The Politics of Love

Marriage is tough. I ought to know, as I have a notch of failure on my belt and in my heart. And while you could argue my divorce story is a “made for TV” movie in many ways (husband wakes up one day and informs wife he doesn’t love her anymore, leaving wife, family, friends and community members dazed and confused...wife picks up life and starts completely over...), I surely have to take responsibility for my own short comings and failures in that marriage.

But, I got the chance to try again.  And, try again I have.  I’m married for the second time to a man who also knows the failure of divorce.  We have a renewed commitment and resolve to doing things better this time. And we’ve got those notches to remind us that we are perfectly capable of fucking it all up. But, why did we bother doing it again, anyway?

I mean, nobody HAS to get married, right? Yet, there is just something about making that public commitment that we all crave. I heard someone say on the radio recently that marriage engages a community of people into the commitment in a way that two people just can’t do on their own. It makes sense...sure, sometimes we want to believe that we can stand together on a cliff overlooking the ocean proclaiming our love to each other privately and it’ll just be good enough, but we want more, don’t we? I’ve heard my pastor husband preach at many weddings about the commitment that everyone in the room/tent/yard is also making to the couple being married...to support them, to love them, to recognize their commitment to each other and to respect it. 

This year, Minnesota will vote on whether we should limit the freedom to engage in this public commitment to heterosexual men and women. No matter if they’ve been married a half dozen times previously, if they’ve molested their own children, if they’ve cheated on their spouse and given him/her an STD, if they’ve diminished and disrespected the honor and commitment of marriage in countless ways that would surely mean they should NEVER be allowed to marry again. Nope. All they have to be is heterosexual.  Oh, and a US citizen, I suppose.

And as time goes on and we inch closer to the election, I go round and round in my head, trying to understand how in the world we could be voting on something that would LIMIT freedom. I want to find just the right words to convince everyone how ridiculous this is. I want to proclaim how true conservative/Republican values feature LESS government in people’s lives, so regardless of your party affiliation, you should clearly be voting this hurtful amendment down.  

But, I’d be fooling myself if I didn’t admit that for me, it really comes down to the friends and family that I love. Friends and family members who happen to be gay. And there is one person in particular who comes to mind...every time.

His story isn’t mine to tell, but here I am telling it. Or my version, anyway. And I wonder if it will come as news to Chad that his 6th grade teacher has been taught more by HIM about love, courage, respect and hope than I ever could have hoped to teach others.

My first year out of college, I taught 5th/6th grade and Chad was in my first class. He was really a great kid to have in class, with his interest in history, his creative spirit and his good behavior. After all, I was just a 22-year-old, idealistic new teacher, fresh and green out of college, who may not have been as prepared as I thought I was for suburban elementary kids who were getting to the age where the opposite sex was clearly more interesting than what the teacher was trying to say. Which brings me back to Chad.

I knew he was gay. Maybe it was just a good guess. I can give you a long list of reasons why I knew, which would include a bunch of stereotypes, but none of that really matters now. Sexual preference didn’t get discussed in elementary classrooms and in the end, he was another kid in my class with a caring mom who always came to conferences and a dad who I knew existed, but was off on the fringes somewhere, not as involved in his kid’s life as any of us would have preferred. Little did I know, Chad was already beginning to notice more and more how different he was from the other boys.  And almost as quickly as those feelings surfaced, they were suppressed in ways even Chad couldn’t completely understand. There wasn’t room to even consider your own potential homosexuality in suburban White Bear Lake in 1991.

My teaching career was short, and Chad was one of a couple of students who kept in touch with me. I remember him writing to me a time or two when he was in high school, and he even thanked me for giving him an appreciation and love for writing.  I didn’t know exactly what was going on in his life, but I now know that he was busy trying to please his parents, attending his Catholic church (where he was beginning to develop quite a strong faith) and working to be what the world wanted/expected from him, as a young man. Because Chad was a good boy, who would grow into a good man.

