Simon and Linda have a huge cat called Helix. I was pleased when I heard he had a scientific name, it was something that my cat Quark could have a chat to Helix about over a bowl of milk at a bar sometime. Simon and Linda are both scientists, and damn smart ones at that. I went to the same university as Simon and we hung out with some common friends but it’s been a really long time, probably about 10 years or so, since I’d seen him last. And Wollongong being the place that it is, the 6 degrees of separation were in force; Linda went to school with my sister (in the same year), the groomsmen were old friends from high school (a different one to my sister) that I hadn’t seen for while and the celebrant was another friend’s mother. This wedding was just like old times back in the ‘Gong.
Things weren’t looking good in the morning, many keen eyes were on the Bureau of Meteorology’s website for the forecast. And just like it always seems, mother nature scares the hell out of me, and all other wedding photographers, by threatening rain and cloud before lavishing untold rays of golden sunlight for the afternoon.
I can’t remember being teased as much by a bridal party as I was by this one; like I mentioned, I hadn’t seen most of them for years so they took the given opportunity to remind me of what it was like at school. We saw another wedding party nearby getting some formal photos taken with a couple of large softboxes with portable battery units and two assistants. “Hey Lucky, do you have a big light set up like that? That’s how the REAL professionals do it isn’t it?” they said. But when you spent every lunchtime at high school playing improvised games hitting plastic Coke bottles filled with grass with broken fence palings around a basketball court, you get to know that it’s all just part of the give and take of being old friends.
Fourteen hours sounds like a lot of work but if it’s like this day, I’d gladly do it every day.