Good afternoon and welcome to Rolvendon. My name is Paul, and Gavin has asked me to say a few words of thanks on this special day.
When Gavin asked me to do this, just a few weeks ago, my first thought was farrrrkkkk!!!! I’m a little nervous about making this speech. In fact this must be the fifth time today that I have stood up from a warm seat with pieces of paper in my hand. But I live in South America, and so if this speech doesn’t go well I will soon be well out of harm’s way, so bare with me.
Nigel, who conducted the service, said that today was the first time, in all the years that he has been doing this, that he has seen a bride drive herself to the wedding. And that it was the first time he had seen a bridge arrive in a van. I understand that for those of you that are drinking, Claire will be offering a taxi service at the end of the night.
Gavin and Claire have been courting for 14 years. For some reason Gavin wanted me to talk about the hare and the tortoise, but I swear that lunch was chicken, so that’s not going to happen. Sorry Gavin.
In preparing this speech I looked at what other people think about marriage and weddings. German philosopher Friedrich Nietzsche said many things on the subject including “Marriage: this I call the will that moves two to create the one which is more than those who created it”. If anyone understands that, please can they explain it to me. I think what he was trying to say was that the whole is greater than the sum of the two parts, but the comment I like most was by US journalist Helen Rowland who said a wedding is “the point at which a man stops toasting a woman and begins roasting her,” and with 14 years of preparation, I am sure you will agree that Clarie and Gavin have served up and excellent dish today.
However, thinking about it, after 14 years, instead of the Wedding March, perhaps we should have been listening to the Hallelujah Chorus. 14 years is a long time, and by the way they look today, they must have started dating when they were ten. I was certainly surprised. When he told me he was going to do it in a barn, I said, ‘Gavin, I think you have been living in the country too long’.
Gavin and Claire met in Derby, where Claire was studying art and Gavin was working in a bar. As Gavin observed, “Not much has changed really, she's still the creative one, and I'm the piss-artist.”
Claire has been a part of Gavin’s life ever since I have known him. Gavin and I met in 1998 playing pool in the Prince Albert pub on Coldharbour Lane in Brixton, London a place that has to be the antithesis of this quaint English countryside. At the time, Gavin was studying his MA in graphic design at Central St Martin’s and I was studying an MA in printing and publishing at the London College of Printing, creative occupations that have been an enduring thread of our friendship. And it was Claire who was responsible for Gavin being in London in the first place as she wanted to move South from the Midlands and Gavin followed.
Gavin has spent the majority of his professional career as a freelance designer while I have spent most of mine as a freelance journalist, but this speech is by far one of the most difficult writing assignments that I have ever had. However, freelance journalists charge by the word, and as I like the sound of my own voice and have written a lot, by the time this speech is through, I expect there to be big cheque waiting for me, so thank you for that Gavin.
The fact that Gavin and I both work as freelancers in related creative disciplines has cemented our friendship and enabled us to collaborate on a range of prize-winning books about graphic design and other subjects. We have produced 13 books together since 2003, projects that have been stimulating to work on, and that have produced beautiful results.
Although living on the other side of the world does not present Gavin and I with the opportunity to meet or talk frequently, when we do, our conversation is direct and intimate as we discuss hickey’s and binding screws, crotches and hairlines, even stroke weight and finishing techiques, straps, flaps and bellybands, … These are all printing terms, by the way, and part of the rich and fascinating vocabulary that is part of our trade, for which I have developed an obsessive eye.
Gavin and I also have a shared obsession about printed materials that penchant for American Psycho by Brett Easton Ellis, an infamous and controversial book that was the subject of Gavin’s final project for his MA ten years ago. As part of this, Gavin produced an edition of the book printed in binary, just ones and zeros and about this thick. Apparently Brett Easton Ellis, who is fastidious for detail and who included detailed lists about the clothes the characters wore, heard about this book and commented “how anal”.
One of the leitmotifs in the book is the sociopathic antihero’s love of music – a passion that Gavin and I share - or rather muzak in Patrick Bateman’s case, puerile pop in which he finds deep meaning, and although Ellis wrote with great irony while eulogizing the merits of the disposable hits of the 1980s by people like Genesis and Whitney Houston, he had a lot to say about love, such as these observations about Huey Lewis and the News:
“Things looked up for Huey and the boys on the second album, 1982's Picture This. The album hits its peak with "Do You Believe in Love," which is the best song on the album and is essentially about the singer asking a girl he's met while "looking for someone to meet" if she "believes in love." The fact that the song never resolves the question gives it an added complexity that wasn't apparent on the group's debut.”
For many people here, it may have seemed that Gavin and Claire were never going to resolve the question of whether to get married or not, but happily, we now know the answer to that. Sharing your life with someone you love is one of the most important ways that we can better ourselves and grow, and although the marriage question may have dallied for a while, Gavin and Claire have been sharing their lives and growing together for many years.
In fact, they are now sharing surnames. Claire is now Claire Ambrose-Gordon, and Gavin is now Gavin Ambrose-Gordon, or as he pointed out to me with a tinge of disappointment, GAG. Even their dog Benny is joining in and will become BAG. … Well, you may not like your new initials Gavin, but at least it means there is one GAG in this speech that works, so thank you for that.
Gavin told me that the idea today was to have an unconventional wedding and this was reflected in the dancing entertainment. The original idea was to have a lap dance for everyone but unfortunately the wedding budget didn’t stretch that far, so only I will be getting one.
Latin America, where I live, has sensuous, vibrant dances such as salsa, meringue and samba, and when people ask me what the national dance in England is, I have to try to explain the … erm …sensuous qualities of … erm…Morris dancing, another great challenge.
The term Morris dancing is derived from moorish dance, perhaps from the Moresca pageant that celebrated Ferdinand and Isabella driving the Moors out of Spain in 1492, about the same time that Gavin and Claire first started dating.
I remember that as a child at school, Morris dancing was something that we looked forward to with a mixture of excitement and fear as it was an activity that always saw the blood rise. As this was about the time that Star Wars came out, this was usually in the form of a split lip, bloody nose or cut hands as this traditional English dance in the school hall turned into a light saber battle scene in the Death Star hanger. Fortunately there were no serious injuries today.
I will soon be returning to the relative safety of South America, and in drawing to a close, Gavin and Claire I would like to leave you with some words from one of the greatest writers from that continent, Gabriel Garcia Marquez, who said, “the problem with marriage is that it ends every night after making love, and it must be rebuilt every morning before breakfast”. Having said that, I hope that you continue to build your lives together and have a happy and prosperous future.
Ladies and gentlemen, I am sure you will agree that Gavin and Claire are wonderful, generous people and a fantastic couple. So please raise your glasses and join me in a toast to the bride and groom, Claire and Gavin, Mr & Mrs Ambrose Gordon.
ENDS
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