The Script

PROCESSIONAL: Bach's “Jesu, Joy of Man’s Desiring” performed by Kingsbury Strings

OPENING WORDS OF OFFICIANT MARY JOAN COLLINS:
Friends, we have been invited here today to share with Kathryn Mari Phillips and Kelley Elizabeth Quinn a very important moment in their lives. In the past six years, their love and understanding of each other has grown and matured, and now they have decided to enter a civil marriage.
In the words of Massachusetts Supreme Court Justice Margaret Marshall, a civil marriage is “at once a deeply personal commitment to another human being and a highly public celebration of the ideals of mutuality, companionship, intimacy, fidelity, and family. It is an association that promotes a way of life, not causes; a harmony in living, not political faiths; a bilateral loyalty, not commercial or social projects. Because it fulfils yearnings for security, safe haven, and connection that express our common humanity, civil marriage is an esteemed institution, and the decision whether and whom to marry is among life's momentous acts of self-definition.”
It is fitting that we gather here today because this is where Kati and Kelley were alone for the first time, explored each other and fell in love.

(Mary Joan, one of Kelley's longtime friends from Elmira, then gave her take on the ceremony.)

READINGS
“The First Day” by Christina Rossetti. Read by Heather Pitzel, Kati's college newspaper editor.

I wish I could remember the first day,
First hour, first moment of your meeting me;
If bright or dim the season, it might be
Summer or winter for aught I can say.
So unrecorded did it slip away,
So blind was I to see and to foresee,
So dull to mark the budding of my tree
That would not blossom yet for many a May.
If only I could recollect it! Such
A day of days! I let it come and go
As traceless as a thaw of bygone snow.
It seemed to mean so little, meant so much!
If only now I could recall that touch,
First touch of hand in hand! – Did one but know.

“Madonna of the Evening Flowers” by Amy Lowell. Read by Moira Crowley, a longtime friend Kati met at the Daily Iowan.

All day long I have been working,
Now I am tired.
I call: “Where are you?”
But there is only the oak-tree rustling in the wind.
The house is very quiet,
The sun shines on your books,
On your scissors and thimble just put down,
But you are not there.
Suddenly I am lonely:
Where are you?
I go about searching.
Then I see you,
Standing under a spire of pale blue larkspur,
With a basket of roses on your arm.
You are cool, like silver,
And you smile.
I think the Canterbury bells are playing little tunes.
You tell me that the peonies need spraying,
That the columbines have overrun all bounds,
That the pyrus japonica should be cut back and
rounded.
You tell me these things.
But I look at you, heart of silver,
White heart-flame of polished silver,
Burning beneath the blue steeples of the larkspur,
And I long to kneel instantly at your feet,
While all about us peal the loud, sweet Te Deums
Of the Canterbury bells.

VOWS

(We read vows that we wrote ourselves. Then we had our friends read these vows to us and we replied in the affirmative.)

Do you promise to be faithful and honest in every way and to honor the faith and trust that is placed in you by (Kelley or Kati)?
Do you promise to love and respect (Kati or Kelley) in her successes and her failures, to work at your love and always make her a priority in your life?
Do you promise to stand by (Kelley or Kati) and lift her up so that through your union you can accomplish more than you could alone?
Do you promise to make (Kati or Kelley) laugh, to softly kiss her when she is hurting and to be her companion and best friend all the days of your life?

EXCHANGE OF RINGS: Adapted from "Illuminata" by Marianne Williamson
With this ring I give you my promise that from this day forward you shall not walk alone. May my heart be your shelter and my arms be your home.

DECLARATION OF COMMITMENT BY COLLINS: Adapted from a Native American prayer

Kati and Kelley by taking these vows you have changed the course of your lives.
Now you will feel no rain,
For each of you will be shelter to the other.
Now you will feel no cold,
For each of you will be warmth to the other.
Now there is no more loneliness,
For each of you will be companion to the other.
Now you are two bodies,
But there is only one life before you.
Go now and enter the days of your togetherness
And may your days be good and long upon the earth.
You may now kiss your bride.

INTRODUCTION OF NEWLYWEDS BY COLLINS
I present to you Kathryn and Kelley Phillips-Quinn. You may now kiss your bride.

RECESSIONAL: Queen, “Best Friend”