Higher Order

 Going to a wedding, something I had not done for a few years, gave me time to reflect. It's been nearly twenty-eight years since I was in the center ring, or fourteen if you're counting that giddy little celebration with Elvis in Vegas. Saying those vows, and then reaffirming them in front of the King, was by far the most committed I have ever been to anything. Ever. Most of my life I have made the impression of someone with dogged determination and tenacity, devoted to people and causes. But I am careful about leaving myself a way out. I'm the guy who never leaves a five star review. I don't like to say always and never unless it supports hyperbole. My wife has had to suffer with my insistence that there is no such thing as unconditional love. 

Which, oddly enough, seems to be a condition of our love. 

And yet, there I stood on a hillside in Colorado and later an ersatz chapel just off the strip in Las Vegas, pledging my devotion to this on person. Committing to this one relationship. In front of witnesses. And the aforementioned Elvis. It is as close as I come to holy, or wholly for that matter. 

That's probably why I found myself, the night before yet another outdoor wedding in Colorado I found myself talking with the woman who would be officiating at the ceremony. I asked her if this was her calling or if this was one of the quickie deals she had done online. It was the latter. She went to great lengths to assure me that this did not in any way diminish her fidelity to the moment and the couple she was slated to join the following day. She felt the conviction to her calling, even if it came from the mother of the bride and not the Flying Spaghetti Monster or some other deity.

So I asked her how she did it. She explained the process as ridiculously simple as I had heard it might be from others in the past. And later the next day as my family sat at a table on top of Pikes Peak, I had access to Al Gore's Internet and I made the necessary clicks to become ordained as a minister of the Universal Life Church. I don't need to be Elvis or a priest or a student of the ancient scrolls. I tend to be found poking fun at God more often than I am fearing him. Or them. Or pronouns too great to be imagined. But I am now officially open for business. 

I am available for weddings. I will bring people together in that way that I enjoyed so very much all those years ago. And I promise to try and keep a straight face while I do it. Sarcasm isn't the problem here. It's just not that easy to contain all the joy.