This was always my orig­inal posi­tion and it still makes more sense to me in a hand­fasting cere­mony: Don’t have someone tie your hands together.

Let your hands fasten on one another in a free-​​willed clasp, right hand to right hand and left to left. This is such a strong visual. Your arms and bodies form an infinity circle that is fluid and adjusts easily. That’s what you want from a wedding. That’s what you want for a marriage.

In this way you aren’t tied together, you’re joined in love and by love. At any point you could let go hands — but you don’t.

The ropes are the wrong image anyway. It seems that orig­i­nally, as the woman became a member of the family, she was brought “under the plaid” or under the protec­tion of the man’s family. The plaid was clothing and bed covering. All over the world there are cere­monies that cele­brate the couple’s joining in the marriage bed by enfolding them in a blanket. (previous cultures were a little lustier than ours and a little clearer about the marriage’s rela­tion­ship to estab­lishing a lineage!)

Tip: So you decide which way you want to go in your wedding cere­mony. But whether you join hands or not, this is a lovely cere­mony that will, if you let it, evoke memo­ries of your dreams for marriage, how much you loved each other as you stood, bound in love, promising one another tomorrow, on the day that you married. That image will live with you for years!