FINDING THE RIGHT READING

So many readings are available.  Have a quick look on the Internet and you will find hundreds.  Here are a couple of sites, Buzzfeed and The Knot..  I have also included below some that have been used at recent ceremonies and are a bit different:

This one comes from So Long and Thanks for All The Fish” by Douglas Adams of Hitchhikers Guide to the Galaxy fame.

They looked at each other for a moment.

 The moment became a longer moment, and suddenly it was a very long moment, so long one could hardly tell where all the time was coming from.

 For he, who could usually contrive to feel self-conscious if left alone for long enough with a Swiss Cheese plant, the moment was one of sustained revelation.  He felt on the sudden like a cramped and zoo-born animal who awakes one morning to find the door to his cage hanging quietly open and the savannah stretching grey and pink to the distant rising sun, while all around new sounds are waking.

 He wondered what the new sounds were as he gazed at her openly wondering face and her eyes that smiled with shared surprise.

 He hadn’t realised that life speaks with a voice to you, a voice that brings you answers to the questions you continually ask of it, have never consciously detected it or recognized its tones till it now said something it had never said to him before, which was “YES”

 

“Yes, I’ll Marry You, My Dear” by Pam Ayres

Yes, I’ll marry you, my dear, and here’s the reason why;

So I can push you out of bed when the baby starts to cry,

And if we hear a knocking and its creepy and its late,

I hand you a torch you see, and you investigate.

Yes, I´ll marry you, my dear, you may not apprehend it

But when the tumble drier goes it’s you that has to mend it.

You have to face the neighbour should our Labrador attack him,

And if a drunkard fondles me, it’s you that has to whack him

Yes, I’ll marry you, you’re virile and you’re lean

My house is like a pigsty, you can help to keep it clean.

That sexy little dinner that you serve by candlelight

As I do chipolatas, you can cook it every night!

It’s you that has to work the drill and put up curtain track.

And when I’ve got PMT it’s you who gets the flak.

I do see great advantages,

But none of them for you, and so before you see the light,

I do, I do, I do.

 

 

AN ANCHOR OR A SAIL?

Graeme Ward

A wedding is a marriage and a marriage is for life

A man gets a wondrous thing when he takes himself a wife

The lady, in this union, will gain a champion bold

To care for her and love her and to keep her from the cold

 

But you must work at marriage to keep it from getting stale

Will you face your challenges as an anchor or a sail?

As you embark upon this journey there’s a simple choice

Getting it right in marriage gives you reason to rejoice

 

Now an anchor is useful thing, solid and reliable

Will keep you safe in harbour and that is undeniable

It ties you down and holds you in the place that you should be

Makes sure you’re never blown off course or simply lost at sea

 

But marriage ties never work when seen as a restriction

Because making less from more must be a contradiction

Do not try to change your spouse to recreate your persona

Today you gained a partner, you did not become an owner

 

So think hard before you stamp your foot or make too many rules

Never persist in argument, that is the way for fools

Find a way to compromise when things do not go your way

Always try to listen and let your partner have their say

 

A useful anchor you could just be, but rather be a sail

Spread your canvas to the welcome wind, grab life by its tail

Look for opportunity; life is a great adventure

Take on all the challenges that it chooses to send you

 

Nick Harkaway

“I need bruschetta (that’s “broo-SKET-uh,” not “brushetter,”) a slender piece of ciabatta toasted and brushed with garlic and oil and covered in fresh tomato and basil– the chunks inevitably fall off the bread and the olive oil runs over your lips and down your chin. The whole thing is delicious, deeply physical and delightfully undignified, and a woman who can eat a real bruschetta is a woman you can love and who can love you. Someone who pushes the thing away because it’s messy is never going to cackle at you toothlessly across the living room of your retirement cottage or drag you back from your sixth heart attack by sheer furious affection. Never happen. You need a woman who isn’t afraid of a faceful of olive oil for that”