I've been receiving many requests for wedding gossip. "Everything seemed so smooth! Come on... was there any drama before the wedding." Drama? At a wedding? That never happens! Oh, OK, let me quote one very funny remark said to me by one relative (to read this put on an East Coast Ethnic Accent): "Ten years already! Can you see the crease, in my tongue? From biting it all this time! Dale. He is a very great man, and what a wonderful father! but two kids? Make it legal already!"
Following is the transcript from the ceremony and random pictures of the event. To see exceptional pictures on Facebook friend Sharon Roufa. Sharon's Aunt and Uncle are professional photographers and there you will find some stunning shots. Remember this was a speech and so, grammatically it's funky. I also didn't write it totally on my own. I borrowed the 'preachy part' from friendlyathiest.com. Sharon and Dale tweaked a part or two and wrote their own vows.
As you think of the Wedding, and the wonderful friends and family that surrounded the couple, note that Michael Laffen provided an excellent musical backdrop and some great laughs. Joel Cooper made for a superior best man, not only by being a super handsome backdrop for the groom but by being a willing and patient swing dancing partner. Bonita Banks was able to refit Sharon's mother's dress to fit Sharon beautifully! Bonita's partner Theresa had a secret job that she perfected, but we won't get into that here. Really, this was a full community participation event. I could never thank everyone who helped in some way or another. I mean, kabob making night! How many of us were there rocking out at the bakery and laughing? And Abbie...your job was critical...
I will set the scene: The sun occasionally shone as clouds were moving in and out over the property. A beautiful spread was laid out over a newly cleared yard. A stage was set up for the band. The music was a perfect mix of traditional and modern. Here I go:
I would like to draw from a passage in Michael Ignatieff's essay "Lodged in Heart and Memory";
“As time begins to elapse, one begins to love the other because they have shared the same experience. Selves may not intertwine; but lives do, and shared memory becomes as much of a bond as the bond of the flesh.”
Today we publicly affirm the union of Dale Banks and Sharon Roufa. To begin, I would like to draw on our shared memory of these two as we celebrate the bond these two have chosen to undertake.
The first time I saw Dale he was standing at the payphone outside Eagle Quality Center returning messages he had received on the bush lines. It was deep fall and it was pouring rain, much like this summer. He had filled his water jugs from the spicket and was putting them in his car and the two of us realized we lived very close to each other on Diamond Ridge Road. Our homes were not even a mile apart.
Don’t misunderstand, I lived in a luxury spread with my girlfriends, Dale lived in a homestead cabin that seemed pretty far off the road (especially in winter). He hauled his water, composted, and conserved. He was a loyal and devoted father to Sophie and Hailey. He threw wonderful sledding parties on full moon nights. He fought offshore oil drilling and worked to help the city of Homer institute a recycling program at the landfill. He started his recycled products company. He also played drums made out of sheet metal in his band Club Rubucava whose hit included “Urea”. He was banned from being a dj at KBBI for playing music that was deemed ‘inappropriate’ (even at midnight) and so he considered doing pirate radio… But that is another story.
My first memory of Sharon was seeing her in Two Sisters Bakery (in the old location), she hadn’t been baking there too long. She was chatting about how she was going to build a cabin on the land she had just bought. “So”, she said, “I checked out some books on building at the library and I was surprised to find that it’s no more difficult than piecing together a dress. They write those books for men for god’s sake.” I was amazed at her awesomeness. Since that time, there has never been a time that I have come to this house and not been blown away by something she is doing, be that sawing alder branches to make buttons for hand knitted sweaters, perfecting her cheese recipe, building her sauna, or sharing with me how close she came to joining the Israeli Army, this woman is a wonder.
Both of them intellectual and progressive, both of them active and determined, both devoted to ideologies that promote sustainability and social justice. It would only make sense that these two, when they met in the winter of 1999, would find that they were perfectly suited for each other.
And they both know how to have a good time…
Love: a universal mystery. How does it happen that two people pick each other over all others?
