Today, the Tetons and I were once again conscripted into providing a visiting couple visual proof they were wed in the Hole.
This morning’s wedding was the first of several I will photograph this summer; my Saturdays will henceforth be punctuated by sisterly recitations of that one biblical passage about the resounding gong and the clashing cymbal, plates of poached salmon and questionable renditions of “Mustang Sally.” Though this wasn’t the case today. Today’s ceremony was as simple and pure as can be. The couple was from Washington; John’s a financial reporter for Reuters; Jen’s in “International Affairs.”
It seemed a wedding on a whim. I was hired the day before yesterday. They’d been on a camping road trip, and decided to walk the plank while passing through town. Actually, they’d originally wanted to be married while recently traveling in Mongolia, but the Mongolians had scoffed at that idea. Happily, John and Jen found Montana and Wyoming to have a similar landscape, so they could indeed enjoy the forest steppe climatic zone of their connubial dreams.
John and Jen got a permit from the park to be married at the Jenny Lake overlook, hired me, and recruited as their officiant, Tom Jordan. A municipal judge here in Jackson, Jordan is reputedly stern in his courtroom, especially if you’ve done a few naked laps at the Demo Derby.
Likewise, at weddings, Tom says what he means, but here, what he means is love. From no other officiant do I hear such earnest joy, such rapt devotion to the institution of marriage. Mrs. Jordan, that man is nuts about you. I have no doubt that if Tom kept stats on the success rate (versus the divorce rate) of his clientele, he’d have a league leading batting average.
The ceremony was at the edge of the overlook’s rough granite railing, which is only a few steps down from the parking lot. It’s as busy as mid-summer up there now. Giant buses kept disgorging squadrons of elderly tourists to stand blinking in the sun, recalibrating their brains from the warm, hummy, swervy, morning nap they’d been enjoying on route to the sudden sensory overload of nippy air, big black mountains, and a girl whirling in a blinding white wedding dress.
Before the ceremony, Jen had a few matters to discuss, a few necessary changes to the traditional wedding rite. She didn’t want “obey.” “I never say obey,” said Tom. She didn’t want “’til death do us part.” Tom doesn’t say that either. “No need to be depressing,” he said, adding, “And I don’t say man and wife. He’s already a man.”
Finally, just before the ceremony’s end, she and John would whisper something to each other. “Three letters,” she said, “it’s kind of like our code.”
The witnesses were two elderly ladies from Leicester, England. One held the bride’s fleece jacket as Tom swept us all along on an impassioned reading of the wedding rite. After they’d exchanged rings, but before he pronounced them husband and wife, he whispered to Jen, “Your secret code?” Unfortunately, I couldn’t get close enough fast enough to hear the letters. CIA? THC? WTF?
And then we went off down the trail to the lake shore, so we could include the full glory of Teewinot Mountain and Cascade Canyon in the background of a few portraits before the blushing newlyweds got in their car and spent the rest of the day driving to Denver. I shot them standing on a rock in the water. With a little effort, they managed to get there and back without getting their feet wet.
No muss. No fuss. Perfect.
I just wanted to say that Tom Jordan did my wedding just over a year ago in the town square under one of the Elk horn arches. It was wonderful and if there were anyway I could send him a thank you, I would so it. Being married in the tetons is amazing.