Chad went on to college, and I vaguely knew that he was studying biology, but I was pretty wrapped up in my three kids during that time.  However, when his wedding invitation arrived, it gave me pause. So, he’s not gay, then? It never occurred to me that years and years of expectation and pressure that are so much a part of growing up, most of us don’t even notice them, had worn away at Chad like shoreline is worn away by the waves. So, of course he met a girl and was going to marry her.  That’s what boys do.  Especially Catholic boys.  But, none of that occurred to me at the time.  I just figured I must have had it all wrong...

It was a nice wedding. And I went back to my life and Chad headed on for whatever his would hold, too.

Turns out our marriages were unraveling at about the same time... teacher and student.  Much of that time is a bit of a blur for me, but I’ll never forget the day that Chad emailed me and said he had something important to tell me. His marriage had ended, ironically when his wife left him for another woman. But, it’s funny how things tend to twist and turn and in the end, Chad was finally able to come to terms with the fact that he was gay. I was honored that I had an important enough place in Chad’s life for me to be one of the people he felt he needed to “come out” to. I didn’t have the guts to tell him I had always known until we met for drinks a little while later.  

And suddenly, there we were...student and teacher, on equal footing. We shared war stories of online dating. We lamented broken marriages, failed expectations and shattered dreams. Neither of us had a fucking clue about what the future would hold, but we both knew that we had love in our hearts and wanted to find someone special to share that love. Nothing hetero or homo about it, folks. Just plain love. 

A lot of the arguments I’ve heard around limiting freedom to marry surround religion and religious views. For example, “according to the bible, homosexuality is wrong and a sin”. Ok. Let’s start proof-texting from the bible then, shall we? I will find a passage that states gluttony is a sin (yes, that’s in the bible, too).  Should we then prevent fat people from marrying, as they are clearly not following God’s plan with their shameless overeating? You think this is ridiculous?  It’s the SAME DAMN CONCEPT, people.  Or how about a passage condemning greed over material possessions, which last time I checked, appears to be the current foundation of our country. 

But I think my favorite ridiculous argument is the ignorant and completely irrational statement that gay people have actually made a choice to be gay, and could simply make a difference choice (feel free to insert “if they would only follow God” as needed)...

Right.  

You think that Chad made the CHOICE to be a gay man, which ultimately resulted in the loss of employment in his position as a youth director at a Catholic Church? (a job in which he was well respected by students and parents alike and a job he loved) He was fired immediately when they found out he was gay.

Or that Chad made the CHOICE to be a gay man, which meant that rather than bringing a girlfriend home to meet his conservative, suburban, homophobic father, he told his dad he was gay, and faced years of estrangement and painful relationships.  

I’ll tell you one thing, I wouldn’t choose to do that. But I don’t have to, do I?  Because I’m one of the lucky ones, who just so happened to have been born with a sexual preference that is a mainstream societal norm.

The thing is, my gay friends and family are among the most faithful, spiritual and loving people I know. And Chad is an amazing example of that. Chad seeks not only to be understood, but to understand. Chad has shown courage and integrity in the face of all kinds of adversity, his entire life.

So, when Chad decided to marry his partner this past summer, I was honored to not only be present, but to be a part of the ceremony. And on an absolutely perfect summer evening in June, in the front yard of Chad’s father’s home, they were married. Is the marriage recognized by the state? Nope. They had to go elsewhere for that recognition. Did everyone at the ceremony feel that homosexuality is ok? Nope. But, they had chosen to attend anyway, in the spirit of love for Chad and Troy. 

I have never attended a wedding where I was struck more by the presence of a courage, determination and even a sacrifice to simply be one’s own self. And I do not remember being at a wedding where the love of a father has so clearly overcome all kinds of adversity. And as I watched my daughter try to explain to her little brother why these two men had to go to a different state to “get married again” (he couldn’t even comprehend why such a thing would be necessary), I was struck with a sudden hope for the world.

This hurtful amendment will either pass or it will fail. And until our state gets its shit together, gay couples won’t be entitled to the same rights and privileges that I share with my husband. Privileges surrounding health care, visitation rights in medical facilities and tax benefits, among countless other things. I will vote and fight to change that fact for as long as I live.

However, if there’s one thing I know, we can’t vote to control love. Love transcends power and money and it most fucking definitely transcends politics. 

Thank you, Chad, for helping me to know that for certain.