About 30% of the time I hate my husband. I mean hate, really loathe, as in, Chris-Rock-staring-at-a-box-of-rat-poison-and-the-only-thing-that-stops-me-is-an-old-episode-of-CSI hate. Other married people know what I’m talking about. And why should gay people be denied those exquisite feelings?
Seriously, why should the excruciating agony of marriage and divorce be reserved only for straight people?
Marriage is fundamentally different from living together or committing informally. It just is. I’m sorry to all those people who say, “Why do I need a piece of paper, etc” …. Well, the rites of marriage bring another dimension, another quality, to the state of being a couple–whether you like it or not. The act of getting married is one of those irrevocable passages, like having a child, that demarcates life. It’s never again the same. Two adults who wish to undertake that passage together should be allowed to, whether they are gay or straight or transgender or one of them is from the planet Xetron–as long as the Xetronian is an adult over the age of consent, and isn’t being forced into the marriage.
In the end it comes down to two hearts who wish to formalize a journey together. Every such wish is an act of tremendous courage and optimism. Who is to say that God, whoever She is, would not admire that courage and optimism just because the two hearts are both temporarily encased in male bodies? Or temporarily wearing female bodies? If I were God, I would be applauding: “Yay! You go! Marriage is one of the most difficult tasks on earth, and you’re going for it! I’m proud of you!” I do not understand the sanctimoniousness of people who use God as an excuse for their own bigotry.
The great poet Rumi: “You that hand me this cup, you are my soul and my loving. Whatever enthusiasm I’ve had, you are those, and any success is yours. Clap for yourself! These are your hands.”
It’s not about bodies or the costume of gender. It never was.