Just married!

We got engaged at the Oregon Coast on New Year's Day, 2021. We were originally planning to get married in May 2023, but then I got into nursing school! So we decided to wait until June when I would be on summer break. We had a lovely ceremony by the water at a little public boat launch near discovery park. Sofia's cousin, Sarah Beth aka Spud officiated. Alaric's sister, Kristin was his witness. Sofia's former roommate, Desi, took photos and was Sofia's witness. We wrote our own vows. Spud's remarks were at turns hilarious and moving. Kristin gave a beautiful, tear-jerking speech. Desi's presence was a delight. When we finally got to see all the photos later and relive those memories, we couldn't stop smiling. Thank you all for celebrating us from near & far. We love you so much!

It is my great honor to be officiating a wedding for a relationship that I’ve had a front row seat to from day 1. Before day 1, in fact. So before Al and Sofia make promises for the future, let’s take a stroll back through memory lane, shall we? It all began during Thanksgiving weekend of 2019. At least, for Sofia it did. Al didn’t get in on the action for another month. Sofia and I text constantly, and we’re always — or rather, were always, it’s a bit one-sided now — swapping screenshots of profiles we see on dating apps. On this auspicious November day, Sofia texted me, “oooh just saw a very cute profile. Lives in Portland, so maybe just in town for the holiday? Just nice to know some good people still exist.” But it wasn’t meant to be. At least, not yet. It took Al a solid month to open the app back up and match with Sofia. At which point, she sent me a screenshot of Al’s profile, along with a text saying, “dating apps FINALLY coming through for me.” As we all know, given why we’re standing here today, Al and Sofia had immediate chemistry, and were able to successfully turn an originally long-distance dynamic into something lasting and precious. Here’s a sampling of text messages I received from Sofia in the first month alone: - In all caps, after the first date: “omg HE IS SO CUTE AND GREAT” - After the second date, “Omggggg” with five g’s, and then each of the following words in its own text: “Al. Is. Amazing.” - A few days later, Sofia wrote, “Al is [insert three star-eyed emojis here]. HE IS JUST SO DREAMY.” Al — because yes, Sofia sent me screenshots — was also smitten. After just one date, Al texted Sofia, “you are just as lovely as I suspected you’d be.” After two dates, he deleted dating apps from his phone. And after less than a month, he was stocking his Portland apartment with her hair products and making sure he had what he needed to make coffee the way she likes it. As the first month turned into a second, Al wrote, “I might have to come up this weekend. I don’t know if I can wait until next weekend to see you again. Pretty much if you aren’t in Portland, I’ll be in Seattle.” And as the second month turned into a third, Sofia was texting me to say, “I was just thinking how happy and secure and calm I feel with Al, and how good that is.” Another time, she wrote, “we ate dinner on his back stoop the other evening and it was so sunny and perfect out. After dinner, I sat between his legs, leaning back against him and we just chatted for a long time. A perfect moment! I keep thinking back on it.” With this much enthusiasm and joy, and so many perfect moments, you could say it’s been a fairytale. But it’s also real life, filled with logistics and complications, from this initially being a long-distance relationship to the difficulties of being newly together the moment a life-altering pandemic hit, to so much more. But as Al wrote to Sofia as the world started to go topsy-turvy in March 2020, “Just do what you can. If something happens, we will take care of each other.” This promise, made so early on, has gotten them through so much already, and has led them to now. It’s a promise that we’re here today for them to reaffirm and for us to witness. And it’s promise that I know will carry them through the years to come, no matter what they may face. They’ve proven they’re up to the challenge. After all, Al and Sofia, you did the impossible: you found yourselves a love for the ages on a dating app. If anything’s worth toasting to, it’s that. Let’s do this sh*t.

