Is Equality a Fairy Tale?

Jack and I celebrated a wedding anniversary this past Sunday. To honor our 12 glorious years together, I spent part of last night making phone calls to my local legislators encouraging them to vote in favor of marriage equality in Illinois.

Thankfully 12 years ago, when we got married, the state of Illinois didn't question our commitment to one another. They were not interested in our future plans, including whether or not we planned on having, or adopting children. Nowhere on the application did they ask about our birth order, only the priest that married us hesitated when he found that we were both first born, a snag that does raise it's ugly head from time to time. And because I am a girl and Jack is a boy we were allowed to marry in the state we called home. It was, and still is, a legal union.

Nine states have now legalized same sex marriage, Illinois is poised to be the tenth.

Curious 8 year old Mary listened intently as I explained why voicing your opinion matters, and why this particular subject is of interest to me.

"Me too Mom, I'm going to make a list for you, of things to say". She came up with only one thing, "some things are fair and some things are not fair and this is not fair".

"You know I think this is a little like a fairy tale, when the dumb old King gets to decide who is to marry, and they don't even get to say what they think. Isn't this that way, when someone else gets to say if you can marry? Shouldn't you just get to marry who makes you happy?".

Tonight Mary will be making the calls.

Still Crazy After All These Years

The two men at the next table were a bit loud, laughing heartily with a slap on the back kind of vigor. My lunch companion was Jane Austen and this wild kind of fun was a bit distracting as I read my way through a plate of rice and green lentils. "Remember freshman year, or was it sophomore, when you....", I looked up, suddenly envious.

It's not often that I have lunch with someone with whom I could reminisce about sophomore year, in fact it's almost never. My school companions have spread from New Mexico to New York, we rarely actually talk, much less have lunch together. The last time we were all together as a group was at least twenty years ago, so long ago I don't actually remember, and I certainly don't remember every saying "good-bye, see you in what, maybe twenty years?".

But that is how it happens, even with people that at one time you held so tightly that the thought of a weekend without them was torture. Thankfully laughing together is like riding a bike, you don't ever forget, especially when you realize, halfway through the beautiful wedding, that you left your car running in the driveway outside. And when you, at 45, end up being only a slightly more grown up version of the person you were at 18, reconnecting with those old selves comes quite easily.

Was this where we thought we would be? Almost thirty years later, giggling at the tiny dog in the tiny dog carrier two seats away, at the home of Peter and his husband Brian, in New York, watching our friend Laura marry her longtime partner Candace?

Long ago, at about this time of year, we'd all wrap ourselves in ragg wool, borrow a family wagon and drive west for a day at the Renaissance Festival. After hours of eating turkey legs, making hand dipped candles and listening to poorly tuned accents, we'd pile back into the woody wagon, pop the Vivaldi cassette in the player and muse about spending days like this for the rest of our lives. Of course at 17 we failed to consider that things change; life doesn't always stay in suburban Kansas City, and that we were just beginning to discover who we might be for the rest of our lives.

Family wagons morphed into mini vans and we moved away, found new friends, grew up, and grew apart. We married, had babies, watched babies go to college, and two weeks ago found ourselves back together for the first time in a very long time. We discovered that saying hello again is just as easy as saying goodbye, and that after all these years, we were essentially the same wonderful people we knew so long ago. It seems that knowing people so intensely, and so thoroughly, works to bind you together for years to come, even if you don't spend any of those interim years together.

Politics and ceremony aside, it was really nice to be back amongst old friends.

"Did you think Laura would grow up and marry a woman?"
"I don't suppose I thought Laura would grow up".

When Did You Learn How to Read?

It's the first section I read, blasting past all the real news, all of which can wait until I have read every bit of the Sunday Style section of the Times. There's Modern Love, and Social Q's, and my very favorite, Weddings and Celebrations. It's a very legitimate way to snoop into the lives of people I don't know at all, comparing accomplishments of the bride and groom, and backgrounds of the families. I study the pictures, trying to decide why the 38 year old partner in the Manhattan law firm is choosing to take her husband's name, or why two people who live and work in D.C. got married in St. Louis, where neither of their parents live, or how the woman with two Princeton professor parents married someone without a college degree.

