Valentine's Day for our wounded veterans

Today, there has been an awful lot of discussion floating around about this photo from the wedding of Iraq veteran Ty Ziegel and Renee Kline. It won a first prize in the portraits category in the 2007 World Press photo awards. I first heard of it through a friend, who directed it to a discussion of the photo taking place at the photo blog BagNewsNotes. You can read the commentary here.

For many of us, Valentine's Day is a time to enjoy the dearest person in our lives. We hope for something picturesque, a romantic dinner by candlelight, a new set of lingerie to try on, and some good ol' fashion lovin'. We are trained to expect something perfect.

However, life and love aren't perfect. Easy, happy love is for the silver screen; real-life relationships are much more complex. This photo, whatever you think about the Iraq War, is an apt reminder of the imperfect and more deeply authentic love of which we are capable.

Enough of my rambling. What do you think of the photo?