Rebecca Rehm and Judi Burgess
 We
met in Cambridge at a friend’s home in August
of 2000. We had an immediate connection, and after
two years of serious courtship bought an historic
farmhouse in Millbury and adopted two cats. Then
in February of 2003, even before the SJC decision
came out, we decided to get engaged and began
to plan our ceremony and reception to be held
on a mountainside at Rebecca’s parents’ home
in the Adirondacks on September 18, 2004.
When the SJC decision finally did
come out in November, though, we knew we had to
get married as soon as legally possible. On May
17, 2004, we went to the Worcester Courthouse
at 5am, and when the courthouse opened, we were
one of the first ones to be heard by Judge Susan
Ricci to request a waiver of the three-day waiting
period to get married.
Later that day, after obtaining
our marriage license from the Millbury Town Hall,
we went home to have our ceremony with a few family
members on our side lawn on a very perfect day.
Because of the justice and fairness in the SJC
decision for lesbian and gay families in Massachusetts,
life has truly exceeded our dreams!
Read more at the Boston Globe...
Kelly M. Bonnevie & Karen Kaufman
Due to all of the hard work of your organization and the courage of the plaintiff families, my partner of 13 years, Karen Kaufman, and I were married on May 20, 2004. We went to Brookline Town Hall where the clerk, Patrick Ward, served as justice of the peace in a moving ceremony where our two children, Matthew, 4, and Abigail, 1, were present. Mr. Ward handed out traditional wedding favors of wrapped almonds that he and his wife had prepared for all of the couples getting married that week. The clerk's office had a big wedding cake that was a huge hit with our children. The next day I was able to obtain health insurance for my family for the first time (Karen is a stay at home mom and without marriage, my health insurance plan would not let me add her as an additional insured). My hand was shaking as I signed the marriage license since I could not believe that I was getting married after all these years of thinking it would never happen. We celebrated afterwards by taking the kids to Larz Anderson Park where we took pictures to commemorate what my son called our "Family Wedding Day." We returned home to several beautiful bouquets of flowers left on our doorstep by neighbors and friends in our West Roxbury neighborhood. With two young children, we have yet to have a honeymoon, but their grandmother has promised to watch them in May so we can finally celebrate as a couple!
Thank you, GLAD, we couldn't have done it without
you.
Patricia Brennan & Denise Doucette
Denise and I got married on May 22, 2004 at the First Parish Unitarian Church in Bedford, Massachusetts. We had 100 guests, approximately half family and half dear friends. It was the most joyous celebration of freedom, equality and love that anyone could have dreamed of. Every single guest said it was the best wedding they had ever been to and many are still talking about it. We still laugh and cry and can't quite believe it when we watch our video. In one month we planned everything and we felt as if we were in a complete state of grace from the Universe. One friend made the beautiful wedding cake, her husband took the pictures, another ordered and paid for the gorgeous flowers, another offered to DJ, and the list goes on from there. The most awesome minister in the world, John Gibbons officiated and had tears in his eyes when he said, "It would be my honor to marry you.”
The whole process was touched by magic and we will never forget the feeling as we walked down the aisle and felt the absolute wave of love from everyone there, it was palpable, we could have walked down that aisle forever.
We want everyone on the planet to feel how wonderful it is to be treated as equals under the law. It is life changing.
Jack Craib and Julian Rothblatt
At 5:15 a.m. - four days after May 17 2004 - the sun rose as usual, despite the fears of some skeptics. Jack Craib and Julian Rothblatt awakened in their home at 6:45 to find their sweeping pond view unchanged from May 16 despite predictions of Armageddon by others. It was a glorious day for a wedding, and particularly so for those about to embark on a new adventure heretofore not possible for them or any gay and lesbian couple in Massachusetts.