The Times is the perfect place to list everything that has been accomplished in a relatively short time: doctoral candidacies, degrees from Oxford, charitable board seats .....and yet, not one wedding announcement that I have seen lists the exact age at which the bride and groom finally learned to read. It's amazing, this very important milestone and it isn't so much as mentioned. It's probably best, imagine Aunt June, were she to discover that William's fiance didn't put together sounds and letters until she was almost seven; everyone knows that a relationship built between a five year old reader and a seven year old reader will never last. This tidbit could keep Aunt June at home on the wedding day and force her to return the place setting of china purchased for the once happy couple, knowing that the relationship was certain to fail. And heaven forbid that the 36 year old senior analyst who graduated with honors from Columbia be outed as one who struggled and didn't finish his first chapter book until third grade. Not only would his marriage be doomed, unless of course he was engaged to marry another slacker, but his professional career would surely be over. What kind of super analyst must you be to overcome that kind of dirty laundry?

This is vital information that is being withheld. Imagine how this could change the current drawn out Presidential election process: two candidates, one learned to read a full year before the other, election decided. We could have avoided this entire debt ceiling debacle by knowing that Obama was placed in an accelerated reading group in first grade while Boehner was left to learn with the average students. Obama plan wins.

This could mean the end of the ever intimidating job interview. Thank you for submitting your resume for our review but at this time we have chosen to go with a candidate who learned to read six months earlier than you did. We wish you luck in your job search however we know that you will never find anything in our industry as it clearly states on your resume that you never fully understood the letter of the day on Sesame Street and thus, remained in the standard reading classroom your entire academic career.

Everyone knows that the age at which you learn to read is the most accurate predictor of future success; just ask the moms on the playground. Why the New York Times hasn't picked up on this I will never understand. All the news that's fit to print? I beg to differ.

Pomp, Glorious Pomp!

Over three hundred years ago my family left England. I've yet to forgive them.

Had they been able to hang on for just a few more years I would have certainly found myself happily packed into this mass of people Friday morning. Rather, given to some long lost need for religious freedom, I watched the glorious nuptials on the west side of the big pond.

To note, Westminster Abbey appears to be a very nice church. Lovely hymns, a very pleasing service, magnificent flying buttresses; what about that says get into a boat and cross an unknown ocean to an unknown land? What on earth, literally, were they expecting to find over here?

My grandmother was convinced that our family could have rewritten history. Her cousin dated Prince Edward, the brief King Edward VIII, before he met the future Duchess, Wallace Simpson and abdicated. Had Mimi's cousin been a better suitor for the then Prince perhaps the whole Wallace debacle could have been avoided, and that twist to the family tree eliminated. Of course then Wills and Harry would be reduced to the group of "lesser Royals" when attending such grand affairs having missed the direct line to the monarchy. Or sadly, there might not be a Wills and Harry as Charles may not have snagged the snappy Diana had he not been the Prince of Wales. Rewriting history is daunting, in own life it means skipping a trip to the market, missing a sale on asparagus and thus making risotto with mushrooms instead; far less dramatic but captivating all the same.



As one who generally eschews all the princess nonsense generally associated with six year old girls, I am oddly fascinated by the Royal family. To be fair, I am somewhat dazzled by all weddings. The Style section, specifically the weddings, is the first section ripped from the Sunday paper, I blather quite loudly at weddings of friends and cry freely at television weddings. Add to that the layers of pomp and tradition associated with a royal wedding and my fascination is understood.

That the princes immediately remove their hats and gloves (leaving them with slightly mussed hair) upon entering Westminster Abbey is compelling. Their father, who, upon removing his gloves, wiped his nose and then shook hands with the entire clergy line up, could have used a royal hankie. As a person who is horrified to find my self seated next to exposed and voluminous arm pit hair on airplanes, who was completely disgusted at the teenagers, dressed in shorts, groping each other in church on Easter Sunday, and who teaches her children that adults are to always be addressed as Mister and Misses, a little pomp and pageantry is completely intoxicating. In my ongoing quest for a bit of civility and order in my daily life, a royal wedding is like a dance in a field of tucked in shirts and neatly trimmed nose hair.

