July Weddings | Themes and Elements

A few days ago I began early preparation for a wedding that I am officiating in July 2016. My clients are planning to do the legal bit the week before elsewhere in Europe, with a number of their nearest and dearest in tow, returning to England for a larger ceremony and celebration. 

The theme of the ceremony that I am preparing in consultation with the happy couple is vintage, village fete. The ceremony itself is taking place in a village hall and following this all guests will have the opportunity to indulge in some fete day games and activities in the grounds. All key players will be wearing a combination of red, white and blue and I'm already planning my outfit. 

At our first meeting we talked about possible extra elements and under consideration are Hand Wrapping, Wine Box/Love Letter and Rose Ceremony. There’s plenty of time of course and other options are possible (see Elements page for details).

It’s never too early to begin thinking about your wedding/renewal of vows/commitment ceremony so do get in touch to discuss themes and possible elements.

Grief as an Embodied Experience | Occupations and Relationships

This last week has been a busy one. On Tuesday the 14^th July it would have been the 84^th birthday of my mum Dorothy Thornton. I bought plants and flowers and some sparkly birthday table decorations and with my friend Vanessa travelled to Coverack for the day to visit the graveyard where my mum and my dad are buried. 

The day my mum died my life changed forever, not just because I’d lost the most significant person in my life but also because I’d lost another part of my identity. As I’ve written previously I am a widow and sadly have never achieved biological motherhood. Having no siblings I don’t know anyone else with a similarly ‘rootless’ identity. And yet, I feel lucky to have in my life a number of VERY significant others; close friends and extended family members. One term for unrelated family is ‘fictive kin’. But despite agreeing with others who suggest that the word ‘fiction’ no longer equals falsehood and the opposite of ‘truth’ I struggle with the suggestion that fictive kin are ‘unreal’. So  I prefer ‘family of choice’ and ‘friends as family'.

Some of my most significant others came with me/I met at the annual summer conference of the British Sociological Association Auto/Biography Study Group which took place in the beautiful Dartington Hall in Devon Thursday 16^th-Saturday18th July. The theme of the conference this year was Formal and Informal education: lives, works and relationships and although we worked hard sharing our work and commenting on each other’s ideas there was time for discussion of more personal concerns and for the nurturing of good friendships and the making of new ones. My paper ‘‘Active Recovery’: reflections on embodied learning’ was the third in what I’ve come to think of as my grief trilogy. In July 2010 in my paper ‘Auto/Biographical Reflections on Personal and Other Legacies: much more than money’ (Letherby 2011, 2014) I focused on my relationship with my late father Ron Thornton (1923-1979) and husband John Shiels (1948-2010) highlighting the interconnections between us and supporting the continuing bonds approach to bereavement and loss. In ‘Myself and Other Human Animals (Or Babies and Bathwater)’ (Letherby 2015) presented at the 2013 summer conference I continued my analysis to include my experience of grieving for my mother Dorothy Thornton (1931-2012). This year I extended my argument further reflecting particularly on my experience over the past couple of years. In the paper I focus on various occupations, including  my changing writing style (this blog included) a new engagement with physical exercise and the experience of retraining to become a civil celebrant with the UK Society of Civil Celebrants (UKSOC). For me these experiences have been important emotionally, physically and intellectually and have led me to argue for an embodied, sociological understanding of grief. In addition to giving a paper my book He, Himself and I (which is a further development of my 2010 paper) was launched at the conference and I will be ever grateful to the Auto/ Biography Study Group for their support in the production of this project (and my other related work as highlighted here) and their positive responses to it/them.      

