Jul 8, 2010

Dense Joy

We came from all over the place. Some from Chicago and Missouri. Others made the road from New Mexico or from closer to home destinations like Kansas and Oklahoma. We descended in droves on a farm in the middle of Benton, Kansas for the day of days. There was a circus tent and a sandy little beach. Bean Bag tournament and whiskey drinking in the middle of the day with a whole roasted pig and homemade cobbler thrown in for good measure. Did I mention the rain? The deluge did not deter this band of merry-makers who raised their collective heads and scoffed at the blackening sky with smiles of childish glee plastered on adult faces. Cowboy boots and pink prom dresses. More ink on more shades of skin than any up close and gorgeous painting I have ever seen in real life. Big embraces and loud belly shaking laughter pouring out of beautiful mouths playing catch up. Hands on shoulders, faces tilted close, sparkling eyes and the lean in closer, yes closer please, listen.

It was a wedding. A wedding of two so very much in love that they made sunlight wherever they walked. Parted clouds and glowed rainbows in their wake. It was this moment that brought together this motley family, both in blood and in intention. We celebrated under a tent strung with lights with the cacophony of this amazing collective hum making it's way into the coming night. A band capable of shaking the very dirt under your feet taking the tiny makeshift stage set up in the only dry spot left just added the necessary soundtrack. Toasts. Toast the bride and groom! Sing her a song, Ike! And he did, Tom Waits style with her just melting into a puddle of tears over the obscenely amazing boldness of this gesture in front of all of us. More toasts, more laughter like your chest might just burst from all of it, like when you were 5 and your dad tickled you until you couldn't breath. It was like that. And then the fireworks cracking the sky like a million fireflies taking synchronized flight. Arms wrapped around sweaty necks faces tilted upwards, catching the brilliant glow of gunpowder and ingenuity.

And it went this way until sore dancing feet and too much whiskey and the undeniable need to lay down overtook everyone and we meandered our way to trailers and tents pitched under the arms of awaiting trees, tucking in to more open arms and dreams and old quilts. A wedding. A family created and chosen bearing witness to the new fork in the new road of two so very loved. I find myself tearfully grateful and deeply honored to have been one of the ones watching with awed eyes and an open heart the clasping of those two sets of hands and the words that were spoken. And in this moment it becomes so wonderfully clear, family is not only what you have, it is also something you make.