For Casey and André

 

For Casey and André 

Dearest family members and friends of Casey and André, 

Welcome to this celebration of love and commitment. With your permission, I would like to introduce myself. First and foremost, I must say I am not a judge, a priest, a pastor, a rabbi, a Muslim officer, or any other type of powerful person in the legal or spiritual spheres. I am here to conduct the wedding of Casey Snook and André Krüger because of the special bonds of love and friendship that have been blossomed since the day I received a visit from a young and enthusiastic engineering student at my office at the University of Massachusetts Dartmouth.

It was almost exactly eight years ago, then, when Casey wanted permission to enroll in my Portuguese 101 class. It was by chance that we met, really, since all she needed was another three credits to fulfill her Honors Program requisite. Lucky me! I got a lot more than a new student: a new wonderful friend, one of those people we can easily call kin-souls.

What kind of friend, though? Well, it’s a long story, which I promise to cut short. Right away, that morning in my office, I realized she was not an average student or an average person. She displayed a remarkable zest for learning. She was lively and articulate. She was determined and convincing. Even though she had presented herself as an engineering major, she soon showed me that her ease with numbers and hard science was just one among her many talents. In the following weeks I learned that she was taking intermediate Arabic, that she knew some Italian and some Spanish from family interactions and travel experiences, that she played various musical instruments, that she sang, danced and performed in public as part of a course on old Asian music and another on African traditions. Among several other ways of being an active student on campus and off campus, Casey was moved by very different impulses to pursue two of her passions: in Ghana, she would improve her musical skills, and, in Panama, she would work on different means to help the poor in desperate need for running and drinking water.

As that Fall semester unfolded in 2014, we had other several conversations in my office. I realized, then, that she had a passion for helping solve some of the planet’s gravest concerns. That desire fomented her interest in travelling, which, in turn, fed her craving for learning foreign languages and cultures. We did have much in common, including our appreciation for music and travel, and the passionate attachment to our families and friends. Casey definitely had other traits that I greatly admired, like courage and determination. They were also further evident as I read her entertaining and elucidating blog entries that discuss a plethora of cultural adventures and geophysical discoveries around the globe. As the following school semesters passed, I could attend several of her dance and music performances. I saw those traits, too, as she interacted with her peers, instructors and family, whom my wife and I eventually had the honor of meeting and becoming friends with.

Then there was the day I met André. What a fine young man, I immediately I sensed that Casey had scored highly again in life. There were many opportunities for me to learn about his intelligence, flexibility, kindness, patience – an amazingly loving personality. For that realization, I had the honor of spending time with him not only in New England, back in the United States, but also in Berlin, in his own country, where he made sure we would enjoy fantastic nights at venues offering jazz gigs. I was also impressed by the large number and endearing character of the Facebook messages he received when he finished up his internship in the Boston area. Best of all was to see how André treated Casey on a day-to-day basis. On so many of such occasions, I simply wished I was just like him.

In fact, the day-to-day deeds matter a whole lot, and that’s how I would prefer approaching the feelings and expectations behind the reason for us to gather at this marvelous place called Casa Felix: Casey and André’s wedding. This is the second time in my life when I have the delight and distinction of officiating a ceremony in which two beings join hands and hearts for a life together. I am deeply grateful to you two, Casey and André, for the joy your invitation gave me, and also for the trust in my capacity to add a little color and flavor to this exuberant festivity. But because I am a man with a penchant for literature, I cannot put aside the ending of the second act of Our Town, a 1938 theatrical play by the North American author Thornton Wilder. The story takes place in Grover’s Corners, a fictional small town in New Hampshire, not far at all from Casey’s birthplace. I’m sure some of you have read it. It is a classic piece of modern drama that was heavily influenced by existentialism.