Otherwise it was a Friday like many others for Jack and Julian working, shopping, and gardening; but on this particular day also preparing for a very small living room wedding and dinner, scheduled for 7 p.m. The marriage license had been requested on Monday from an old friend who is a town clerk in Massachusetts as well as a justice of the peace, and who with her husband made up the entire wedding party…she as the celebrant, and he, the congregant. And at 7 p.m. it indeed took place with little fanfare, no brass band, but lots of love. Vows were exchanged, the “I do’s” proclaimed, and the full legal backing of the great Commonwealth pronounced.
Jack and Julian were now, after 28 years together, legally married, and, for the time being at least, living together as spouses with the blessings of the State. Now it’s all up to an unpredictable legislature, which Jack and Julian hope will do the right thing.
Incidentally, on the next morning, they found, upon opening the refrigerator that their milk had not soured!
Elizabeth Denny & spouse
I just wanted to commend you, once again, on your wonderful - and important - work in Massachusetts (and elsewhere, but I happen to live here). I am still amazed, delighted, etc. that I was able to marry my partner (now my wife) of 20 years last May 18th. It has made such a difference in our lives - I hadn't expected it to, seeing how we'd lived without it our whole lives and I never expected that we'd get the right to marry in my lifetime. But it has made a difference. Not so much in terms of the legal rights (although this has helped us in a number of important ways), but more in terms of public recognition of our commitment to each other and to our community. You made that possible, and I can't thank you enough. I can't wait to see a victory in Connecticut, and I hear that New York is working on the same sort of Supreme Judicial Court decision that we had here. It'll come, some day, for all of us. I wish you the very best & we will continue to contribute to GLAD as we have done and are able to.
Martyn Scott and Bob Buckley
Nothing has changed. Everything has changed.
Our anniversary is still January 27, not May 20. We've been "married" for more than 10 years, not married for almost a year. Taxes turned out to be a royal pain in the nether regions this year. When I needed to be with him in the emergency room a few months ago, I was asked my relationship to him - I immediately stated "husband" and was ushered in right away. He's watching television, while I have a couple of things slowly cooking on the stove. We share one soul and what's left of a brain. The cats want to be fed again.
Did I actually live to see the day? Will someone please pinch me? Are we really and truly legally married? Yep. Our friends, families, and co-workers, as well as many other kind people, are thrilled for us. We are shocked at how our governor, our president, and so many other people with way too much time on their hands feel that we are somehow destroying their marriages by simply being a happily married couple. Well, when one's mind is on one's own business.
The main reason for writing this, though, is to share just a small part of the exuberant joy that we experienced on the morning of May 17, 2004.
We were in Provincetown that weekend doing some work on our place to get ready for Memorial Day, paying very close attention to the news. We had already decided to elope, quickly if we could, but we were certain that our governor, who had a lot of negative energy focused on everything but running the state, would find a way to prevent it. He found a darling little gem from 1913 to thwart so many, but luckily for us, we were still eligible that morning.
We couldn't believe what we saw on the television set Sunday night! Joyous same-sex couples were filing into Cambridge City Hall and coming out with marriage licenses! "OK, Babe, let's get to bed now and try to get some sleep. We have one hell of a morning ahead of us!"
We got up at the crack of dawn (we are morning people like our president has brains), brewed a vat of caffeine, and high-tailed it to Town Hall, not having a clue what to expect.
We expected to see a slew of media people, and we were not disappointed in that respect. We also expected to wait in line for hours, but were very pleasantly surprised in that respect. When they opened the doors of Town Hall for business, it was obvious by the expressions on the faces of the people that work there that they were very happy to be at work that day! Doug Johnstone, the Town Clerk, had a veritable army of very well trained volunteers that made what could have been pandemonium an absolute breeze. Additionally, as there was a typo on our license, the man who assisted us reprinted it in the most beautiful penmanship that we could hope for! When we finished our business, we walked out of Town Hall hand in hand to a loudly cheering crowd and a camera and microphone. Friends told us that we were on television, but I couldn't tell you what was asked or what was said. What we remember the most of that moment and the rest of the day is this: the air was just thick with positive energy! The sheer joy was so tangible, as though every person in the entire town had just had their best Christmas ever! To be in love with my soul-mate, to know that we'll spend the rest of our lives together as a married couple, and to have had such a day of affirmation, is to be truly blessed.
