I was just looking at a friends of ours' wedding photo. It is the best wedding photo I have ever seen. It's a photo of a beautiful bride standing in a gorgeous wedding gown holding her decorated soldier spouse in her arms, up in the air, like they are about to cross the threshold. They are both smiling and happy, truly happy, free to be themselves.
Her decorated soldier just happens to be her wife.
We have so many traditions in American, hell let's face it, in the world, surrounding weddings. When I was planning my wedding my mother and future mother in law broke out the book of ettiquette. The bride's family pays for the gown and the reception, including tranportation, and invites. Grooms family pays for flowers, rehearsal dinner which should include all out of town guests. Each member of the wedding party pays for their outfits, which runs into the thousands of dollars. The maid of honor has to foot the bill for the shower and bachelorette party and the best man the bachelor party. The bride and groom have to buy something, a gift, for all of the members of the wedding party. The groom pays for the honeymoon. And by the time I got done with trying to figure out what color toilet paper I wanted in the toilet at my fourth bridal shower, I left home, moved in with Peter six hours away from home and didn't come back until the Friday before my wedding.
Gay couples are finally so lucky. Even if they had former relatives who went underground to get married the question of, or argument about, why Johnny doesn't want to wear grandma's wedding dress is probably NOT brought up.
It's all new, fresh, a blank canvas. If you wanna go all traditional have at it. If you wanna both wear wedding dresses or tuxes have at it. One a gown, one their dress uniform...HAVE THE FUCK AT IT!!!
It's great getting married when you're gay! A new frontier! When your gay and engaged nobody's feelings get hurt because you don't want the groom's family seated on the right and bride's on the left because there are 300 of one side of the family and 30 on the other. Nobody gets into a fight over how you HAVE to turn CATHOLIC if you marry a Catholic and that would break your mother's heart because the Catholic church won't marry you in the first place when you're gay! They may recruit you to be a priest or a nun but they won't marry you!
As an aside... No one from my side took communion at my wedding, despite the priest actually inviting all the non-catholics up for communion - it was Vatican II everyone was open to new and exciting things, yes I am being sarcastic - not one came. So the catholic side of the church had empty pews all taking communion and the protestant side sat there with their hands folded making comments about the priest making cocktails. Hetero weddings are typically very exclusionary. You gays are so lucky the hard core Christians hate you so you don't have to deal with this! Just sayin'.
At the planning of gay weddings nobody says a word because they are all, or at least the old fart stick in the mud's self involved homophobes are all, sitting there with their mouths hanging open. The grandmas either don't come to all the planning "luncheons" or shut up out of fear, ignorance, stupidity or sometimes, sometimes if you are lucky, they shut up because they are being supportive!
By virtue of being out casted and ostracized, hated and maligned for all the history of the world, except maybe the ancient Greeks, the gays have earned the right to make up whatever kind of wedding they want and nobody is gonna say a god damned word! HA! I love it!
Now, my prediction is that the great grandchildren of our friends who wore a wedding gown and a decorated army uniform and all the other wonderful gay couples who are to be married in the next couple of years, my prediction for their great grandchildren is that as Jane and Christina tell their great grandparents about their upcoming nuptials, they will be told, "Well, your grandmother and I had PINK toilet paper in our bathroom at the second shower. It was so beautiful. And, honey it would be great if you, Jane, wore my gown and Christina wore Grandma's Army uniform. IT'S TRADITION, after all!"
But for now, the gays have it made!! :}
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