Well… our moment has arrived. After nine months of planning,  it’s finally  time to enter the Ridotto Ballroom and join our hands in marriage. We ascend the stairs and join our families.  Pachelbel’s Canon in D Major plays, as we’re escorted to the stage, me by my  aunt and Recio by his mom.

We join our guests under the baroque fresco with our celebrant, Fabio Moresco. We’re joined on stage by my two sisters, and my best man, David Stanko. Recio’s son Isaiah is his best man, and his brothers Evan, Dillan and Jonathan are his groomsmen.

Fabio greets our guests and begins our ceremony: This meeting and this love are what bring us together today. The uniting of these two friends to establish a new family is an important and memorable event. It brings together two separate families and backgrounds and creates a union that is a sign of hope in the midst of a troubled society. 

Traditionally, the passage to the status of married couple is marked by the exchange of rings. These rings are symbols of the unbroken circle of love. Love freely given has no beginning and no end, no giver and no receiver for each is the giver and each is the receiver. 

And now, Romi and Recio have declared before all of us that they will live together in marriage. They have made special promises to each other. They have symbolized it by joining hands, taking vows, exchanging rings and by signing their wedding certificate.

By the authority vested in me by the State of ITALY, I now pronounce that you are HUSBAND and HUSBAND. You may kiss each other!

The room explodes in applause and we exit the stage to our favorite song… the DYNASTY theme song. There may have been a few laughs too.

We are so grateful to all of our friends and family who traveled half way around the world to join us, bearing  witness to our nuptials. As it turns out, our wedding was the first gay wedding held  in the Ridotto Ballroom. As I mentioned earlier, this was the first casino in all of Europe where famed ladies man Casanova gambled and smoked opium with courtesans, before being tossed into jail for not paying his gambling debts. It was was also the seat of the French embassy after being conquered by Napoleon Bonaparte in 1797, and lastly a glamorous  ballroom during the Austrian Empire.  Therefore, we were a historic wedding, in a historic space. Love wins is not just a hashtag, but a way of being. Thank you Venice for treating us so beautifully and making us feel like family. You will forever be in our hearts.

Hotel Monaco and Grand Canal