Re-Married... Withouth a Divorce

I officially made it through my first year of marriage! I think it’s safe to say that it exceeded my expectations – because frankly, I had none. I made a great choice and hoped for the best... and it worked! In the past year we’ve had personal successes and personal failures. We’ve laughed, cried and laughed some more. All in all, it’s been a really great twelve months.

When we were originally planning our wedding we had every intention on going to the great state of Massachusetts, the only state at the time to allow and recognize same-sex marriage. However, they had a residency loophole so we decided just to do our wedding our way and legalize it some other day. Just one short year later with Massachusetts no longer requiring residency we now have FOUR states that have marched into the 21st Century and are allowing and fully recognizing same-sex marriages. So... We flew into Boston a week ago last Friday and did the tourist thing for three days. After that we headed out to Cape Cod to hang with some friends and to get RE-Married on our anniversary.

In order to get married on our actual anniversary, we needed a waiver from a local courthouse excuse us from the three day requirement Massachusetts has for marriage licenses. As we walked up to the courthouse is a VERY small town called Barnstable on Cape Cod, I could feel just the slightest bit of nervousness. I am completely open and honest about my personal life, but I have spent most of my adult life in the South and I would NOT feel good about going into the courthouse in my county with my female partner and inquiring about a marriage license.

We walked in and were greeted by a female Deputy who appeared to be straight; she smiled and asked in a very heavy New England accent if we knew where we needed to be. I told her we were there to get a waiver for the marriage license. I thought she was going to come across the table and hug us both! She smiled and told us what floor we needed to be on and what we needed to ask for. She congratulated us and sent us on our way. In the court clerk’s office, we received the same response and had our waiver signed by the judge in less than 20 minutes. We proceeded to the Town Clerk's office in the town we planned to marry in and received an almost warmer response with the clerk offering up romantic spots for walks along the beach.

Lisa and I finished preparing for our "Re-Marriage" feeling a little surprised and also a little saddened. We were surprised that EVERYONE we came in contact with; male, female, old, young – they all gave us the same response – sincere congratulations and well wishes. At the same time we were saddened that there are 46 other states (our own home state included) that wouldn’t recognize our union and in most cases have and continue to adamantly fight against same-sex marriage.

With that, Wednesday, April 8th Lisa and I celebrated our first anniversary as a married couple saying our religious (and legal) vows with a UCC Pastor on a rock jetty in Provincetown Massachusetts. It was a lot colder on Cape Cod than it was last year in Key West but we made it through the year and now have a legal marriage license to prove it! Maybe on our second anniversary we will have recognition in our own state??

A girl can dream can’t she??