Weddings
Destination
Asheville, North Carolina - in fact, Western North Carolina almost entirely - is pretty gorgeous. We locals manage to share waterfalls, vistas, the Blue Ridge Parkway, the retreat centers, churches and outdoor escapes with each other and with the tourists who flock here during all four seasons. We’re a top destination wedding and stay in the nations top 5 places for couples to tie the knot and then celebrate with guests.
If you want to have your ceremony here, let’s do it. Here are some resources and reasons.
What’s your pleasure
I am a Rabbi. [Have we covered that? Yes, we’ve covered that already.] And as such, I perform all of the ceremonies that are expected of a Rabbi for Jewish couples who want a traditional ceremony. It’s my honor. It’s also my honor to help you sort out what you don’t want, what you would like tailored based on your personalities and wishes, and help you navigate any aspects of creating your service. It is about you. We all like to say that and then we wade into issues of logistics, family, biases and cross-purposes. It happens. Just know that I get it, and while I cannot promise that it will be rain free or pain free, I can almost insure that you will spend some portion of the day laughing. Never a bad thing.
Not Jewish? Not to worry. I’ve married dozens of couples from all stripes and faiths and my goals are the same: don’t screw it up. Kidding. My goals are the same: make sure that I did what I was asked to do and say for the beginning of this couple’s journey. Honor and celebrate them first. Everything else will get figured out.
Pre-marriage counseling
I believe in the importance of premarital counseling as a means to opening up communication and preparing a couple for the inevitable rough spots that come when you hitch a wagon to a star. Who is the wagon and who is the star? Hard to say, and trying to figure that out means no one wins. Also, that phrase is outdated.
What I do is facilitate a conversation and provide clarity about expectations. We talk about conflict styles, household responsibilities and some pretty mundane stuff that can end up making a difference in the long haul. The feedback I’ve received on the premarital work has been pretty positive and it allows a couple to begin to see how they will communicate once they’ve had the wedding and get mugged by reality.
“We had a wonderful experience working with Rabbi Alterman! We are not from Asheville, which could have made this a difficult process, but Rabbi Alterman was extremely accommodating to us. He would even FaceTime us so we could get to know each other without having to make additional trips to Asheville. We wanted a very casual ceremony and he was very respectful of that and delivered exactly what was asked of him! He is very laid back and has a great sense of humor and it showed in the ceremony! He is overall easy to work with and a great guy. ”
“Thank you so much for assisting Ariella and Jordan in preparing the ceremony. I know that your guidance and advice was very helpful to them as they gave voice to their deepest feelings for the day and each other. We know it was not a halachic Jewish wedding when the groom is not Jewish. But our daughter comes from a very committed Jewish home and Jordan has embraced so much of it as he honors her so can I say, we are hopeful he may decide to join up some day?
Anyway, we wanted you to know that the ceremony was simply perfect! It was the perfect balance of tradition, modernity, special mentions and wonderful, warm humor (emphasis on warm!) It was truly the kid’s creation and we were so pleased by the result!!
You are a kind a soul and we are so grateful that you were part of this amazing day and so instrumental in making it so.
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