i'm a sucker for a good marriage. er, wedding.

Two of my close friends out here in The Great Bay Area got hitched on Saturday afternoon. It passed the "it's not a great wedding if I don't cry" test with flying colors.

The ceremony was in the Mills College Chapel, which is a small round building with lots of windows and a warm, woody interior. Since the groom was raised Quaker, they had a quasi-Quaker ceremony. This involved the bride and groom sitting with their families on each side of the chapel in silence. For a long time. Thankfully they didn't put us through the hour of silence that would be a regular Quaker meeting, and they capped it at 15 minutes (even though the program warned it would be about 20). A fabulous lutenist played before and after the silence, and then the bride and groom stood at the alter, repeated their one-sentence vows, exchanged rings, and kissed. (Apparently in the rehearsal, the parents said there wouldn't be applause for the kiss. I mean, it's a church, right? WRONG. So much cheering.) Then we all got to sign this HUGE certificate that we were witnesses to the wedding.

The reception was in a small lodge owned by Oakland Parks & Recreation in a forest, and again, with lots of windows and a dark woodsy interior. The couple ordered pizza from ZACHARY'S! It was incredibly delicious. Since they were paying for most everything themselves, things needed to be kept simple. But they managed to put together an incredibly classy but laid-back event. And the cake! The cake! There were two cakes, one chocolate and one 'summer' flavored. Summer apparently tastes like light vanilla cake, almost angel-food-cakey, with vanilla frosting the consistency of whipped butter and strawberries.

This is the couple that I lived with for three weeks before finding a real home, and it was so wonderful to celebrate their relationship and the wonderful future they are going to have. (No apologies for sticky-sweet hackneyed blog posts about weddings. NO IRONY FOR WEDDINGS. ONLY HAPPINESS.) The couple is now in (or on their way to) New Orleans for a week, where they will hopefully make good on their plan to get massages EVERY DAY.