Liepsna

Vaiva and I married on October 22, 1977. At that time, I was a second year law student at Boston University and Vaiva was doing her third year of graduate studies at Yale. The wedding and reception were to be held in New Haven.

The Vetra dance group of New Haven would not be created for another six years. Vaiva found a Lithuanian dance group willing to perform at our reception in Elizabeth, New Jersey. The group was Liepsna.

Vaiva wanted to include the wedding dance, Rezginele, in the performance, and she wanted us to be the bridal couple. Although I had absolutely no folk dance experience, I was up for it. I had been OK at square dancing in grade school, and had a good memory for the patterns of the dance.

I took the train to New Haven, and then we drove to Elizabeth, just past Newark, a good 90 minute drive, for rehearsals. I think we went three times. Our dress rehearsal was in the afternoon space after the wedding and before the evening reception.

Liepsna did a terrific job. Here's a photo of the group after the dances were complete.



Here's a photo detail. You can see how happy we are.