These four photos were taken with one of those little wedding cameras that was on our table at the reception of Sam (my sister Susan's son) and Ashley. Every picture was awful. I imagine that with the overwhelming influx of quick, inexpensive digital cameras that these old 27-exposure Kodak cameras have mostly come from the backs of wedding planning and catering supply closets.
Sam and Ashley coming into the reception room: during the time between the 2:30pm wedding and the 5:00pm reception, they took time to just be together. I had to smile when they admitted that they didn't feel any different now that they were married. I think that Robert Fulghum would tell them that they had already gone through the "real" wedding months or even years before at some unremembered moment when they each discovered that they loved the other and wanted nothing more than to be together. The public joining of their lives was made legal last Saturday afternoon. The marriage of their hearts--what really keeps people together when they hurt or are angry or feel pushed aside or are disappointed by things that have happened or even disappointed in themselves--that takes place when no one is "witnessing" or officiating. Sometimes it happens before a man and a woman are married; sometimes it happens after. The saddest things is when it doesn't happen at all. In such cases, the reception is the highlight of the day since there was a party for them and presents to open--as if it were a birthday celebration.
Me and my little sister Susan. We both wore black and looked fantastic.
This is the only photo I have of dad and me together. The photos were so bad that even my correcting for red-eye didn't help the way that I looked. Awful photo. Wonderful time spent with dad.
Dad sat up at the head table with Susan and Sam and Ashley and Ashley's parents. They also took time to talk quietly. Even though the photographs turned out grainy and badly lit, I do cherish the people and the events that these photographs remind me of. If for nothing else, they are worth keeping on file so that I can skim by them everyone once in a while and see them unexpectedly--and be back in Wichita KS again. Everyone was so cordial and kind and Sam and Ashley were so beautiful together. Both of them cried through the wedding--my favorite memory is of Sam, during the middle of the wedding service, reaching to wipe the tears off of Ashley's face--and of her turning to look at him, rather than at the Catholic priest who was officiating.
Brent and I are going on our first cruise next week. For our anniversary, he found me a Pentax UNDERWATER CAMERA!!!!! It is a coppery-orange electronic marvel--water tight and sand proof. If I flatten my hand, the camera sits quite nicely in the middle. I have been practicing with it--and have gotten used to some of the features. It doesn't photograph in RAW, but it does have a maximum quality JPG so that I need all of the space I can on the memory card. Right now I am using the 16 gb card from my Nikon D300S. I took photos while I walked the dogs this morning and am really excited to see if I've gotten good enough with the camera to get some decent shots of the birds we saw today. I'll have to post some later if they turn out.
At the least, I expect that my photographs from today will be eons better than the few I got off of the disposable camera from Sam and Ashley's wedding. I hope so, anyway.
Isn't Brent incredible? He finds the best--the most surprising--things to get for me. I am spoiled. I am adored. I am loved. I am married forever to Brent in my heart, in my dreams--as well as in the legal wedding register at the Salt Lake Utah county government offices.
