The Illustrious Siegel-Pearson Wedding
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So, as I expected, as soon as my parents had arrived at the beginning of the month, I got too caught up in the torrent of family events to do any writing. The days leading up to Seth and Rachel's wedding were filled with preparations and lots of family together-time. We held a kiddush at the Kol Rina synagogue in the Jerusalem neighborhood of Nachlaot on the Shabbos before the wedding. The next Sunday I spent shopping for a suit at the mall with Avishai happily helping me out with an extra queer eye to find just the right style. He also loaned me a beautiful black woven kippah trimmed with blue to wear with my new threads at the wedding, and I thought it really made the ensemble.
The wedding itself was wonderful. The locale was gorgeous, the ceremony was tear-jerking, the artwork that Rachel's mother did for the ketubah (marriage contract) and the chuppah (wedding canopy) was magnificent, the food was excellent, and the music and dancing were jubilant. I got plenty of opportunity to wow the crowd by spinning fire with a set of poi that Seth's (now former) roommate David graciously lent me. I consider myself quite lucky for that, since I'd feared that my plans for such a performance would be ruined with all my equipment stuck in Tzfat with the rockets whizzing by. Finally, the wedding was a precious opportunity to savor visits with the various family members who had come and to meet more of Seth and Rachel's friends.
In the weeks before the wedding, I'd heard some friends and family from outside the country wonder if the wedding would even still be taking place. I'm glad that we were able to prove to the world that it takes a helluva lot more than a war to stop this family from celebrating our joy.
I plan to write about World Pride week in my next entry, but for now I'll finish off by linking to Moshe Chaim's blog, which features a lot of reports from my fellow Tzfat residents on the experiences during the war.