A Tale of Near Garden Disaster
"A Garden Story"
As a report from our Summer gardens would be full of moans and miseries, grumbling about our officially cooler than ever Summer temperatures and many rain storms, I have decided to relate a garden story for much lighter reading. So many stories of humour, fortitude and happiness cannot be told in one session, so I have decided to stick to one tale - "The Happenings in the Garden when I was a Marriage Celebrant"
The Australian Government, in 1974, passed an act of Parliament to make lay citizens marriage celebrants for couples who wanted to be married outside the confines of a church and not in the rigid surroundings of the Registry Office. Appointments were made by the Australian Federal government. I was phoned by our State Attorney General and asked if I was interested in taking the post. On asking what the appointment would mean, I was answered "I am not sure. But I am positive it would be good politically. You will meet many people at, presumably, happy times in their lives". He was a rather caustic chap, married three times! I was a political animal in those days so I agreed I would accept the appointment. I got out my Oxford dictionary and looked up the word celebrant. "Officiating priest, high official in the Catholic church" were two of the meanings. Very peculiar, I am not even a Catholic. I rushed into the Registry Office and had a talk with the Registrar General who gave me bundles of papers to be filled in with the couple and my important looking, simulated-leather-bound Marriage Register and warned me "Always make sure you see their divorce papers and birth certificates. If you get into trouble, ring me"
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Garden story: I soon threw myself whole heartedly into my new career. Couples, on their first visit to me, would see the garden of the town house and ask if it was possible to have the Ceremony in our garden. I would agree quite happily and throw in a bottle of Champagne if the numbers were small. For several years our paths and gardens never looked tidier. All this for the official fee of Australian $20 [USA $10] but I met some great people and it was a most enjoyable and interesting experience albeit with a lot of extra garden duties. Before the start of the wedding, I would be giving the paths a last sweep, preparing the champagne glasses and filling the house with flowers as the official signing of the register took place in our sitting room. My youngest daughter, Francesca, was only seven years old, just the age to get under my feet. Apparently I would say to her "Please stay in the back of the house. I have a wedding today" Kees, wise man, usually went to a household auction somewhere else, anywhere else!
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