Two Guys and a Wedding

A behind-the-scenes look at the plot to destroy hetero-marriage ... and how we're going to choose a caterer.

[twoguysandawedding]

A Fifteen Month (and then some) Retrospective

With brief explanations and nothing more than what amounts to simple line drawings, Madeline L’Engle illustrates the idea of time travel via tesseracts in her novel A Wrinkle in Time:

As her drawing demonstrates, it’s much more difficult for a being to cross an expanse that’s linearly distributed between two points. However, if the route one takes is “wrinkled,” his journey becomes that much shorter, propelling him from origin to conclusion in a rapid acceleration of time and space.

It’s been fifteen months since I started this blog, and as I write this entry — perhaps the last formal post before our wedding — I’m reminded of L’Engle’s image of traveling through time. I feel as though Johnny and I are currently standing in the middle of a wrinkle: that L’Engle’s tesseract has expanded around us and collapsed the past year into loosely connected fragments of memory that float as mirror shards — just out of reach — to offer half-forgotten glimpses of who we were when we first started this commitment: one a college sophomore who threw a black-and-white nineteenth birthday party complete with a beer bong long enough to descend from his lofted bedroom, and the other a second-year medical student and serial dater who crashed the party long enough to stay for the next six years.

And only the year before that meeting, one of us had just started college, and the other medical school. We didn’t know each other then, but we both experienced the first-year excitement of academic rigor, new friends, parties, autonomy, and regret mirroring the experience of thousands of others at our university: this was a rite of passage. That green, naive enthusiasm was punctuated by the nearly simultaneous promises and upheavals of hope and progress: a woman and a black man were each gearing up to run for President in a historic moment that bridged national hurts and miscommunications and mutual distrusts; one of those individuals would win the Presidency. Such a moment was necessary, especially for two queer kids in Madison, Wisconsin who — along with their larger LGBT community and allies — had previously witnessed their home state pass a constitutional ban on same-sex marriage. We mourned with our friends as state after state fell to the same legislation around them; this sadness was only shared in silence: 2006 was a remarkably different time and space for us and our openness and our self-comfort.

And as time keeps spinning and we stare into more of these looking glasses, we find the faces of the friends who supported us; imagist flashes of when when we moved into our first apartment together; when we came out to our families; when our parents met for the first time; when we graduated; when we first kissed; when we drove across the country; when we said goodbye for a year; when we revised life plans willingly; when we left the Midwest; when we first used the word love to describe each other.

And fifteen months ago in New York City, when we got engaged at a musical about drag queens.

And today, as we stare at our calendars and understand that we are seventeen squares away from our wedding.

I could dive into the details of what we’re doing to prepare for these last few days before our marriage and list the small things that we must frantically finish, the private triumphs and tragedies of planning a wedding. But I didn’t want to leave you all with a blog post of center pieces and dinner menus and last-minute attacks of anxiety. Instead, the nostalgia for the things that were and the curiosity for the things that may be press against my consciousness with the affectation of a casual detachment that can’t hide earnest impatience. I think of our own personal drama as a piece of the larger times in which we live: as a dovetail joint that both supports and is fortified by the other pieces of construction helping to build some nebulous future: our first black President prepares to step down, and a woman could replace him; Wisconsin becomes the latest state to reverse its constitutional ban as a bigoted and fearful house of cards topples; we are getting married.

And once that happens, perhaps time’s string will stretch tautly once more, drawing a line that slows us down and enables the chance to take stock of ourselves.

But then again, do we want that: to forsake time’s cycles and unexpected turns?

Thanks for all the love and support.

Until next time, Johnny says “ciao!”

[twoguysandawedding]

[twoguysandawedding]

The Elephant in the Room

Whenever a student is absent, the first question that they ask their teacher upon returning is, “Did I miss anything in class yesterday?”

For those of you who are teachers, perhaps you’re already bristling at that all-too-common question. After all, it can be a fairly biting inquiry rooted in the implication that, sometimes, a teacher’s lessons aren’t meaningful; that what the student is really asking is, “did we actually do something important in class, or did we get busy work that I don’t have to make up?” Indeed, there are entire poems that people have written to lambaste that query and defend the value of daily classroom work.

