The Wedding of Melissa Goodell and Janus Abello - 24 June 2012

The part of the ceremony officiated by Vince Hawkins, lead minister of the Columbia Church of Christ.

This past weekend, I traveled to Columbia, Missouri, to attend the wedding of my friends, Melissa Goodell and Janus Abello. Both the ceremony and the reception were held at Columbia College. They chose to have their ceremony on a Sunday, which is a little unusual, but I liked that I could drive down to Columbia after church.

I first met Melissa when she moved to Columbia to be closer to her then-boyfriend, Brandon. Being from Boston, we instantly bonded over our shared love of the Red Sox. One of my earliest memories with her is watching 'Fever Pitch' with Jimmy Fallon and Drew Barrymore and relishing thoughts of Fenway Park. That and helping her learn how to drive a manual-transmission car. And Janus, I can't remember when I met him, but I've known him for a while. He's originally from Anchorage, Alaska, and came to Columbia to study at the University of Missouri. I think it's pretty cool how God brought them both thousands of miles from home to meet each other, took them halfway across the world to Novosibirsk, Russia, for them to fall in love, and then solidify that love into marriage back in Columbia, Missouri.

Here's some of my favorites:

   

Maks, the lead minister of the Novosibirsk Church of Christ, traveled to Columbia to be part of their wedding. He prayed in Russian (left). The vows portion (right) was officiated by the other minister in the Columbia church, Jason Touchatt. Melissa cries as Janus read his vows. I cried, too. They were great. He talked about how parts of Melissa's character initially scared him because they were so amazing.

50th Annual Heart of America Marathon

One of the hardest marathons in the US to run, because of the route. There's a really steep hill that happens at the end of the course. And, oh!, the drama. My camera has been being hinky lately. It all of a sudden didn't want to turn on. I fiddled with the battery a little bit and it seemed to fix itself and then...

I'm at the marathon and I've been taking pictures of the atmosphere, etc., and here comes the first-place finisher. He's heading down the home stretch and my camera has gone asleep. So I depress the button, nothing happens. Now, I thought maybe it was just my battery, and I'd brought 2 extra charged ones, and I stick in the first one and nothing! I'm muttering, 'come on! come on! don't do this to me!' And get the second one in and nothing! Stupid camera! Now I'm going to have to get you fixed!!! And I'm on assignment and I missed the winning shot.

So I started taking pictures with my i-Phone and then around 9:30 I tried the Missourian and someone was there (they weren't there at 7:30 when I tried to check out a camera just in case my 'working' camera decided to get finicky), so I walked the 3 blocks down to the Missourian and got a working camera.

Here's my captioned pics:


Carolyn Mitchell, 72 (#39), of Lenexa, Kan., waves in triumph, with Karen Nicholson, 43 (#167), close behind as she crosses the finish line of the 50th Annual Heart of America Marathon on Monday, September 7, 2009. Mitchell was one of the last participants to finish and had planned to run with her husband, Kent Mitchell, but he was sidelined with an injury.


Newell Kitchen, 50, of Columbia, Mo., rests after completing the 50th Annual Heart of America marathon on Monday, September 7, 2009. The Heart of America marathon is considered one of the most difficult in the United States because of the weather and some of the inclines during the race.