The Location: Both of our parents are still married, which in this day and age is amazing. So we decided, since they were both married in New York City, to honor their marriages by getting married at the Riverside Church, where my parents were married 38 years ago, and then having the reception at Terrace on the Park, where Chris’s parents were married 35 years ago.


The Ceremony: It was important to my mom that we get married in a church, so we had a traditional ceremony in a nondenominational church since Chris is Catholic and I am Protestant. My cousin read a poem, “Because She Would Ask Me Why I Loved Her,” by Christopher Brennan, and my aunt, who is a nun, read 1 Corinthians 13. We also had a candle-lighting ceremony and a soloist sing “Ave Maria.” We wanted it to be short and sweet.


The Moment: When the priest was saying our declaration of intent, Chris wouldn’t let him get to the end of the declaration. He kept interrupting the priest to say, “I will,” after every question: “Chris, will you have Jane to be your wedded wife?” “I will.” “Will you love her, comfort her, honor and keep her, in sickness and in health?” “I will.” At the end of it—“Will you be her faithful husband so long as you both shall live?”—our priest, who was quite funny, said, “I know you will,” and everyone in the church started to laugh. Later, Chris told me that he was just so anxious to have me be his wife.


The Unique Feature: Instead of party favors, we gave a 9/11 charity organization money in our guests’ names.