Letherby G (2011) ‘Auto/Biographical Reflections on Personal and Other Legacies: much more than money’ in Sparkes A (ed) Auto/Biography Yearbook Durham: BSA Auto/Biography Study Group

Letherby G (2014) He, Himself and I: reflections on inter/connected lives Durham: BSA Auto/Biography Study Group

Letherby G (2015) ‘Bathwater, Babies and Other Losses: A Personal and Academic Story’ Mortality: Promoting the interdisciplinary study of death and dying 20(2)

Carnivals, Celebrations and Ceremonies | Cornwall and Up Country

This is one of two signs outside Penzance Railway Station (the one pointing north) that I took a photograph of last Saturday (27th June) when my friend Vanessa and I arrived for the Mazey Day celebrations. At this time of year there are many outdoor carnivals, festivals, music and theatre productions taking place in Cornwall. Not that such celebrations are restricted to mid-summer as Helston Flora Day (May), Padstow Obby Oss (also May), the Gorsedh Kernow Ceremony (September) and other such  events testify.

Personal celebrations and ceremonies - including weddings and renewal of vow ceremonies, namings, funerals and memorial ceremonies -  can also take place outdoors, local to the place where you live or elsewhere. So if you live in Cornwall you may want to travel 'upcountry' for your ceremony or alternatively travel to Cornwall from elsewhere in Britain or further afield. Like many other UKSOC celebrants I am happy to travel with you or too you in order to ensure you have the bespoke ceremony that you want. 

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For those of you interested in the origins of Mazey Day the following is taken from http://www.purelypenzance.co.uk/tourism/festivals.html

The Golowan festival (Cornish for midsummer) is the festival of St. John and is held in Penzance each year in late June. Although it is an old tradition, it was revived by a group of artists and local schools in 1991 in order to remember the local area heritage. The festival is ten days long, culminating in the Mazey weekend and notably Mazey Day on the Saturday.

Golowan was one of the last mid summer festivals practised in Cornwall. In the 1890’s, the Penzance government outlawed the festival due to the rising insurance premiums for the towns business community. Traditionally the towns streets were lined with alight tar barrels which were paraded around. . . . 

The modern Golowan is arguably a little less dangerous. The celebration of the area's arts and culture attracts thousands of visitors to West Cornwall . . . .  The core of the celebrations is Mazey Day, when the streets are filled with market stalls and entertainers and the town's school children parade up and down Market Jew Street, setting out from St.Johns Hall, holding aloft large paper mache and wicker creations. It truly is a sight to behold, with some figures being larger than the building around them. . . .

OR check out the Golowan official face book page https://www.facebook.com/pages/Golowan-Festival-Official-Page/277967782386

Father's Day | Memories of Dad

Making sandcastles with dad

My father died when I was 20, over 36 years ago. I have many memories though. What follows is a extract from a book focusing on his and my late husband's lives as they connected with mine. 

'Some of my earliest memories are of sitting on my dad’s knee with my thumb in my mouth, riding on his shoulders as we played together and being tickled so much I worried that I would wet myself. I remember searching for fairies with him at the bottom of my parents’ bed and taking a young friend back to my house even though he fell over outside his own because ‘my dad is good with sore knees’. He became the street’s unofficial doctor after that and his treatment always included funny stories as well as plasters and antiseptic. . . . . My mum told me that he laughed when as a baby I peed all down his back, and even managed a smile the time I was sick on his head after he threw me up in the air too soon after tea. I remember him patiently spending the whole of his lunch hour from the factory gently attempting to remove the saucepan that I had stuck on my head and then dancing round the living room with my feet on top of his.. . . [I]  still cherish the Valentine’s card that he sent me (anonymously) the year after the friend I walked to school with got a dozen and I got none (I only found out he sent it a decade or so ago).' (Letherby, G. 2014 He, Himself and I: reflections on inter/connected lives Nottingham: Auto/Biography Study Group p20).

Trains, Boats and Batmobiles | Vehicles and Ceremonies

I am rather fond of trains which is lucky as they have, and continue. to feature quite significantly in my life. As a non-driving child of non-driving adventurous parents I've always travelled a lot by train. We left Liverpool, the place of all our births when I was seven and moved a number of times until settling in Cornwall four years later. For a while we lived in a flat in South Queensferry, outside of Edinburgh, overlooking the Firth of Forth railway bridge and then there was the night we spent in a railway carriage in an otherwise deserted London railway station (but that's another story). 

