Nova:

Hello from the heart to our friends and family, loved ones and lovebirds, movers and shakers and artistic spoon makers. I am so honored and excited to get to invite you all into this warm air, this sun shining grasp of love, and this hope I have for us to sink into our vulnerable, feeling bodies, minds, and spirits. I am so enamored with each and every one of you, the human in you, the poetry in your heart, the songs of life you sing and the ways you inspire me and have touched our lives and watched us grow. What makes today special (besides, of course, getting to share with you all the amazing wonderful man that is Alex Ezorsky, and the love we share) - is You. It's watching you guys - meeting one another, providing space for you to bond and connect, and maybe see old friends. Nothing in my life has felt more meaningful than creating space for beautiful humans to experience love and growth. It's what I do in my work with kids, it's what I try to do in my past and current homes with friends, it's the energy I try to invite in when I curate parties or collaborate on workshops, and it's also what inspires me to find so much meaning in hosting this wedding. Hopefully it provides a centering, safe, loving space for you to reflect on the ways you love in your lives - what is meaningful to you? How's your self-love game going? Who do you want to connect with more deeply, and how? How do you like to be loved, and by whom? What are your philosophies around love? Really.... it's an excuse to host a weekend-long workshop and ongoing discussion on Love, and selfishly, see your faces ALL AT THE SAME TIME. WOW. I know weddings are dull for some, or come off superficial, or feel too long and too boring... we'll do our best and see what happens.

I'll be honest, I'm so excited to put on some fun wedding costumes and dance around and tell y'all in joyful shouts from mountaintops how much I love this man, because I really think we have something special and wish for everyone I've ever brushed shoulders with to experience this kind of love in this lifetime. But I'm also excited to see you, to embrace you, to create space for you, and to be with you.

In community, love, and light -

Nova

Alex:

🙄🥺😭🤧🥰…

👋 I am getting married to Nova Reilly because I love her infinitely and she has suggested that we share this infinite love for each other in a more ceremonial way in front of you. Since I have infinity love for her there is plenty leftover to show and tell even if I personally find the act of sharing one’s interpersonal love a strange or braggy thing to do. Apparently people like it. Come to think of it, I’ve liked it myself; I’ve been at weddings where the love was beautiful and made me feel things. I guess I’ve always just felt they "had" to do that because their families made them do it, which meant I saw it as less of a “look at us love and kiss” and more of a “sorry you have to watch us LOVE EACHOTHER, pff, parents, whattaya gonna do? 🤷‍♀️🤷 Lets dance!💃🕺”. But thinking back on it they almost certainly decided of their own free will to ask everyone watch them kiss! I can’t believe I fell for their secret plan to show off their love under the cover of formality! Blame the fact that I’m a child of divorce, or a dude, or a nerd, but I’ve always thought there had to be more to the story of “why wedding” than the modern sorry-not-sorry coy-love-boast. So to find a deeper meaning and understanding of my place in all this, I’ve done some research:

Not so long ago this ceremony was largely for families to show to their community that they formally agreed their kids could fuck and make babies. An agreement made likely after the parents weighed the pro’s and con’s like whose family would be the heir to what and balanced the scales by throwing in a donkey or some jewelry. They showed this bond between two people very publicly, so much in fact a “bedding” ceremony was where family and friends could watch them fuck, (or pretend to…) Woah!...All publicly in front of other people and GOD so nobody could back out of the deal, also because paperwork is boring and reading is hard. The result was that everyone knew what to do if there was ever a little baby running around naked pooping in people’s gardens. The locals who were at the wedding could say hey isn’t that Nova’s kid? Where is Nova? Oh right, hiding from the marauding murder men of the next clan over. Hey I was at that wedding and Alex promised 7 goats to protect her from the murder men, and look after the baby, where the hell is he? Oh right, defending us against the murder men with his catapult invention. Well if I remember correctly his parents agreed to this baby too, oh there they are, hey old people in their 40’s clean up this poopy baby.