Before we were Alaric and Kristin Beck, we were a different duo. Of course this was the duo Joey Dogg and Nick Whinney. Joey Dogg (Alaric) and Nick Whinney (me) got up to all sorts of antics. They were usually cowboys in the West. They rode horses side by side through many an open field, be it on hobby horses or our twin branches of the apple tree in our backyard. There was a point, though, when I was not Nick Whinney. In the very beginning, I was Joey Dogg and Alaric was Nick Whinney. But this was deeply upsetting to me, because Nick Whinney was cooler than Joey Dogg. Every time we played, this was the case, and it ate at me. So in a spurt of youngest child persuasion, I convinced Alaric to switch with me, so I could be Nick Whinney. However, from then on, surprisingly to my small child brain, Joey Dogg was now the cool one. It was not until years later, still reeling from this series of events, that I realized that the problem was that I thought Alaric was cool, so naturally it didn’t matter whether I was Nick Whinney or Joey Dogg, he was still going to be cooler. I have a complicated relationship with the phrase “I’m proud of you” because to me it has always rung a tiny bit hollow, with just a tinge of ownership to it. So I’m not going to tell you that I’m proud of you, Alaric. You are your own person with your own direction in life and you have overcome the challenges you’ve faced with your own strength. You are just cool, whether as Nick Whinney, Joey Dogg, or Alaric Beck. Instead I’ll say I’m impressed by you and I admire you, my big brother. I admire the man you are and the boy you have been. I’m lucky to be your sister. I’m impressed that you and I got through life when it was un-get-through-able, even if I’m the only one who remembers that part. I admire how you have navigated the journey you and Sofia are on with a deep appreciation of who she is and a deep loyalty to who you are. I am and will always be here for you, with my own deep appreciation of who you are and a commitment to support you in your relationship with your wife. I have never been married but I’ve seen a lot of sh*tty marriages so I’m just going to note some things that seem like good ideas, and from what I’ve watched you two work through over the past few years. It seems like kind and generous honesty is a pretty good policy. It seems like being true to yourself is important. It seems like being curious about the growth of your partner, and open and accepting of that growth, leads to a dynamic relationship. And as my therapist told me recently, sometimes it’s not just about what you need, it can also be about what you want. Hearing from your partner what that is, having a sense of humor about it, and being open to the idea that you can come up with better compromises together than you can ever come up with alone, those all seem like solid foundations. But mostly, from watching you two, it seems like this is the final line: trust yourself and each other. Laugh together, be in your bodies, walk side by side. Slow down. Life is long but also so short. Taking it on together will be the proof of all these things. Finally I’ll end with a poem that I wrote for this occasion, with input from our oldest brother and our niece and nephew. There once were two cats and a mutt Who did not make the wedding list cut But they’ll soon get some of All this wedding day’s love And the poem’s last word should be “Butt”

In a traditional Jewish wedding, the ketubah — or marriage contract — is an integral aspect of the ceremony. Our ketubah outlines the promises and commitments we have chosen to be the foundation of our marriage, modeled after the ketubah Sofia's parents wrote. We read the words of this ketubah aloud at our ceremony, with Desi and Kristin as witnesses. On the 17th day of June, 2023, 28 Sivan 5783, here in Seattle, Washington, Alaric Baxter Beck and Sofia Rebekah Nakhnikian-Weintraub, having searched for and finally found each other, stood before witnesses and made a covenant together as husband and wife, lovers, partners and friends. We promise to give each other joy, comfort and strength, to respect our differences and to strive to be forever in love while making a life together. We promise to prioritize our partnership above all else, while also tending to the other important relationships we hold dear. The family we build together, and the families we bring together, will be the focus of our lives. We will remember our mutual respect and love for one another, even in our most trying times. We will continually strive to bring out the best in each other according to our shared values of forgiveness, compassion and integrity. We will lean on each other amidst our individual struggles, and support each other’s growth, from the smallest of goals to the loftiest dreams. We will both offer to help the other, and accept offers of help. We will be open to change and new ideas. We will share our thoughts and listen. We declare our commitment to create a home in which everyone is loved, nurtured, safe and protected. Where we celebrate the flow of seasons and passage of time, and also the little accomplishments and joys of everyday life. Where there lives at least one fursome creature. And each kiss is at least two kisses. We promise never to take the other for granted; to always take time to greet each other when one of us returns home, to eat together more often than we eat apart, to remember how lost we would be without each other. Should we find ourselves defining our happiness by the things that we own, we will remember how blissfully happy we were in a one bedroom apartment. As our world expands and contracts, and as life’s gifts ebb and flow, our loving partnership will be our constant. We will build and nurture a life and a love that sustains us. And everything is valid and confirmed.