My Big Fat Pagan Handfasting

It was a cold, snowy, Valentine’s Day. Sunnie and I were celebrating our 5th Wedding Anniversary and we had planned to as the Catholics say, have our Marriage blessed. The night before and part of Valentine’s day it snowed, sleeted, and had episodes of freezing rain, so for all intent & purposes, we had to postpone our Handfasting until the following Saturday. I posted several times on the NE Pagans group on Yahoo to which I belong that we were Hand fasting to see who was coming, but mainly what I found out was that a majority of Pagans as well as running on Pagan Standard Time (PST), they fail to ever post responses to any surveys ever posted. Two sets of people did contact me directly that they were coming & 3 sets did contact me that they would not be able to make it. The only family member I did tell about it outside of my kids was my sister, but she declined because she is still trying to deal with me “coming out of the broom closet” and being a devout Catholic, did not want to compromise anything in her faith. I hold no ill will towards her for that, but we even had a lengthy conversation regarding this several days before, but she is set in her ways and if this is a sample of how my parents will take it, it will be some time before I tell them even though I have been dropping subtle hints here and there to ease them into knowing that their son is a Witch. I just wish that people would open their minds and not be clouded by the prejudices instilled in them by the Catholic Church. I think I will send my sister the 13 Principles of Wiccan Belief to better educate her & once I get the TLC special about Witches that aired the other night.

Fast forward to Saturday, February, 17th, a cold winter night, by clear with no snow, this time it’s a go. I spent most of the day cleaning my house up due to 5 kids with 2 teenage slobs included. My 19 month old actually picks up after himself better than my 17 yo & 14 yo, but that’s a different blog. Talitha was the first to arrive very fashionably early at 5:30 pm (this is very rare for a Pagan fore most Pagans follow PST, Pagan Standard Time, which means your are always late. The next guest was my 5 month pregnant daughter Caitlyn who came without her boyfriend because he is not religious; handfasting is the same as marriage, with the only difference being we bless the marriage. The third guest was Sunnie’s friend Sue, nicknamed “The Church Lady” by me and my friends, who eventhough is a Methodist, is very open minded and provided pictures of the event. My sons Bobby, Aidan, & Liam were already here, and my step-daughter Abria was away for her HS retreat weekend, that left Tempest & Brenda because the rest of my Coven bailed on us due to one thing or the other or prior commitments. Tempest and Brenda held to true PST by arriving at 7:30 for a 7 pm event. With my family here, my dearest Covenmates & HPS, and friend/photographer, we all merged to the basement where I set the Altar up and we were ready to go.
Talitha led us through a beautiful Handfasting Ceremony that she uses as a standard with the addition to the Rose Ceremony that Sunnie & me added. Talitha blessed our rings, and asked us both positive and negative questions to which we responded “I will!” to the positive and “I may.” to the negative with “Is that your intent?” asked following that to which we responded, “No!”. After the questions, a cord was draped over our arms which ended up totaling six and the knot was tied. Our Handfasting cord now hangs at the traditional spot on the wall above our bed to serve as a reminder to our Love. After the Ceremony we feasted on steak, chicken, a veggie stir fry, buttered rice, salad, & caramel-apple cheesecake. All in all, I am glad that we chose to renew our vows on our 5th Anniversary and to bless our marriage in the eyes of the God & the Goddess!

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