And so I took my freedom and chose to spend over five hours watching every single detail of the glorious day, from my side of the pond, with a cup of English breakfast tea firmly in hand. It would appear that we all had a jolly good time.

A Late Announcement

Allyson, a daughter of Sharon of Kansas City, and the now late William, was married ten years ago today to Jack, a son of Dave and Mary of Lincoln, Nebraska. Reverend Patrick Sean Liam Flannagan, a Roman Catholic priest with an over the top Irish name, performed the St. Patrick's day nuptials at St. Clement Catholic Church in Chicago. The bride, who is known as Ally, is also the stepdaughter of Jackie and the also late Jack. The bride does not have great luck with regard to keeping wonderful fathers living.

Allyson, who will stick with the name she has been using for too long to consider changing, was, until ten years ago, a trust officer with UMB Bank in Kansas City, responsible for taking care of truly lovely old people who entrusted their financial concerns to a woman who had difficulty passing Algebra 101. The groom, who was also, and still is, a banker, is far more skilled in mathematical logic and will, forever, be responsible for balancing the family checkbook.

The bride's father worked in the soft drink industry, specializing in packaging products, at a company bearing his family name. Years of store deliveries to the bride's childhood home required Ms. Ally to kick a very long standing addiction to Tab when the soda became difficult to find on store shelves. The groom is still happily attached to his daily Coca Cola but finds that he prefers the version produced in Mexico, available at Hispanic markets all over Chicago. The bride now abstains from all soft drinks, as do their children. The bride's mother has retired from a life of random volunteer work and car pooling, and now spends her days inside collecting Ironstone, newspapers and soy sauce.

The groom's father is a meat inspector with the USDA, supervising a pork production plant in Nebraska. That his son chose to marry a woman who does not eat meat has proved to be very difficult. Convinced that she has just not yet had a good steak he has offered repeatedly to sign up the bride for the Omaha Steaks Meat of the Month Club. The bride is horrified but has graciously declined this kind offer. The groom's mother is a nurse who is thankful she no longer has to beg for grandchildren.

The couple met in June of 1996, at work, where Ms. Ally initially thought that Mr. Jack looked like a secret service agent who appeared to be far too stiff and boring to ever go for ice cream after work. That she does not actually like ice cream was not considered relevant. The groom immediately found the bride to be witting and charming, with dazzling blue eyes, cascading chestnut hair and a keen sense of style. They first had lunch together on the way to visit a mutual client. The groom ordered a very messy sandwich; his great concern about spilling on his suit did little to dispel the earlier notion that he was stuffy. When he appeared a few weeks later in the bride's next door office, long after the bank closed, to regale her with tales of a last minute post happy hour trip to New Orleans she realized that he might not be as dull as once she thought.

The couple, both avid baseball fans, went on their first outing, not called a date, to watch the Kansas City Royals host the Chicago Cubs. "I knew then that I wanted to marry someone just like Jack" Ms. Ally said, "but I had no idea that I would actually end up marrying him". The groom remembers that day as the hottest he has ever been in his entire life and spent several innings completely focused on the child directly in front of them, wondering if he was going to puke the chocolate malt he had just inhaled in the 95 degree heat. This was before the groom became painfully aware of his future wife's all compelling fear of vomit. "It was miserable, horribly hot, and she insisted on driving in her new Jeep. There was no top and no air conditioning, it was painful. I did enjoy the game though, Royals won", said Mr. Jack.

To the surprise of many the couple actually married and have stayed happily in that fashion for ten years. The groom, it turns out, does like ice cream and enjoys going out for a scoop or two of Chocolate Malt Supreme on any given day. The bride still does not like ice cream, but is always happy to go along.