Emotional & Intimate Capilano Suspension Bridge Wedding

I’m not going to lie, I have been putting off blogging this wedding for awhile, mostly because it’s still a little painful for me (selfish, I know), but I finally feel ready to share it.

Many moons ago I was first introduced to the White Family when I shot Jalline & Tino’s wedding back in 2011. It was then that I was introduced to Jalline’s brother Dalen. Fast forward two years and in 2013 I shot Dalen & Stephanie‘s wedding at the Vancouver Aquarium, where previously unaware, I had learned that Stephanie’s father Bob had been struggling with a couple of serious boughts of cancer, and it had been a miracle that he had been alive to walk his daughter down the aisle earlier that afternoon. I didn’t learn this, of course, until the speeches began, and everyone burst into tears all around me, and I was so overwhelmed that I too, burst into tears listening to the stories.

It was one of those times that I was hit with the real gravity of my work. It’s so easy to get caught up in the flowers, and decor, and all the pretty little details that one can forget that as a wedding photographer you are given a one day pass into the secret, and intimate lives of strangers.

Navigating the foreign world of  emotional strangers can be taxing at times. So often I am drained at the end of a wedding, having to be the cheerleader all day, encouraging people to let me into their world, using intuition to guide me as to when it’s okay to push, and when I need to put my camera down and take a step back. While each of us craves love, acceptance, and validation it can be so difficult to really let your walls down and be vulnerable enough in front of a stranger to truly let them see you. I know the depth of what I am asking others to do.

There was a moment at Stephanie and Dalen’s wedding where everyone was visibly hurting, still recovering from the havoc cancer had wrecked across the family, and I could see Stephanie’s mother and father shying away from the camera trying to hide their tears as their daughter spoke. I knew in that moment I had to let them know it was safe to cry, so I dropped my camera from my face to show them that I too had a face streaming with tears. I had showed them that I too felt the gravity of the moment, that I was human, that I felt, and I wasn’t there to take advantage of them or exploit their emotions. I watched as the walls came down, and they turned their attention back to their daughter and each other, and I faded away from their attention. We were all safe in that room, together.

Navigating emotions with a camera in your hand is like navigating a stormy sea at times — you move between the waves, you brace for impact. Sometimes people say no, they put up walls, they kick you out of the room, they tell you they don’t feel safe with you there, and it hurts a bit to be shut out. But sometimes people let the walls crumble, and you see this beautiful depth to humanity and you are reminded that we all experience love and pain the same, and you feel deeply connected to the whole universe. This was one of those times.

We laughed together. We danced together. We caught up like old friends. At the end of the night Stephanie’s father Bob came up and gave me a hug and thanked me for my work, and I felt like family. I felt like I belonged there with them – not an outsider with a camera, but a friend who had been there all along who just happened to document the day.

When I received a call from Stephanie’s younger sister Shannon the following year that she was getting married to her long time partner Byron. I was more than stoked to catch up with all of the Whites again. I knew everyone would be there from Jalline & Tino, and their parent’s to everyone else I had met along the way at Stephanie & Dalen’s wedding like family & friends who had supported and loved this family.

It wasn’t until a couple of weeks before the wedding that I learned that Shannon & Stephanie (and Robyn’s) father Bob, however, had received the devastating news that his cancer had returned yet again, with a vengeance and the outlook was grim. I was heart broken. I was heart broken for the three sisters I had come to love. I was heartbroken for their friends and family. I was heartbroken for Pat, his dedicated wife and the sisters’ mom. I felt helpless. It felt like my own family. I wanted to say something, but nothing felt like it would be enough. My camera has been my voice for years so I offered up the only thing I could think to do, which was be there for them in any way I could to document their last few days together.

The day before the wedding I received a call from Shannon saying that Bob’s health had declined and he would no longer be able to walk Shannon down the aisle, so in a quick change of plans arrangements were made to go to the hospital where Byron & Shannon would be married in front of her father, so he could attend, and the fathers of the couple would sign as witnesses to their union.

The morning was difficult. My hands shook the whole drive to the hospital. I hadn’t seen Bob since Stephanie’s wedding, I didn’t know how I would feel, how I would react, how I would hold it together if everyone else around me was falling apart. I was afraid I would crumble into a pile of the floor. Shannon asked to get into her dress, and have a first look there in the hospital with her dad and have a few moments together before the ceremony. I will carry that difficult and beautiful morning with me for the rest of my life.

No walls up, nothing to hide, I cried behind my camera as her dad, wearing the Lion King tie she bought him as a little girl admired his baby all grown up in her wedding gown, and my heart broke into a million pieces for them. It felt like goodbye. On a morning that should feel like an exciting new chapter into forever we were closing a chapter forever. It felt unfair. I wanted to protest, but to who?

And then came the moment when Byron walked in, and stood at the end of the aisle, and Shannon came in with her mom and I saw Byron’s face light up and I remembered love. I saw him squeeze her hands and I saw him stand there wanting to reach out and give her a hug. I saw him support her with everything he could offer in that moment and I remembered love. I saw them vow to spend a life together until death did them part, and I watched her mom and dad squeeze hands and shed tears as they spoke those words and I remembered love.

How blessed are we to know love? In a world so full of pain and suffering, how blessed are we, the few who have known love in its myriad of forms? How blessed are we for hugs, for support, for friendship? How blessed are we to give and receive kindness, compassion, and understanding to and from those around us? In times of great and deep pain we are blessed to have known love, so that we have something easier to fall back into when everything feels dark. How blessed are we to have each other, even if our time together is fleeting? I suppose in the grand scheme of things our time together is always fleeting – so then, how blessed are we to just have each other, here and now?

The rest of the day was perfect and beautiful in every way. Full of flowers and beauty. Full of laughter, and tears of joy and sadness. It was full of beautiful views at the Capilano Suspension Bridge and elegant food at the Stanley Park Pavillion. It was full of hugs and kisses and drinks and dancing, but it all pales in comparison to knowledge that we were all there in that moment together to witness Byron & Shannon pledge a lifetime of love to each other. For that I am endlessly grateful.

Shannon’s father Bob passed a couple of days after the wedding. I couldn’t even edit the pictures at first it hurt so bad. I cried every time I looked at them. Im crying as I type this now, but there is also peace. There’s peace in knowing there we were all there together in that moment, in union and in support of something beautiful in this sad, ever-vanishing world, and I’ll hold that forever.

Bob, I’ll miss you, thank you for sharing your life with us.
Shannon & Byron, and the whole White family, we love you all. Thank you for letting us in.

John Bello, thank you for your support not only as my colleague but as one of my best friends. I wouldn’t have trusted any one else to help me shoot this wedding and I know you take care of my clients like they were your own and I’m forever grateful for that.
Love you.