Today, Valentine’s day, is my business anniversary. Seven years in, I am still excited to photograph weddings. Seven years in, the language/marketing promoting weddings still makes me cringe.
Words are important. I am consistently frustrated by the clumsy language surrounding weddings. Specifically, when weddings are boiled down to one word, love. All you need is love. Love is not cancelled. (and also….the more money you spend on your wedding, the greater your love). This is where I strain my neck and say, nah.
I love chocolate. We’re not betrothed. Choosing to marry someone, and have a wedding, is about more than loving a person. I’ve spent my 20’s and 30’s learning it is possible to romantically love a person, and be completely incompatible in sustaining a relationship. It’s heartbreaking. Love is complicated.
Weddings, like love, are also complicated. A wedding is a gathering. In her book, The Art of Gathering, Priya Parker states, that to have a meaningful gathering you need to define a purpose for the gathering.
“A good gathering’s purpose should also be disputable. If you say the purpose of your wedding is to celebrate love, you may bring a smile to people’s faces, but you aren’t really committing to anything, because who would dispute that purpose?”
I’ve photographed about 200 weddings. What excites me to photograph weddings, is celebrating the complex experiences and emotions they create. They all, to varying degrees, have been a stew of anxiety, fear, joy, family feuds, pain, grief, and also, overwhelming love. Reducing weddings to one word is insulting. I also worry this over simplification of language will actually start to deteriorate the richness of the experience.
In the last seven years I have been delighted by the diversity of the wedding celebrations I have witnessed. I am confused when I hear people say, “I hate weddings.” All of them? All moments of them? Saying vows on a Brooklyn pier? Do you hate ABBA dance parties on a bar patio in the middle of a summer black out? Do you hate priests comparing catholic marriage to 9/11? Do you hate wearing chic outfits and eating oysters by the ocean? Candlelit ceremonies in the dark of November? Do you hate parking lot pizza dance parties in the summer rain? Fog machines? Peking duck stations? Long Island Ice Tea as a signature cocktail? (Don’t lie to me on this one.)
My favorite depiction of a wedding is the second act of Thornton Wilder’s Our Town. This exchange gets me every time:
Emily: “Well, if you love me, help me. All I want is someone to love me.”
George: “I Will, Emily. Emily, I’ll try”
Emily: “And I mean for ever. Do you hear? For ever and ever.”
I love this moment because it expresses fear and hope. To attend a wedding is to witness the creation of a new thing. Weddings are both terrifying and wonderful.
My college professor (hey Spencer Golub) once said, “Words, even good ones, ultimately fail us.” I think pictures also, even good ones, ultimately fail us. The more I make photos, the more humbled I am by the inability to reproduce the overwhelming energy and beauty of human presence. This year, amidst so much isolation, the importance of in person human connection has never been more clear.
Despite the limitations of photos and words, I still believe it is essential to use these tools to strive to communicate the pain and beauty of human experiences, like weddings. Weddings are important. But they’re not solely about love. They are hella complex. I believe it would be a beautiful thing to be more honest about this and celebrate the complexity. And of course, there will always be love. No disrespect to love. Love, even the kind that doesn’t lead to a lifelong union, is a phenomenal sensation. Kicking it back to my guy Thornton from my favorite play,
“But before they do it, I want you to try and remember what it was like to have been very young. And particularly the the days when you we’re first in love, when you were like a person sleepwalking, and you didn’t quite see the street you were in, and didn’t quite hear everything that was said to you.
You’re just a little bit crazy. Will you remember that, please?”
It’s been seven years, i’m still hanging on to this wild wedding world. Happy Valentine’s day, hope y’all feel some big love today.
#weddingsarecomplicated #feelyourfeelings #iloveweddings #loveiscool. #8606558382 #happyvalentinesday
Such true words – a lot resonates. Love these haunting Thornton quotes!!
Thank you Molly!! Thornton, always a fav.