Our wedding three days later was a private affair, and after what we experienced on May 17, Provincetown was the decided place. We chose to wait the three days required by law to get married, rather that seek a waiver, to be on the safe side, as it was made known to us that some people would rather that we not be married. We were fortunate to have been referred to Justice of the Peace Joan Drysdale. She performed a beautiful spiritual non-denominational ceremony in her front yard beside her lily-pond. (We later found out that it is a drainage ditch, but it's a lovely drainage ditch.) We were witnessed by a next-door neighbor and a couple of cats. Our photographer was someone from a Swiss magazine (Oy! The media.) We had our wedding "reception" at Bubula's, at a table for two by the sidewalk. We were wished well by passers-by (guess it gives you away eating dinner at Bubula's on a Thursday night in a Gucci suit and a Brooks Brothers tuxedo?) Once again, we received affirmation of our marriage, for which we are very grateful.
So, thanks for reading this, and even more, thanks for your work in helping us to be married! We know that there are forces that still want to take it away from us, but nobody can ever erase our wonderful memories, nor can they ever erase the fact that one beautiful day in Massachusetts, we were married in the eyes of the state and of God! We'd like to keep the legal rights too.
Donna & Lisa
We met on match.com.
The first time we met we knew it was for the rest of our lives.
My wife/partner asked me to marry her on May 17th the day they legalized marriage in our state.
It was a day I will never forget. We had our ceremony on the beach on August 28th down in Provincetown with her two wonderful children by our side.
Cassie & Jacob (her children) are very proud of us and except both of us for who we are. We have had ups & downs like all marriages do. But the ups totally outlast the downs. We are very good communicators to each other and the kids. It has been great to introduce her as my wife. I am very proud of that. Everyone around us accepts us for who we are. My mom passed away the beginning of this year and it has been very hard on us all. But she was very accepting of who Donna and I are. She was very happy to see two people so happy. Our family will last a long, long time no matter what other people try to do or say....
Thank you for letting us share our story.
Anna & Amy
My partner and I got married at my Grandmother's house in Andover, Massachusetts in June. We had our then 6-month-old daughter in her baby Bjorn as we exchanged our vows. We have been together for 12 years, and this was a special opportunity for us to celebrate a long-standing and loving commitment. My family was there to celebrate and it finally felt like we had something official. We were married by a Justice of the Peace that I found online, who turned out to be a Republican who was in favor of gay marriage!
I look forward to the day when we will have the same rights as others and can have the same protections that they enjoy, no matter where we live or who we love. We are a family and that is written on something more enduring than a piece of paper.
Carol Master & Sherry Mayrent
From Carol: The main difference between my feelings and Sherry’s as we approached our marriage in May was that, since I had previously been married, I was more aware of how important the social supports that come along with an official marriage can be -- especially during those rocky times that most relationships go through. And yet, I also was amazed a how profound an experience such a simple act would be. Since my story is pretty much included within Sherry’s, I’ve decided not to repeat what she has so eloquently expressed but rather to send along a copy of my wedding toast.
Comments on becoming married to Sherry – May 23, 2004
(Please imagine we are at our Passover seder and have just poured the second cup of wine.)
Every year at Pesakh, in the section of the Seder that begins “in each generation everyone should think of him or herself as having personally left Egypt”, we always read the following paragraph (it is taken from an old Workman’s Circle Haggadah):
“In every generation, therefore, one ought to ask: what is needed now that freedom may be won? How are we heirs of Moses? How may we contribute to the liberation of our own people and of all peoples who still suffer from oppression and need?”
