happy again to tell a story of two people meeting, falling in love, about the engagement, about their faith and finally (I’m sure this never gets old for people who do a lot of weddings) pronounced another couple husband and wife. After the ceremony we took a group picture with both families and went to celebrate Josh and Molly Cooper.
Writing and performing the ceremony for these two couples was probably one of the more challenging things I did in 2012 (biking across 5 states was definitely easier) because I wanted everything to be perfect. I know it wasn’t perfect but I came to the conclusion sometime while working on Addison and Kali’s wedding I was just celebrating them. No matter how good or bad what I did was it had nothing on their love for each other. So I tried to look at it as trying to give a good gift. If it was good, they would like it, and if it wasn’t good they would still be just fine. I have to say though those two nights were the two happiest of my 2012.
My prayers, love, and best wishes to you, Mr. and Mrs. Haynes and Mr. and Mrs. Cooper, in 2013. Thank you.
I AM PART 