On Sept. 29, in the wake of Hurricane Helene, Peter Hoffman Batinski and Justin Robbins, the brother-in-law of his fiancée, Keri Young Terenzio, went for a walk around the hard-hit Biltmore Village area of Asheville, N.C. As they surveyed the damage and checked on some friends’ businesses, Mr. Batinski noticed a man in a vest that said “media” taking photos.
The next day, Sept. 30, a photo of Mr. Batinski and Mr. Robbins standing beside a toppled silo appeared on the front page of The New York Times. (The photographer in the vest was Sean Rayford.) Without power, cell coverage or newspaper delivery, however, Mr. Batinski never saw it.
And, of course, he had other concerns: He and Ms. Terenzio had to decide whether to cancel their Oct. 5 wedding.
For more than a year, the couple had been planning their nuptials in the Asheville area. They invited 115 people, many from around the country. But now, there was no water or power and local officials were pleading for outsiders to stay away. A wedding was the last thing on anyone’s mind.
Between nursing shifts at the overcrowded Mission Hospital, which had gotten its power back, Ms. Terenzio tried to communicate with guests. “Everyone out of town was telling me their hotels and flights were canceled, and we didn’t want people coming into town because there’s too much going on here, and the locals need the resources we do have,” she said.
The food truck they had booked couldn’t operate without power or water. The venue, a 33-acre farm outside of Asheville, also didn’t have power or water.
“I had an internal struggle of overwhelming guilt,” Ms. Terenzio said. “Should we even do this when people are out there struggling and maybe we should be out there helping people?”
That’s when the couple’s local community chimed in.
“Everyone said ‘We need this, we need a moment to be happy,’” Ms. Terenzio said. The owner of a local business, Ben’s Tune Up, a sake brewery in a converted automotive shop, offered its location. The photographer, Wyatt Kostygan, said he was still available, as did the hair stylist, Tracie Jameson.
Another friend cleared out her flower garden to provide decorations. And two of Ms. Terenzio’s uncles drove overnight from Texas and Florida with food and water, so the event wouldn’t strain local resources.
The local musician they had hired, Sam Irvin, also said he was still available, emailing Ms. Terenzio, “I have been considering whether I’ve got the bandwidth/fortitude to come play and I think I’ve decided that some normalcy, some purpose and a chance to offer what I care about most during this tough time could be really special.”
The couple is familiar with crisis. In April 2020, Mr. Batinski and Ms. Terenzio matched on the dating app Tinder. “‘That’s the one,’” Mr. Batinski recalled thinking when he saw a photo of Ms. Terenzio wearing a flannel shirt and making a silly face on top of a beautiful mountain.
For their first socially distanced date, they went for a hike with their dogs. After a few more dates, they decided to pod together at Mr. Batinski’s home in West Asheville. They’ve lived together ever since.
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In August 2023, Mr. Batinski asked Ms. Terenzio to marry him.
Mr. Batinski, 36, was raised in Carbondale, Ill., and has a bachelor’s degree from Southern Illinois University in agricultural systems. He works as the head of sour and specialty brewing at Hi-Wire Brewing, an Asheville-founded craft brewery.
Ms. Terenzio, also 36, was raised in Ho-Ho-Kus, N.J., and has a bachelor’s degree in liberal studies from Florida International University. She works as an intensive care unit nurse at Mission Hospital. The facility had made national news because of the dire conditions post-hurricane, with overcrowding and no food or water.
While the storm touched virtually every aspect of residents’ lives, the couple were determined to have their wedding day be a happy one.
Ms. Terenzio and Mr. Batinski were married Oct. 5 at Ben’s Tune Up. Ms. Terenzio’s friend from Florida, Robert Biggs, was ordained at the last minute by American Marriage Ministries to officiate; the original officiant couldn’t make it.
After the ceremony, the 30 guests who were able to attend ate a dinner of hamburger patties and veggie dogs cooked on a barbecue grill because there was no water. Bathroom stalls contained small buckets of water driven in by friends with instructions on how to use it to flush.
A guest brought a copy of the Sept. 30 New York Times. At the reception, the groom held up the paper as he gave a speech, laughing that his unexpected feature was “at least one fun thing that came from the storm.”
Then, it was 7:30 p.m., curfew time, followed by a “mini-moon” in a cabin they rented in the woods a few hours outside of Asheville, where “we’ll probably take a lot of showers,” Ms. Terenzio said. “We’ll relax a little before coming back to continue helping friends whose homes were destroyed.”
The post In the Wake of Hurricane Helene, Still Saying ‘I Do’ appeared first on New York Times.