You know, those darn existentialists! They are profound and precise in their thinking, but they can be too boringly and painfully pessimistic sometimes, a sort of pessimism that we can use for humor, of course. Breaking with realism, it is the Stage Manager who walks out of his role and plays the part of the clergyman in the wedding of Emily and George. Looking aside, the clergyman certainly shocks the bride and groom, plus the rest of his audience: “I've married over two hundred couples in my day. Do I believe in it? I don't know.” He emphasizes the element of boredom in a long-lasting relationship: “The cottage, the go-cart, the Sunday-afternoon drives in the Ford, the first rheumatism, the grandchildren, the second rheumatism, the deathbed, the reading of the will.” Yes, I think it is appropriate to laugh.

The stage directions explain that the scene takes a different tone, though, when he looks at the audience for the first time, with a warm smile that removes any sense of cynicism from the next line. On marriage, the clergyman adds, “Once in a thousand times it's interesting.” Wait a minute, this is not necessarily the point of view of the play. It’s that of just one character, a minister in disguise. If that character’s words are true, which I think are not, I firmly believe that, in light of what I said about Casey and André, these two extraordinary human beings are genuinely equipped and prepared to be that one couple in a thousand. To be fair to Thornton Wilder, we must remember that he ends the first act of that famous drama three years after the start of the action. The Stage Manager is busy at this time saying that a lot can happen in a thousand days. “Yes, the mountain got bit away a few fractions of an inch; millions of gallons of water went by the mill; and here and there a new home was set up under a roof,” he conjures. “Nature's been pushing and contriving in other ways, too: a number of young people fell in love and got married.” Then he concludes, “Almost everybody in the world gets married, you know what I mean? In our town there aren't hardly any exceptions. Most everybody in the world climbs into their graves married.”

Maybe this part of the script is essentially true, but it doesn’t matter. One of these days I will Google that question and let you know. What I am here to argue about, though, is the beauty and power of love, the whole reason we have come to Casa Felix.

My studies in philosophy, history or literature have not confirmed it yet in great details, but we kind of know that faith in love in a life by two is an old thing. There is also a loud and attractive cousin of love, that which we call passion. Passion can be a really loving sister to love, but many times that cousin-sister simply fades away. Worse than that, if confined in disappointment, passion can hurt and blind us. In my opinion, there is nothing intrinsically bad about passion, even though it can push a person very far away from what love is all about: to wish and to strive for the well-being and happiness of the ones we love.

We do not need existentialism, however, to realize that life is tough, a world of thick and tricky woods we have to walk through somehow and, hopefully, enjoy it to the core, at least from time to time. Different from passion, which, some say, can easily turn into a torment that may drive us crazy, love often is a comforting grass to sit on, enjoy and rest, before it empowers us to move forward with our plans and goals through the woods, as they never cease to surprise us, with bright sunny days or dark cloudy skies.

As Wilder’s Stage Manager suggests, love is certainly one of the most widely taken paths through the woods of life. Those of us who live with our partners know about the sweet and the sour days of existence. So, what? What kind of bliss would we have here today, under these amazing clear skies, if it were not for the gloomy cloudy hours? What matters is the faith we deposit into and extract from the love we feel for our partners! What counts is the chance to look deep into our loved one’s eyes and recognize their love while thinking that we live together because that is our option, our determination to make life better that way, while creating and discovering moments of pure joy and gratitude for each other. What indeed helps us is to accept and embrace life as it is, both for how it can be unexpected and challenging but also generate even more love between us. Love, that way, may provide us with simple and easy respite or with long-lasting strength and courage that grow inside without our knowing how or why.

Honestly, all we need in order to understand and believe those powers of love is to take a look at Casey’s and André’s shinning eyes. This is enough for all of us physically here, and for all of those who could not join us today, to garner faith and joy in the decision they have assumed together. To all of you I ask to pause and think quietly and exclusively of Casey and André sometime tonight. May we all feel the tremendous inspiration that they bring us, as they celebrate their union with us. In our brief spiritual retreat somewhere, may we say a little prayer for these loving human beings. At this moment, though, if I may, I would invite you to salute the couple with a very warm round of applause, even before they exchange their rings and their vows. Of course, we will do that again, then, after the vows, and then again and again, ad infinitum!

 

Casa Felix

Olivella, Province of Barcelona, Spain

September 21, 2022