The Lady Of The House • What I'm Doing Tomorrow

What I’m Doing Tomorrow

I’m going to a wedding. It shouldn’t be a big deal. I’m in my 30s so I’ve been to a ridiculous amount of weddings. Three this year, at least.

This one is special.

Tomorrow two friends of mine are getting married. They’ve been together for 25 years. This is the first year they’ve been legally allowed to wed. One of the grooms is very nervous. Not that they won’t go through with it, not that either of them would run. After 25 years together, there isn’t a single thing that marriage can throw at them that they haven’t already been through and survived. They’ll both be there, it will be a lovely ceremony, and then they’ll be married as they should be.

But still, he’s nervous. Why?

Being married was never allowed to be part of his life view. And then, quite suddenly it was, and everything moved rather quickly. They’ll be married just over a year after NY State voted to legalize same-sex marriage. That’s fast, until one considers that they have already been through a lifetime together. Yet still, he’s going to be a husband when he never thought he would be. That’s the sort of thing that changes your definition of who you are. Think about that. The government has defined part of who he is and what he thought he could be for his entire life.

He’s practicing smiling because he’s scared.

As a boring straight woman who is allowed to marry pretty much anything with a pulse, they’re nerves I don’t understand—no, can’t understand—because I’ve never been told no. I was allowed to get married when I was practically a baby, with no real life experience, no plan, and decision-making skills to rival those of a drunken marmoset. Marriage is something that society likes us straight women to do, and these days doesn’t even blame us too terribly if it doesn’t work out. I hate to be flip, but it’s not a gigantic deal for us (really, I’m not kidding) especially considering there are about 6,200 weddings per day in the US. It’s just not so special. We don’t have to work to get married, we can just up and do it—believe me, I know, I was married in Las Vegas.

Yeah, tomorrow is different.

Tomorrow I’m going to a wedding of two people who have loved each other for 25 years. That’s incredibly special. I’m going to cry. I’m probably going to wind up taking my own marriage a little more seriously too.

-TLOTH