As per California law, we were stationed 100 feet away from the polling location.
It was November 4, 2008, and I was still nervous talking to strangers about gay marriage. The polls would close soon, and I approached a final stranger hurrying across the parking lot toward the library. I recited my quick, Oliver!-esque “please, sir, would you vote no on Prop. 8?” She screamed back, “Who the fuck do you think I am?” I rejoined our small group and saw our teacher supervisor half laughing, half shocked: the stranger was Courtney Love.
I have thought about marriage a lot since volunteering on my first political campaign. I was in the closet then and had previously thought marriage was an impossibility. This campaign inspired me to think differently, that California voters would think differently. They did not. Barack Obama was elected, and “marriage exists only between a man and a woman” was enshrined in California law. I cried at school the next day. When I went to college a year later and joined the student queer club, I thought gay marriage would be an important political touchstone for the group. In fact, it was the opposite.
I was told gay marriage was assimilationist, that fighting for money and jobs and housing and rights for queer homeless youth was more in line with the group’s mission. That gay marriage was a perfect cause for those in power to convince us to pour money and attention into, and that it would distract us from the real problems. (When I read Alison Bechdel’s Dykes to Watch Out For years later, I would see that same argument peddled by an exhausted Mo.)
I didn’t know what to think. I wanted to fit in, I wanted to be out, I wanted to be an activist. I don’t remember exactly how or what led me to my current thinking around marriage, but I am sure that Courtney Love and the student queer group played important roles.
I don’t want marriage for me. At least, that’s what I think now. I am open to change. I understand couples who marry because they want kids, and it is easier when you are married. I don’t want kids. I understand couples who marry because of citizenship or because of medical necessity. My partner and I don’t fit into those categories, at least not now. I’m an extrovert who loves parties, open bars, and wireless microphones, but I don’t have plans for a reception-like party to celebrate my romantic partnership.
Oh, I love attending weddings. Yes, yes. Flirting with a bridesmaid is like a Top 10 activity for me. But marriage does not fit snugly into my personal definition of queerness. My queerness is more of a political position, against assimilation and with the real needs of the community at the forefront.
Which is why I have been meditating extra hard on marriage since my close friends C. and Y. asked me to officiate their wedding this summer.
I said yes immediately, of course. I love them both very much. We have a group friendship and individual friendships with each other. C. and I became friends in a Western Music History class in 2011, and I met Y. in 2018 shortly after the two of them started dating. They are both bisexual — like very, very bisexual — and the fact that they are a cis male/female couple does not make their relationship any less queer to me.
When they told me they were engaged, I asked why. And then, what does marriage mean to you?
I know they might eventually have kids, but because they will be able to have kids very likely without donors, surrogates, or IVF, the state will see each of them as rightful parents implicitly. They both have health insurance, neither of them has terminal illness, and they are both US citizens. They answered with still-unfolding reasoning, the essence of which boils down to family culture. Y.’s family will see the seriousness and committedness of the relationship only through marriage, and they want their families to respect and accept their partnership as long-term and serious. That and the fact that C. and Y. have no qualms about marriage. They love each other, love parties, and care deeply about the happiness of their family and friends.
Nine months later, they asked me to officiate. We are now a month away from the Big Day, and I’m starting to write out the ceremony. We haven’t yet met to talk through what they want in a ceremony and what my joke-to-sincere-statement limit will be. So all of these memories and politics are rushing into my head as I work out what marriage means to me before I get to know more about what marriage means to them.
I know I will talk about my friends B. and Z. who were married two years ago in Northern California. It was in one of those just-small-enough towns that the hosts graciously put together a packed weekend of wedding events. We were destined to become close with multitudes of strangers between the welcome cocktail party, ceremony and reception, beach day on the river, goodbye barbecue, and run-ins around town. But before any of that could begin, a harrowingly tragedy happened days before the Big Weekend, and it was unclear if the couple would even go through with the wedding. Z.’s closest friend and her friend’s mother were killed.
I heard about the tragedy in the days leading up to the wedding and it seemed like an impossible decision for Z. to continue with the celebrations or cancel everything. If you’ve ever experienced intense grief you might understand the cloud of absolute fogginess and horror that follows the death of a loved one. I cannot imagine what Z. was going through in the lead up to what was supposed to be a joyous celebration of love and commitment. When I arrived at the opening reception, there was a beautiful and intentional memorial table full of pictures and candles of Z.’s friend and friend’s mom. I was able to learn a bit more about the two of them and how they impacted Z.’s life, something that I’m still learning to this day. The couple talked about the two of them, and it was clear how present their memories were at the wedding events.
A main tenant of marriage seemed so concrete to me then and there: It is our community who keeps us together, who witnesses us in deep sorrow and deep joy, who holds us accountable to our values. B. and Z. included a Community Vow section at the ceremony where the wedding guests vowed to be there for the couple in their need. I had never heard of Community Vows before, and it all made perfect sense in the queerest way. We are here to protect each other, to fight for each other, to see each other. Not to send this couple off into blissful and detached domesticity, but to call this couple even deeper into the arms of the community that loves and supports them. Marriage is a multi-directional commitment.
When I think about C. and Y.’s impending ceremony, I think about the community that will be there to welcome them and hold them and lift them up in love and support. That’s the tone I’ll take while writing the ceremony and officiating the wedding. That…and omg, I hope there will be bridesmaids to flirt with!
