The video is just photos taken of our wedding in SF back in 2008 (we're one of 18,000 same-sex couples still legally married in CA). We've relocated to Durham NC from San Francisco.
Paul and I were living in San Francisco when we met in November 2000. I didn’t know at the time that he would be the one.
We dated and we both felt connected with each other but we were still “just dating.” The true test came up in August 2001 when Paul left for Boston to start graduate school. He would be gone two years getting a masters degree. I stayed in San Francisco, but we remained a couple despite the distance. After his graduation he returned to California and we set up a home together. We had survived the distance and grew more committed despite the hardship of the separation.
In February 2004 San Francisco started performing marriages for same-sex couples. The morning it started Paul and I were on a plane to Ft. Lauderdale to visit a friend. When we arrived at the airport in Florida I had a message on my phone. An old friend called to ask us down to City Hall to witness his marriage to his partner. Paul and I were having a good time in Florida, but we longed to return home to see our friends getting married.
When we got home several days later, we biked to City Hall to see if we could get hitched. Thousands of other couples had had the same idea. The line of people hoping to be legally married snaked around inside and then outside the building. There was no hope that we’d reach the office that day, but we did make an appointment to be married – the first available appointment two months away. Unfortunately, the California Supreme Court halted all same-sex marriages before we got to our appointment.
When same-sex marriage was again made legal for same-sex couples in 2008, I was overjoyed. Never much of a romantic, I turned to Paul one night and asked if he wanted to … you know … do what we tried to do several years ago … like get married. I fumbled for the words. It felt monumental to me, that awkward proposal. He nonchalantly said "yeah, sure" and we set a date, July 10th, 2008. Paul had been accepted to the PhD program at UNC Chapel Hill in Public Health. I was finishing up my masters degree in San Francisco. We were facing another year apart, my last year at school and the first year of his.
We decided to marry at San Francisco City Hall, the beautiful Beaux Arts civic structure. When an old friend told me that she and her husband had married there 20 years ago and ever since have referred to the building as “the church where we were married,” I knew we had picked the right location.
Another bonus of City Hall was that the city limited the number of attendees at weddings. We wanted a small ceremony; this would reinforce our choice. About a month before the ceremony, and after invitations had been sent to only our immediate families, my mother called. She said that her closest friend just happened to be flying in from Colorado for a visit the day before our wedding. “Great mom, what will she be doing while you’re at the ceremony?” She quickly assumed full “mothering” mode. “She was there the day you were born. She must be there on this day, your wedding day!” Paul and I discussed this and relented. She could come but no more.
The next night I got a call from my mom. “Marge and Marie must come to your wedding too! They were there the day you were born. They can’t miss it!” Fearing that a pattern was emerging, I said no and stuck to it. Saying no to my mother and two longstanding family friends was difficult, but I reminded her of the reception we’d be having two days later and told her that everyone was welcome to come to our party on that day. It was a strange insight that this, too, is what marriage equality looks like.
The day of our wedding was amazing. Other couples, gay and straight, mixed in the lobby of the building. Some couples were waiting, like us, for their ceremony. Other couples were jubilantly leaving the building with their families. The atmosphere was so incredibly festive. We had each of our mothers serve as witnesses on our marriage certificate. The judge who officiated spoke of love and commitment – all a blur since I couldn’t hear through my happiness. We had a wonderful dinner at one of our favorite restaurants and afterwards danced the evening away at the swanky Top of the Mark, in the Mark Hopkins hotel on Nob Hill. The city was at our feet and everyone in the room congratulated us on our nuptials.
Proposition 8 stopped same-sex marriages in California, but the California Supreme Court ruled that our marriage, along with approximately 18,000 others, would remain valid. We were lucky, though I still feel a bit of guilt for having been in the right place and time with the right guy. When I think about the future of marriage equality, I think about all those couples patiently waiting for their own beautiful wedding day.
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