My first solo train journey was a trip from Falmouth to Liverpool to stay with my maternal grandmother and aunt and uncle for half term week during my O'Level year and since then I have travelled many, many thousands of miles by rail. A few years ago I was lucky enough to be able to spend some of my work time researching and writing about one of my passions. With my friend and colleague Gillian Reynolds I published a number of pieces focusing on sociological aspects of travel including a book entitled Train Tracks: work, play and politics on the railways (2005). 

After interviewing over a 100 train travellers, workers and enthusiasts (in addition to reflecting on our own experience) we were able to clearly demonstrate that trains are not just vehicles that get us from A to B but also places and spaces in their own right - where people play, work, eat, sleep, fall in love . . .. Despite delays, 'standing room only' and carriage doors that close before you're through them it seems many of us still have an affection for the train and the railway. This is reflected, we suggested, in cultural representations  from Night Mail https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zmciuKsBOi0   to Thomas the Tank Engine, from The Railway Children to Grand Central Station and so on and so on. 

- See more at: http://www.amazon.co.uk/Train-Tracks-Work-Politics-Railways/dp/1845200837

Within a ceremony a train (or other vehicle) can again be more than just something that gets everyone from A to B, not that transport isn't significant at such events. Trains* if you like them as much as I do, could play a variety of parts in your ceremony. How about a 19th or 20th  Century themed wedding or commitment ceremony that takes place on a steam train or at a railway museum  accompanied, or not, by 'British Rail' sandwiches? Or similar for a trip down memory lane focused renewal of vows ceremony. What better than a magical Harry Potter style naming ceremony, with a re-enacted journey to Hogwarts mirroring the excitement of a new life journey? In planning a funeral ceremony for a loved one, or for yourself, you might want to consider a bespoke coffin or urn or hold a memorial ceremony at the end of Platform 2. 

Just remember; your ceremony, your choice. 

* For train of course you can substitute horse pulled caravan,  London bus, Starship Enterprise, Batmobile. Need I go on? 

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Reflections on the Pink Army | Metaphors and Meanings

My Race for Life tattoo and finishing medal 

A couple of weeks ago I took part in the Falmouth Race for Life event (see Blog entry 15/02/2015 for previous mention of this). As ever I was struck by how emotional the experience was and I beat my best time (just) arriving at the finish line after completing the 5K route in just over 40 minutes.

This year's theme for R4L is a military one. The running, jogging, walking women - along with their children, dogs, prams - are collectively referred to as the 'Pink Army' and each runner is issued with a pink glove and a number of temporary tattoos (I must admit to missing mine somewhat when the last traces were washed away five days after the race). This year's finishers' medals are fashioned in the form of a dog tag.

Me and other members of the 'pink army'

I have mixed feelings about both the colour (I like pink, I do, but it really isn't the only colour that women wear . . . ) and  the military metaphor. It seems I'm not alone in this for as noted in a recent post by @mosaicscience there has been much written in the last 40 plus years by people with cancer and other diseases arguing against  warfare metaphors. And yet it seems that although there are many that dislike their body being compared to a battleground, and prefer to speak of 'journeys' or 'pathways' rather than 'fights' and 'battles', there are many others who feel empowered in thinking that they are 'keeping up the fight' or in being described as 'a trooper'.

Like me (see Blog entries 05/04/15 and 11/04/15) Mosaic:the science of life suggest that metaphors are useful and help us through difficult times such as illness, loss and grief and different metaphors work for different people. The thing to remember is the need to be sensitive too what works for others as well as what works for you.

Ohh and  in case anyone is wondering I didn't get around to ironing the T-shirt. . . .

Stuck for a Venue? | Maybe Falmouth is the Answer

Falmouth is looking especially beautiful today.

A seaside naming ceremony?

What a wonderful place for a ceremony.

'Proper Job.'

An alternative aisle for a wedding or commitment ceremony?

A memorial ceremony within castle (can you see it) grounds?