Love Notes: The Beautiful Goodbye (Vol. 16)

The part of being a wedding officiant I never expected.

There is a moment after almost every wedding when everything suddenly becomes quiet. The vows have been spoken. The rings are on. The kiss happened. Everyone cheered. Pictures are being taken, the celebration is moving on, and somewhere in all of that happiness, I feel a little something else.

A loss.

I know that might sound strange. After all, I’m a wedding officiant. My job ends with one of the happiest moments of someone’s life. But nobody warned me about the goodbye.

Most of my couples begin as two names on my screen. An inquiry comes in. We schedule a call. I ask about their date, their venue, and their ceremony. Then I ask about them.

And that’s when everything changes.

I learn how they met, what they love about each other, what makes them laugh, and the little things that make their relationship theirs. They tell me about their families, the people who shaped them, and sometimes the people they wish could still be there. They trust me with pieces of their lives, and somewhere between the questionnaires, phone calls, texts, and ceremony drafts, they stop feeling like clients.

They become my couples.

Then, when I’m part of the rehearsal, the circle gets even bigger. I meet their parents, siblings, grandparents, bridal party, and friends. I meet the people who want this day to be perfect almost as much as the couple does.

We practice. We laugh. Someone forgets where they’re supposed to stand. A parent gets emotional. A friend asks a dozen questions because they want to make sure everything is just right. And for this tiny window of time, I get folded into their world.

By the wedding day, I recognize faces. Someone waves. A parent hugs me. The bridal party knows me. And then I see my couple—the two names that once appeared in an inquiry—standing in front of me ready to get married.

For those 20-or-so minutes, I get one of the greatest privileges of what I do. I stand beside them while they make promises to each other, surrounded by the people who love them most.

Then I pronounce them married.

They kiss. Everyone cheers.

And just like that, the goodbye begins.

It’s not only the couple I’ll miss. It’s the mom who hugged me. The dad who made me laugh. The friend determined to make everything perfect. The bridal party I tried to keep in line at rehearsal. The grandparents, siblings, and all of the people whose lives briefly crossed mine because we were there to celebrate the same love story.

Most of them I may never see again.

And sometimes the drive home feels a little quieter because of it.

I’ve realized that the sadness doesn’t take anything away from the happiness. They can exist in the same place. I’m thrilled that my couple is married. That’s what we were working toward all along. I want them to walk away from me, hand in hand, into the next chapter of their lives.

But I can miss them, too.

I suppose I could make this easier on myself. I could show up, read a script, sign a license, and go home. But that wouldn’t be Moore Love. I don’t want to simply know what time your ceremony starts. I want to know why you chose each other.

And if caring that much means there’s a little ache when it’s over, I think that’s part of the privilege.

Because you don’t miss something that didn’t matter.

So yes, I grieve my weddings a little. Not because something went wrong, but because something went right. For a little while, I was invited into their circle. I learned their story. I met their people. I stood beside them.

And then I got to watch them walk away from me married.

Maybe that’s what The Beautiful Goodbye really is.

Knowing that my part in their story was always meant to have an ending.

I helped them get to the beginning of theirs.

Then another inquiry arrives. Two new names appear on my screen. Another story begins. And eventually, I’ll care about them, too.

I’ll pack my binder after their wedding, hug everyone goodbye, and head home with a full heart and that familiar little ache.

What a privilege it was to be part of their story.

And what a beautiful goodbye.

Moore Love Always, 

Kelly

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