Luckily today things are way chiller. We live in a time when the bonds of partners, family and friends are less frequently tested. So what’s left? A tradition of publicly claiming two folks are gonna fuck and take care of eachother and maybe make babies. Luckily over the years we’ve added things! Especially the part where the two people who are gonna fuck actually love eachother, and not because their parents said to.

Nova and I love eachother an insane amount. You may have thought you knew how much since you’ve met us before but y'all have no idea. There is so much more love left to share. Why do you wanna see that? Maybe you find it inspiring? Maybe you like watching love because it’s a potentially infinite unconditional replenishable and shareable source of positive energy and connectedness? Or maybe it’s some sort of sick masochistic self loathing kink thing?* Or maybe you’re just here for the party?! Since I, and it seems much of modern society, aren’t really clear on what weddings are for except some folks like watching love, some folks love loving publicly and it’s a great excuse for a party, we are gonna throw the most fun love-loving Nova-Love-Alex love party we can. Not only will it be an amazing party/art performance but you won’t even be expected to help enforce our vows around love or land management or make sure the donkeys are in the right hands, nor will you have to look after our naked poopy baby if/when we have one (though that could really help🙏).

Also, I wrote this poem:

For what it’s worth and worth it be

like everything, our love’s origin a mystery

But there it sits,

a geyser that only exists betwixt

Nova and me,

And shoots love into each of us and out to infinity

Filling our hearts such that even though their size be ever-so,

Still they overflow

And ironic as it may be, for a fool to feel abashed

Bathing in our loving pool I still fear what would happen if a splash

Ever hit the eye of a passerby and think we simply boast,

Or that our love so loud only justified by doing it for likes on the post.

So when Nova asked if I’d like to invite a hundred or so folks

to witness as we promenade ourselves and have them make a toast

I must admit that though I knew our love doth spew from nature real and true

I found myself amongst the flattery wondering not why we must say “I do”…

But why it must be in front of all of you?

A thousand reasons could come to mind

Ranging from the selfish to the loving kind

Or those that were spoken from my love to me, and i wont be forgetting

But dangit I’m sorry, I just gotta know the history of this thing called “wedding”

As it turns out and I'm sure you’re not surprised to find it be

A marriage was not made public so the town could simply scoff or glee

All attendants were truly there to hold accountable the pacts made by joining families

A set of plans by patriarchs bartering an exchange of heirs for land or ox or carts

And the two two be entangled angled as pawns who simply must play their part

And all who witnessed the central two say I do can, as good neighbors, keep them true

In other words the word is bond and in bondage sew a new

patch in the fabric quilt of families through time, love is just the sinew

But in times of new when ox and cart or castle tower

Mean little to the people who drive in cars far below those with true power

What vows are left which still hold heft and are worthy of proclaiming?

If I were to shout from mountain top to town below all for that I’m aiming,

“To be with Nova as deeply as the geyser blasts and lasts as long as time is old!”

“How great, hurrah 🙄, that’s nice, and so do we with ours or hope to be,

what did you need us to uphold?”

With no more fear of theft of chests or ox or crowns

And since our actions or inactions are unlikely to unsettle towns

I shall use this PDA appreciation day between a queen of loving art and this artsy clown

To ask for your collective hands in witnessing your own connection

a proclamation that comes from us but I think could use your protection

That love itself, be it from the geyser of Alova or anywhere it is found

All in fact connected via the deep mystery underground,

When arises that it be guided hand to hand,

To fill up the deserts and bring fertile land

And collectively we weed and seed and reap and sow

And weep and grow and have and hold and warmth in cold

In sickness and health and in poverty or wealth

Never be afraid to let love show

* [wait - No don’t come if this is your self-loathing kink, please get help, there is someone for everyone, just do whatever self-work you need to do to raise your self esteem, and or lower your bar, just be well, you can come to our anniversary when you’re feeling better.]

Photos