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I can’t help myself. I’m writing because there’s just so much going on that I can’t keep it to myself any longer.
I’m about to burst. Into tears, at least, if not with pride. There’s so much going on. Can’t pick up a paper or turn on a TV without hearing “gay marriage.”
As amazing as all this coverage is, however, it’s stressful: This is not an abstract or trendy debate, this is about our lives.
The Supreme Court weighed in Tuesday and Wednesday, delivers a verdict late June. (Appropriate month for a marriage verdict?)
Can we divine their thinking from the questions they asked our brave lawyers and those defending the Defense of Marriage Act (the latter aptly named Bipartisan Legal Action Group)? Will the “dream duo” of Theodore Olson and David Boies prevail over Proposition 8?
However encouraging we interpret the court’s questions, there’s no getting around some basic facts: They’re a majority of older white men, not one of them really knowing our lives from the inside. These judges, sitting high above the rest of us watching, listening, will render a verdict that intimately impacts my life and my family.
Stomach-churning. I try not to worry, I want to assume fairness and love prevails, but…
The stomach-churning is not only about DC. Here in New Mexico, just last week, the Santa Fe mayor and city attorney “declared” marriage legal for all of us. And the American Civil Liberties Union, the National Center for Lesbian Rights and the Albuquerque law firm Sutin, Thayer & Brown just filed a complaint in District Court in Albuquerque to challenge the denial of marriage licenses.
So many unknowns: Will our attorney general issue a ruling giving clerks a green light? Will the clerks then issue licenses? Will the governor issue an injunction? Will our lawsuit linger so long that opponents gain a foothold in the courts? (We have a Republican governor on record opposing “same-sex marriage.”)
These are just some of the questions that roll around in my head in the middle of the night.
Sue Hallgarth and I celebrated our 25th anniversary last August. This September marks the 10th anniversary of our Canadian marriage. That’s not that long, actually, and so much has happened in a decade.…
We are no longer such novelties: according to the 2010 Census, there are at least 5,825 same-sex couples in New Mexico living in all but two counties across the state. And 35 percent of those who identify as couples are raising children.
Nationally, the numbers have flipped: Regardless of which poll you look at, well over a majority of Americans now support our right to marry.
So this will happen. Eventually. We’re not going back.
