We're over two weeks past the wedding, and things have more or less settled into a normal routine. We still have a huge pile of thank you notes to write, and we're still excitedly waiting for all the professional photos and videos to arrive, but we're back to working long hours. There's still time to reminisce, though!
There were a number of symbolic items in our ceremony. Most obvious was the chuppah. This canopy under which the bride and groom stand is representative of the home we will build together. We chose to ask our guests to add flowers to it on their way in, so that they could contribute (metaphorically) to our home.
We had a bag for "kinyan". The idea is that our wedding ceremony is the creation of a partnership (Jewish weddings, depending on how traditional they are, sometimes are based on this, but often are based on the husband's family acquiring the wife, which we found to be weird). To symbolize this, we put items into a bag to indicate that we are pooling our resources, and our possessions will be owned by us as partners in the future. The bag itself was made by Katherine Barron-Hopkins, a dear friend of mine since college, who also served in my wedding party. Into the bag we put our rings, and one other item from each of us. Mandy chose an ink pen, and I chose my grandfather's slide rule. We then held the bag up high as the partnership was made official.
Of course, one of the most well known parts of the Jewish wedding is the breaking of the glass. We decided to be a little bit creative with this part. Rather, I felt inspired and Mandy let me go and be a nerd. I asked my Uncle Steve (who is big into radio equipment) if he could find a vacuum tube for us to stomp on as our glass breaking. That is similar to a light bulb (a very popular choice, due to its ease of breaking and loud pop from air rushing into the vacuum), but way nerdier. I initially thought of doing a photomultiplier tube, but those are too expensive. An old, not-functioning-perfectly vacuum tube was ideal.
I wish I'd taken a photo of it before we stomped on it. It was a nice-looking tube. Well, here's what it looked like afterwards.
We also used kiddush (the Jewish wine blessing) cups with sentimental meaning. Josh brought a kiddush cup from his parents' wedding. Mandy's kiddush cup belonged to her great-grandmother.
There's one more important ceremonial item: the ketubah. This marriage contract was custom designed for our wedding. While having a couple of witnesses sign it is standard, we liked the idea of having everyone in attendance sign around the border, because they were all witnesses to our wedding. We were also fans of the outer space theme.
Maybe this small description will help explain some of the things which our guests saw at the ceremony. And, again, I couldn't be happier with how things went at our wedding!
J