I am an old bride, and yet, surprisingly I find speaking tonight very difficult.  I should have known better.  Fancy me, lost for words.  I am not sure of the tone for my words, how open or how discreet I should be.  Kevin and I road tested all the words in our ceremony for their truthfulness and found them to ring true.  But this evening is more difficult, to find the right note.

I begin with a Yiddish proverb, Dem Yids simche is mit a bistle shrek, A Jew’s joy is not without fright.  Tonight is difficult because I have both simche or joy and shrek or fright to share with you.  But I am not alone.  In the past, a religious Jew wears under their wedding garments their shroud.  A Bokaran bride makes a magnificent suzami in front of which she and the groom are married, which she places on her marriage bed, under which she gives birth and in which either she is wrapped or which covers her simple coffin to the grave.

I list under simche, my friends and family.  My family from London, Deborah, Gerry, Hannah & Rosa. from interstate brother Daniel, and friends Merryn, Christina, Alex, Sophia and Isaiah; Tom and my cousin Joanna Finklestein this morning.  Your presence heightens the joy of today.  Thank you.

Having a wedding is at least as complicated a management task as curating an exhibition, from commissioning of the rings (Marcus Davidson), and the plates David Ray, and the flowers by Marion Poynter, Getting us to the farm I thank Damien, Marianne and Marshall.  This evening would not have taken shape without the astonishing curatorship of Alex Erlich.  In a Jewish wedding Klezmer music performs an important ceremonial and emotional function and we are most grateful to Aviva and Esther for playing and Ruby for ringing the bell at our ceremony, as is the Irish custom.

I thank Kevin’s family, his father David, Lesley his mother and Harold his stepfather and siblings for welcoming me into the simcha of their family.

I would like to bring to memory my paternal grandmother, Esther Cass, my maternal father Ephrium Shulman, and grandmother, Eva Shulman.  My grandfather Ben Cass, who turns 100 next month who cannot be here this evening.

Traditionally, a wedding is a kind of offering to friends by a family, I am very grateful to my mother Shirley and sister Deborah and Merryn Gates for cooking, for making possible, having 109 people for dinner.

A few weeks ago was Pesach or Passover, and during this time the angel of death did not pass over two dear friends of ours, which effects many of us in this room and I acknowledge and mourn their loss.

I have a strong and abiding relationship with my family.  I bask in their love, friendship, we willingly share in our joys and pain.  In many respects they are a hard act to follow. 

With Kevin I have found a life which compliments my family of origin.  Needless to say, we are very different.  But we share love of stong tea, of textiles and music, of peasant earthy food, we are attuned to smell and sound and the hand made.  We share a love of Esther and Ruby.  We share politics and a rationalist engagement with the world (except whilst in preparation for a wedding).

Kevin and I do not share a temperament, the same hours, an interest in the trivial and gossip we do not share a love of soup or leftovers.  I am loud and emotional and excessive, Kevin is utterly discreet and gentle and measured.  We are a wonderful match.  In Kevin’s company I am free to grow, to play with friends, my family to mother Esther and Ruby with great gusto.  In Kevin’s company I have and do flourish.  He expects me to.

I am safe in his embrace and yet empowered to be myself. I am not anxious being everything for Kevin, nor am I anxious that he be everything for me.

I am in awe of Kevin’s capacity to concentrate, his capacity to speak without notes, his capacity to see and explain things which hasve passed me by, his capacity to read not just the written word but the unwritten nature of things, of politics of human nature.  I adore his intellect - it is both powerful and absolutely quirky. We have a beautiful intimate life, for which I am grateful.

Kevin’s love of words I have two examples.  One day as I was crapping on, as you do, I felt exasperated and accusingly said, “you just think I’m a shop girl”.  To which he paused, cast his eyes around slowly and in a vague manner and replied “just browsing”.  For my birthday last year he presented me with this heavy wrapped object, saying “this is your birthday present…and I guess it’s your engagement ring”. (Naomi held a large brass bowl in her left hand extended forward and in her right circled a wooden mallet around the rim of the Tibetan bowl, which after some time made a long resonant ring).

We have had our shrek, our frights.  And I guess we will have many more.  I am confident in the ballast of our ship to manage what we will encounter.

I love being a mother, a curator and a writer, a daughter and a sister, a sister-in-law, an auntie a cousin, a niece, a friend.

I have loved being Kevin’s secret girlfriend, his partner, his friend and I am most happy to be his wife.