It was such a tremendous day that I went home with a headache, and my eyes full of tears. My heart was nearly shattered from the day’s emotions, while my mind was overrun with images of the never-to-be repeated past…The wedding day of my first born… The tiny baby girl that I would rush home from work everyday just to hold and kiss and sing to… My little Britany… The heart and soul of me is now someone’s wife!
Weddings are very special events that not only mark the passage of time, but announce the beginning of new life. On June 29, 2008 Britany and Marc Alexander began their new life together… Mine ended and began anew the same day. It was a journey that only a protective father can make, and he does it in the secret of his own joy and pain.
The walk “down the aisle” was brief, but at the same time very long. You hold your little baby-now-woman by the hand and take her to her new life; her new man… He is now “the man” and you are now a memory. If you raised your daughter right, and if your investment in her was unconditionally and significantly love based, then you’ll be a very pleasant memory. You also get the privilege of knowing for certain that your baby-now-woman does not really need you like she once did, and that your purpose has been fulfilled… You go home and cry some more…
It is one of the greatest moments of fatherhood, and as my ace dog Roger would say, “You’ve got to be a man just to look at it!” This is what every father wants: to know that his daughter can say goodbye to childhood relationships and matriculate into the world that awaits her; a world of open arms and sharp teeth.
On my baby’s wedding day, I observed a world with open arms. I saw a man after my own heart embrace her with love and humility. My new purpose in life is to embrace them both as one and love them as if they both still need me…
I do…
GLM
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