Kate Crowley remembers the first moment she realized that something mysterious and miraculous was happening between Dale and Sharon. It was her birthday, 1999, and all she wanted was a big, huge, bonfire. When she made this request she had no idea what a difficult undertaking this was going to be, midwinter. As she remembers it, Sharon had worked all night baking. She then went to the house where the party was going to be and shoveled the snow to prepare a place for the fire. There was a lot of snow to shovel. I can’t remember if Kate told me that Sharon then hauled the wood single handedly after chain sawing it and made the fire with flint and straw, but it wouldn’t surprise me.
The fire was big and bright and Kate was thoroughly enjoying herself around this fire. She was standing, chatting with friends, when she looked across the fire ring and at Dale. He was sitting with his legs spread and between them he held Sharon’s feet. He was rubbing them there by the fire. He and Sharon were rapt with one another and she remembers that she felt, at that moment, that something extraordinary was happening between them. It was magic.
Today, ten years later, we witness an expression that is at once public and private, precious, sacred, and truly unique to the two of you. In this act of marriage, you open yourselves to a fuller experience and expression of the great, vast mystery called love.
How is it that two people could willingly allow themselves to endure the vulnerability and power that such love thrusts upon them? If a wedding ceremony is a public declaration of hope, what is it that we are hopeful for today? We are hopeful that we can use this love to overcome the obstacles that life presents. There is hope in the knowledge that two people in love take strength from each other and this strength can spread throughout our families and neighborhoods and into the world.
No ceremony can create your marriage. Only you can do that — through love, patience, dedication, perseverance — through talking and listening and trying to understand — through helping and supporting and believing in each other — through learning to forgive, learning to respect and appreciate your differences, and learning to make the important things matter and to let go of the rest. What this ceremony can do is to witness and affirm the choice you have made to begin a new, today, as partners for life. (From friendlyatheist.com)
Our reading today, which I quoted a piece from earlier, is from Michael Ignatieff's essay "Lodged in Heart and Memory".
"In the marriage ceremony, that moment when falling in love is replaced by the arduous drama of staying in love, the words "in sickness and in health, for richer, for poorer, till death do us part" set love in the temporal context in which it achieves its meaning. As time begins to elapse, one begins to love the other because they have shared the same experience. Selves may not intertwine; but lives do, and shared memory becomes as much of a bond as the bond of the flesh."
Sam, Blaise, will you present the rings?
Begin Vows
Dale
Do you, Sharon, promise to love and respect me?
Will you maintain a safe harbor for our love, our lives, and our family?
Will you sustain me with bread and cookies?
Will you grow together with me, with patience and support through all the seasons of our lives?
Sharon responds
(Dale Puts ring on Sharon)
Sharon
Do you Dale promise to love and respect me?
Will you maintain a safe harbor for our love, our lives, and our family?
Will you keep our family stocked with environmentally responsible products?
Will you grow together with me, with patience and support, through all the seasons of our lives?
Dale responds
(Sharon puts ring on Dale)
To all of you who have witnessed the vows Dale and Sharon have just made
Will you do everything in your power to see that this marriage relationship remains strong?
(Crowd responds)
Sharon and Dale have chosen to be joined in marriage, and have declared their choice to each other and in the presence of this company. They have publicly declared their Love for one another, deepening the bond they have already created with each other and with us, as a community, and sharing the hopefulness that such a love brings into life. They have given each other their promises, and have made their pledge by giving and receiving rings and by joining hands. Therefore, by the power vested in me by Sharon and Dale and by the witnesses present here today, I now pronounce you partners for life. You may kiss.
As we close the ceremony today, let us remember that even in the most joyous of times we must remember that there is still suffering in this world. That as stewards of this Earth, we must continue striving for sustainability and social justice. To remember that even as we celebrate a union of two people in an equation which is more than the sum of its parts, we still must work together until the world is a better place for everyone. In our moment of great joy, there is still suffering. And so we break a glass to remember this.
Then Dale can just wrap a glass in a cloth and stomp it.
Then everyone yells Mazel Tov and congrats and whoo-hoo.
After an extended wait and a pig race (which is not nearly as exciting as one might think) we learned that Falcom came in third place behind a dance troop and a young woman singing Etta James. She was really good and will be performing at the State Fair competition in Palmer next week. The judges made a special point to let us know that they felt Falcom was out of this world and that they will be very interested to see what he does in the years to come. They felt he was a little young for all that big competition stuff. 