This means …
…oppression is not always obvious: usually not to the oppressor, often not to the bystander, and sometimes not even to the oppressed (after all, there was a hesitancy to leave Egypt and even those who wanted to return).
And this means…
…that in every generation we should treasure those who recognize oppression, bring it to our attention, and work to lead us away from it.
And so…
…to the couples who sued for the right to marry,
…to the Gay and Lesbian Advocates and Defenders who, with the help of other organizations such as the ACLU, tried their case as it went through the courts,
…and the those judges of the Supreme Judicial Court of Massachusetts who found that it was unconstitutional for the Commonwealth to deny gay and lesbian couples the right to marry…
…a toast of gratitude.
An afterthought to our children:
You must never think that the Passover Seder is just about something that happened a long time ago; it is about what’s happening in our world and in our lives right now. Our Seder each year to reminds us to pay attention. When you recognize oppression and experience its defeat you truly know that you, too, left Egypt.
From Sherry: When I first learned of the SJC decision concerning gay marriage, I was somewhat disturbed by the likelihood that it would become a dangerously distracting issue in the upcoming election and, at the same time, skeptical that such marriages would actually be allowed. I refused to even think about what it could mean for me and my partner, who had reached our 20th year together at that point. As the weeks passed, her daughter, whose wedding we had joyfully celebrated the previous May, took on the role of wedding planner and attempted to get us to make a plan about what we would do when the decision took effect in May. Despite her insistence, I persistently refused to deal with it until after Passover, which came in March, and only then was reluctantly persuaded to focus on venues and guest lists.
Apart from skepticism, which was becoming less justified as the weeks passed without any significant obstacles materializing, I was quite convinced that celebrating our legal marriage after half a lifetime of commitment would be just a formality, something it felt important to do because we could, and something to do quickly before our right to do it got taken away again.
In reality, that small, simple act was one of the most profound things that I’ve ever experienced.
With our daughter’s help, we did indeed plan a wonderful celebration, and the joy we felt radiating from everyone with whom we came into contact, from the folks in the Watertown town clerk’s office to strangers encountered in stores and restaurants, to the family and friends at our wedding on the 23th, made the week of May 17th a very precious time. And the weeks leading up to our ceremony, during which we hashed out a prenuptial agreement, were intense and interesting as well. But all of that pales in comparison with two unexpected reactions.
The first was a deep sense of security in knowing that I, who was disowned by my birth family at age 21, in large part because they found out I was a lesbian, now have a legal next of kin. While we had surrounded ourselves with a barrage of legal documents attempting to achieve that same state, once we were married, that status became uncontrovertible.
The second was an overwhelming feeling of release from an oppression I never even knew I felt. As someone who had grown up gay at a time when coming out was still a dangerous thing (the early 70s), the possibility of marriage had never even entered my mind. I knew it was something that would never be available to me, and I was able to construct my life around that in ways that approximated marriage. But I never realized, till May 17th, that in some deep recess of my psyche I felt like a second-class citizen. The lightness of being when that feeling evaporated was as amazing to me as it was surprising.
Looking back on our lives from the vantage point of our wedding day, my wife and I discussed lots of things that might have felt different or worked out differently if marriage had been available to us 21 years ago. Perhaps the one that we regretted the most was that life might have been much easier for her kids, who were 12, 11 and 7 when I came into their lives, if we had been able to perform the very mundane act of getting married. Those who cite gay marriage as a threat to the family should remember how many children they put in pain, if not in jeopardy, by their championship of discrimination. The family values folks should also remember that by denying us the Federal tax breaks enjoyed by married heterosexuals, they are depriving our children and grandchildren of a sizable chunk of their inheritance and enriching government coffers at the expense of individuals.
Has my life changed since we were able to married? Yes and no. No, in the sense that we go about our business as before, taking care of each other, our family and our work as we always have. Yes, in the sense that crossing the border from Massachusetts into adjoining states now feels a little sad, as we feel our re-entry into second-class citizenry, and crossing back again brings a happiness that goes.
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