This one year, back when I was in high school, I spent a part of my Christmas holidays in Vancouver visiting some friends.  I was due to come home a few days before the new year.  My dad, who had been in the U.S. while I was in Vancouver, was going to meet me at the International Terminal and we were going to fly home to Ontario together.  But like most travel arrangements…things didn’t exactly go as planned!

The morning that my dad and I were supposed to meet in Vancouver and start heading home, a giant snow storm tore through most of the Western Coastline and brought everything to a screeching halt.  Try to remember that when I was back in high school, cell phones had yet to be invented, hence, instant communication wasn’t quite so available.  I ended up spending two days at the International Terminal in Vancouver waiting for my dad and together, we spent another twenty-four hours trying to get home {which also included in-flight champagne and ice cream bars as we celebrated the new year somewhere over the Rockie Mountains!}.  It was a long and treacherous trip home.  It was a long and tiresome wait in Vancouver.  But, I discovered something incredibly beautiful during that time…that international airports are perhaps the happiest places on earth!

I spent most of my two days at the Vancouver airport sitting up against a wall looking in towards the terminal.  Along side me were the automatic doors that gave international passengers their first glimpse at the world awaiting them on the other side.  And I swear that barely a moment went by while I was sitting there that I wasn’t smiling!  People would anxiously come through the doors…standing on their tippy-toes, looking for the faces of loved ones that they had patiently been waiting to see.  Once found…it was the grandest of reunions.  People smiled…they laughed…they cried…they hugged.  But mostly, they just radiated joy.  They had found each other.  In this mess of a storm…in this mess of an airport…in this mess of a world…they had found each other.  And they had no plans of ever letting go.

I was reminded of this story as Crystal and I were walking towards her groom, who was patiently waiting among the trees to see her for the first time on their wedding day.  As we came up over the hill, she gently lifted her dress, stood on the very tips of her toes and in her most excited of voices, looked at me and said “ohhh…I can see him…I can see my groom!”  I thought that she was going to jump out of her heels with anticipation!

Crystal and Matt are two of the loveliest people that you could ever meet and I’ve been waiting for this wedding for a very long time.  Since the first time that Crystal told me she had met this really cute guy…I had been waiting!  Since the first time that she told me that they were going out on a date…I had been waiting!  Since the first time I noticed that she couldn’t even say Matt’s name without beaming from ear to ear…I had been waiting!  Because great love is always worth waiting for.  Great love for great friends is always worth waiting for.  And like sitting at the International Terminal watching family be reunited through the opening of some automatic doors, Crystal and Matt made their way through the crowds….through this craziness that is life…and they found each other!  And from the smiles that never once left their faces the entire day…you could tell that they had no plans of ever letting go.

Crystal and Matt, you have both become so near and dear to my heart.  Watching you stand before your family and friends to give your life and your love to each other will forever bring a smile to my face.  Thank you for not only sharing it all with me…but thank you for trusting it all with me…

xoxo