A Wedding dance like no other
This wedding put a smile on every face, and finished with spontaneous dancing, a special kind of wedding dance in the temple! It was exhilarating and heartwarming, deep and loving,……….and so much fun!
Congratulations to Tracy and Oliver on your perfect wedding held at Awakening Centre in Maleny, on the Sunshine Coast Hinterland. And a huge thank you to Marion Jonkers Photography for the images.
Wedding in the temple
It began outside the temple. Tracy floated down the wooden steps in a sheer and softly falling wedding dress, with her Mum and her Dad, to the sounds of American Indian drumming.
Andy and Laurel, the owners of the Awakening Centre, greeted her at the foot of the stairs and the three passed through drummed music, a musical cleansing, on the journey to her groom, Oliver. He waited patiently with all the guests on the sandstone paving…with an enormous grin on his face.
Bride and Groom had a moment to greet each other. Celebrant, Kari welcomed the bride’s family reminiscent of village weddings in times gone by. All the guests were invited to shed their shoes and enter the bright airy temple in the round with huge glass windows onto the rainforest backdrop.
Tracy and Oliver waited outside to enjoy a tiny moment’s space before their ceremony. Gently the sounds of the crystal singing bowls lifted up, swam around the space and wafted out to call the bride and groom into the temple space. They floated in on the strains of pure sound.
And thus a wedding ceremony began, in absolute pure happiness. We did not imagine the wedding dance to come.
Handfasting vows
Tracy and Oliver chose a handfasting to make their promises to each other. In a modern interpretation of a traditional ritual, we crafted promises into a series of questions. It was so easy for them to simply respond “I will”. At the finalé, they added their special messages to each other. Oliver began, “You are my puzzle, my world, my best friend,” referring to the pieces of a jigsaw, just like his interlocking puzzle wedding ring. Tracy, in turn told him, ” You are my life partner, my soul mate, my lover, my best friend. ”
A song for the signing
As the papers were signed, Andy Copeman sang one of the most beautiful love songs I know, written by Ewan MacColl for his future wife Peggy Seeger. Andy interspersed the verses with a Sufi poem. It was simply divine
The first time I ever saw your face
The first time ever I saw your face
I thought the sun rose in your eyes
And the moon and the stars were the gifts you gave
To the dark and the endless skies
…….And the first time ever I lay with you
I felt your heart so close to mine
And I knew our joy would fill the earth
And last till the end of time my love
And a spontaneous wedding dance
At the completion of the ceremony and signing, Andy chimed in with “Lay lay, lay lay…” and Leonard Cohen’s endlessly evocative song, Dance Me to the End of Love.
The guests, on a true high spontaneously joined hands and danced in a circle…to the end of love!
Dance me to your beauty with a burning violin Dance me through the panic ’til I’m gathered safely inLift me like an olive branch and be my homeward dove
Dance me to the end of love
……. Dance me to the wedding now, dance me on and on
Dance me very tenderly and dance me very long
We’re both of us beneath our love, we’re both of us above
Dance me to the end of love
Dance me to the end of love Dance me to the children who are asking to be born
Dance me through the curtains that our kisses have outworn
Raise a tent of shelter now, though every thread is torn
Dance me to the end of love
In their words
This is what Tracy and Oliver said:
“We cannot recommend Kari highly enough. Her beautiful spirit and energy and complete professionalism, together with her attention to detail, made our wedding day perfect. We had a small wedding, and we wanted a ceremony that spoke to who we are, far from traditional. We were not very specific in our first meeting with Kari, we came up with very conceptual ideas and Kari turned them into reality, and made them more beautiful than we could have imagined. Kari is able to read and understand a couple extremely well and is a truly beautiful person, and we cannot thank her enough for her part in making our day stress free and truly magical.” Oliver & Tracy
And then there was drinks on the veranda accompanied by the most original platters of food decorations I have ever seen. And of course these were made with love by Tracy’s food loving parents. Yes lots of love was there that day.
So Dance me to the end of love, I say. Just dance me.
Once again, thank you to Marion Jonkers Photography for the images. And to Andy and Laurel at Awakening Centre.
