The Wedding Do's and Don'ts

YES, it happened. We finally tied the knot. I've been flooded with calls and texts and wanted to address my friends and readers through this blog. I also wanted to share some of my small regrets regarding our day.

As many of you know, on July 7, Jason and I will have been together for nine years. Who thought I could remain in the same committed relationship for that long? Not this guy, that's for sure. Just goes to show you that miracles do happen.

We had originally planned to get married almost six years ago. Thinking that 7/7/07 was a great date to get married, we started our planning. Topher and Jason fun fact: We have never conducted our relationship in traditional standards. My official proposal was throwing the ring box into Jason's hands and saying "Well nothing else has been right about this proposal, so here ya go." You don't have to tell me...I'm one romantic guy. During our planning, California began to recognize gay marriages and immediately, our friends' attention turned to us. "You can get married now, and for REAL this time." And while we did appreciate the fact that California was going to recognize our wedding, that did not make our ceremony any more "real" for us. Some people could not wrap their minds around a wedding that was not recognized by the government.

Then, like Lemony Snicket, a series of unfortunate events occurred, causing our wedding to get postponed, repeatedly. Once you have been with your partner for more then a year, the wedding questions start flowing in. When is the wedding? Are you going to get married? Can you even get married now that Prop 8 passed?

It got to the point where I started making up things to tell people, just because I was sick of saying the same thing over and over again. Top 3 responses:

1.) Jason says he won't marry someone who is only a waiter.
2.) I can't decide if I want to marry him or one of the other two people I am currently seeing.
3.) We already did. Didn't we invite you?
Side Note: The last response was never met with a positive reaction. Apprently being invited to our wedding is something people do not take lightly. Who knew?

This is about the time that Jason got sick. So sick in fact that he was hospitalized for four days. That's when I found out that domestic partnerships really aren't the same as a marriage. Did you know the only benefit to a domestic partnership is being able to put your partner on your insurance? That's it. And apparently, if you are not your partners Power of Attorney on their medical record, because you are not legally considered family, you are not allowed to stay over night in the hospital with them. Thank God Jason was awake enough to tell them that he had filed the paper work to make us each others Power of Attorney, but that it just had not gone through yet, otherwise someone else was going to have to stay with him over night.

This also got me thinking, if Jason had died, I would legally have no right to any of his belongings. His family could take everything, and I would be left with nothing to remember my partner with. Just because we were not, technically, married. (I am going to get off my soap box now. But in case you were wondering why I am for gay marriage, it's because of the previous two paragraphs. I don't care if the government changes the name from Marriage to Civil Union for same sex people, just as long as they are awarded the same rights and benefits as married couples have. Everyone should have equal rights in this country, regardless of their background.)

After that day, Jason and I decided we would get married on our terms. We weren't going to have anyone tell us what we should or shouldn't do, because it ultimately didn't matter. It was our wedding, and we needed to treat it as such. We set a date, which was just after my parents birthdays, 3/31/13 (we did not look at our calendar close enough to read that it was also Easter Sunday). We talked to all the necessary people who would be doing something in the ceremony. And right when the planning stages began, the Prop 8 court case went to the supreme court. That's when Jason and I made a pact that we would not tell anyone we were married until after the fact. We had gone through this already once before, and we refused to make our marriage a political spectical.

Looking back, I would have made some adjustments:

Do: Pick a day that is meaningful to you.
Don't: Ignore any holidays that might be the same day.
We had so many relatives turn down being at our wedding because it was Easter, we stopped inviting people all together. Which brings me to my next point.

Do: Have a small wedding with just your closest family and friends
Don't: Inform the ones that were not invited on Facebook.
I can't tell you how many angry text messages I got yesterday. Apparently more people were interested in coming to our wedding then I thought.

Do: Have your BFF conduct the ceremony
Don't: Have her quote The Princess Bride.
Lesley is such a natural public speaker, and an ordained minister, so she's the perfect person to minister a gay wedding. I told her that she should form a website and start charging rates.

Do: Have a reception afterwards
Don't: Have it at your house.
........Unless you have a maid. Nobody wants to do that clean-up.

Do: Register for your wedding.
Don't: Register at Best Buy.
We have been together for so long, there really wasn't anything we needed to "start our lives together" with. So we did the only sensible thing, we registered for all the electronic things we have wanted. Some family members thought that this move made it seem like we weren't taking this seriously, but those who know us well understand that we take our electronics and media VERY seriously.

Do: Take pictures at your wedding.
Don't: Rely on your guests to take good pix with their cell phones.
I do not have any good ceremony pix from yesterday and I gotta say, it's a bit annoying.

Do: Have your father give a toast.
Don't: Have it be after he has been drinking.
I choose to not comment about this. Moving on.

Do: Spend as much time celebrating with your new spouse.
Don't: Tell him you have to leave soon so you can catch the season premire of Game of Thrones and the season finale of The Walking Dead.
In my defense, he wanted to see them just as much as I did, but it wasn't exactly romantic.

On an unrelated topic, my blog turned one year old today. 50 posts, almost 6,000 views, and read in over 30 countries. I never imagined I would have this much success with my writing. New readers keep approaching me and telling me how much they like my writing. I want to thank everyone who reads this blog, even if its just on a now and then basis. Your support is what keeps my writing going.

And by the way, if you were one of the people who was not invited to my wedding, I would advise you to recheck your calendar and remember what today actually is . . . . . .

I never claimed to not be an asshole. But if you started reading my blog from the beginning, you probably should have seen this coming.

(PS Be careful what you comment. You wouldn't want to be the only person fooled by me, would you?)