On weddings, and miracles
A few weeks ago, I cried happy tears for what I think was the first time in my life. I was out for a run on a beautiful fall morning, my wedding (MY wedding?! WUT??) was just around the corner, and for whatever reason it just struck me in that moment that I now had in my hands so many of the things that I’ve yearned for all my life.
Getting hit with the feels while running isn’t great for your form, let me tell you… but it was a very welcome surprise. Especially for me. And man, I hadn’t seen nothin’ yet.
If you know me well, then you’ve likely seen my cynical streak — it is long, and it is wide. Although I’ve not suffered the sorts of dramatic losses and trauma that so many other people endure, I’ve still learned over the years to brace for the worst by default.
Or actually, not even the worst — more like the meh, the mediocre, the vaguely and ambiguously disappointing. Which in some ways is much worse than outright bad. I tend to see things as going wrong more often than not, and I *know* life is full of painful riddles that will never be resolved, at least not on this side of heaven.
In short (so I tell myself): I was never promised anything, so why should I expect anything?
My fellow Christians may object to that argument, but I’ll stand by it — or parts of it anyway. I’m still not convinced that the Gospel promises us happiness in this life, and I think insistence to the contrary can be extremely damaging for those who seek to follow Christ in the midst of depression, trauma, or even just the daily grind. It turns my stomach when Christianity is presented as therapy, or a self-help method, or some kind of existential workout regimen. Bleh.
That said, there is a major flaw in my argument. I still don’t think (or at least don’t think that I think) that I was ever promised happiness in this life. But that doesn’t necessarily mean I shouldn’t hope for it.
Maybe that’s what it means to believe in miracles? To anticipate the amazing even when you don’t have apparent reason to do so?
Point is, I’ve witnessed a miracle, one so unquestionably, inescapably *for* me that I now have to seriously reckon with some of that long-cherished cynicism. Actually, it’s been multiple miracles over the course of the past couple weeks.
My now-wife Vicki and I chose Luke’s account of the miracle at Cana for the Gospel reading at our wedding, which was exactly one week ago (already?? Again, WUT?). Months prior, after a lot of agonizing, we had decided to host the reception in Vicki’s parents’ backyard, in hopes that that would be more affordable and more personal than going with a venue. We rented a huge tent and put it in the backyard, along with tables and linens, flowers and Christmas lights and a nice big dance floor.
Then it dumped rain on Thursday night, leaving an inch of water on the ground inside the tent. My best man Andrew informed me of this development an hour or so before the ceremony, told me not to panic, and assured me that efforts were underway to move the reception into the house. That struck me as a rather hopeless solution — our guest list was small by wedding standards, but far too much for a house party. Still, it was the only solution available.
I didn’t panic at the news, but I wasn’t exactly zen about it either. I was just resigned, as I frequently am about things like this. I think my response was something like, “welp, sounds about right.” Shit always breaks, usually when you need it most. Sounds about right.
Regardless, the problem was out of my hands now and I accepted that. The important thing was that Vicki and I got married; whether or not we also got the beautiful, swingin’ party we’d hoped and planned for was secondary. And (forgive me for casually skimming over a lot of very important stuff here) we did succeed in getting married.
After the ceremony and photos were done, we made the drive back to her parents’ place, drinking some much-needed coffee and admiring the post-rain sunburst that lit up the foliage. We were tired, but content.
Thing is… I’ve never been content with contentment, if that makes sense. Whenever people talk of God or religion as a pathway to peace, I kind of roll my eyes internally. As I’ve told Vicki many times, I don’t want mere tranquility or contentedness out of life. I don’t want a serene mountain lake — I want fireworks, I want flight, I want a wave to ride. In short, I’m more interested in joy than in peace.
So then (I promise, I’m getting to the end here), we got to the Mellinos’ house — and found the place packed with all our guests, as well as all the food, drinks, and gorgeous decor we’d originally intended for the tent. As it turned out, almost all our friends and family had converged on the house first thing that morning to begin this transformation… and many had even SAT OUT THE CEREMONY AND STAYED BEHIND to ensure the job was completed.
And what a job they did. Somehow, they’d managed to turn the living room into a banquet space — complete with tulle and flowers and lights — which then neatly converted into a dance floor once dinner had wrapped up. Tables and settings were scattered about the house like it was a gorgeous little restaurant; the kitchen was now a self-serve bar; the dining room was just (barely) the right size for the dinner buffet. The now-beautiful weather allowed people to spill in and out of the house as they pleased, and a makeshift DJ station in the entryway kept the music going all throughout the night.
In short, the place was bursting at the seams with joy. Sometimes literally: at one point the legs gave out on one side of the back porch, causing it to abruptly lurch downward like the deck of the Titanic. But apart from spilled drinks and elevated heart rates, no one was harmed, and we all got a great story out of it (I honestly think it might have been my fault, as the thing gave out right after I’d stepped onto it to greet some friends. But several other people thought they were the culprit, so, who knows).
I can’t adequately summarize what a wondrous and unexpected night that was, in particular for me. But at the end of it, Vicki and I found ourselves slow-dancing to the last song (the soundtrack from the famous opening scene of Pixar’s Up) and all the other goofs on the dance floor made a big ring around us, swaying back and forth. It hit me like a ton of bricks then that this moment was exactly the kind of thing I’ve longed for my whole life. Love, joy and communion, so present and tangible you can almost taste it.
That’s when the tears started. As I mentioned at the beginning of this post, it wasn’t the first time I’ve cried tears of gratitude. Nor was it the last. But… once the dance was over, and we’d been cheered out to our obnoxiously-decorated car, and then waved and hallooed down the driveway by what felt like a tidal wave of exuberant affection… once we were down the road a ways, Vicki and I pulled over and sobbed in each other’s arms.
We were completely baffled, overwhelmed, hearts bursting: that night was our own Cana miracle, something we couldn’t possibly have earned or planned or expected. I have never cried tears of gratitude like I did then. Even if I never do again, that doesn’t matter.
It doesn’t matter because I now know something that I’ve never known before: how it feels to be truly blindsided by Love, a love so much bigger than you, or your beloved, or even any one of the family and friends who love you individually, that you have to capitalize it and call it God.
How can such things happen, like what happened to me a week ago, if there isn’t a God who loves us? Ubi caritas, Deus ibi est.
