With This Ring, I Thee Wed

I still remember that moment like it was yesterday, even though it happened almost 20 years ago. Although I was overwhelmed with surprise and joy, I also knew that February 12, 2004 would become a pivotal day in history. As a resident of San Francisco and a proud member of the LGBTQ community, I couldn’t believe what I had just heard. Gavin Newsom, the city’s newly sworn-in mayor, announced that he would ignore the law and began issuing marriage licenses to same-sex couples. I immediately rushed to the Civic Center, wanting to be in the center of it all. It was difficult not to be swept up in the emotions of couples who had made the impromptu decision to marry on the steps of City Hall. As I looked around at the crowd filled with people of different ages and cultural backgrounds, I realized that we all had one thing in common: a shared legacy. Our elation was palpable.

Although I was overwhelmed with surprise and joy, I also knew that February 12, 2004 would become a pivotal day in history.

The state would eventually revoke those licenses, but for a brief month I believed that I had been granted the same marriage rights as heterosexual couples. There was no denying that Newsom’s actions sparked a long-simmering debate over LGBTQ rights and moved one of the most important social issues of this generation to the forefront. I thought about the courageous LGBTQ activist and member of San Francisco’s Board of Supervisors Harvey Milk, who had rallied so relentlessly for equal rights only to have his life end by assassination in 1978. I knew his death had not been in vain. It would take eleven more years for same-sex marriage to become legal in all 50 states, when in June 2015 the U.S. Supreme Court struck down all state bans and required states to honor out-of-state same sex marriage licenses. And now that I have found the woman I want to marry, this is a right that I will never take for granted.