But to many teachers — many good teachers, that is — a student’s absence is noted and felt. Sometimes, missing kids can change the structure of a particular lesson; in other instances, entire classroom groups must be re-formed, and a teacher’s strategy must be revised or amended. A prolonged absence is even worse: teachers worry about students when they’ve missed more than a day, checking in by calling home or reaching out to a guidance counselor or any myriad of professionals that schools employ solely for the benefit of children.

When any member of the LGBT community chooses to get married to the person whom they love, they understand that their union engenders a political statement. It’s a fact that Johnny and I have thought of often during our planning process, just as countless other gay couples have around the country and the world. Even with today’s positive headlines moving our country in the right direction towards an equitable American experience, everybody knows that there are many states where Johnny and I still can’t get married. If we were to expand this concern internationally and draw attention to the atrocities facing our community in other nations, gay people can’t even begin to think about marriage in Uganda or Nigeria, where individuals are being beaten and killed because of their sexual orientation. In Russia, publicly displaying any LGBT affiliation can result in indefinite imprisonment. We can’t forget that.

After Johnny’s residency ends our time in Connecticut, we’ll have to move for his fellowship program. Perhaps we’ll be fortunate, and he’ll secure a position in a welcoming place like New York or California or Minnesota, or maybe we’ll be unlucky to find ourselves in Texas or Florida or even my home state of Wisconsin. In the latter states, we would find our marriage invalidated, the rights and privileges afforded to us in Connecticut and under the federal government callously revoked. This is not something that straight couples must consider when selecting their florist.

But the global and national politics are monoliths that inspire patient progress; such entities are slow-moving and sometimes take the effort of generations to craft change. And not everyone is up for being an activist, which implies massive sacrifice and, in some instances, dangers that camouflage themselves in many inauspicious guises. The absence of political protections and the presence of that knowledge resides with members of the LGBT community — or any other minority community — like a chronic illness that you hope, someday, a cure eliminates. But the absence of family and friends from your life, a concern that is admittedly more micro than than measuring the national climate, can sting harder and with more uncomfortable pressure.

The reality is that Johnny and I are going to have absences at our wedding that many couples would take for granted as confirmed presences. Of course you understand what I mean by absences: individuals who aren’t coming because they have a personal conflict in their calendar, but rather a moral conflict in their beliefs. To them, theirs is a view that is so strong they must make a political statement by not attending our wedding to confirm it. It is a conviction that they believe supersedes our own, and their actions prove this: by creating a notable absence in our ceremony, they will cause others to draw attention to and ask questions about that absence. They’re like shadows flickering in the corners of our reception, caught only in the corners of our eyes, but strangely devoid of any corporeal forms.

The fact is that when you’re gay, you sometimes have to do something very consciously that most people (hopefully) mustn’t do in their lives: you must make peace with the fact that when you share your true identity, your selfhood, and your humanity with some people— which is a very vulnerable thing to do, and not something that everybody can honestly check from their bucket lists — you will subsequently have to dismiss them from your lives. It’s an uncomfortable position to be in, but without taking a stance against those who would see you live in repression or misery, you resign yourself to the closet, a place that is far more dangerous for far more people than the uncomfortable direction of moving forward without someone who used to be a fixture in your life.

But a positive results from such an awareness. The people who are present in your life, and who will be present at our wedding, add a magnitude of value that isn’t diminished by those who would try. And when, and if, those people who were absent from the fabric our lives ever come back and ask the question (probably timidly, but hopefully honestly), “What did I miss?”, we'll be able to respond the same way that a good teacher would: “Everything. Let me catch you up.”

But we have to remember that good teaching only goes so far — such students must be willing to learn.

[mollyalicehoy]

Basically every conversation I had this past week.

[twoguysandawedding]

Not Even Tennessee Williams Could Write This ...

An apartment in New Haven, Connecticut. ADAM is pacing in the bedroom, his phone currently on hold. JOHNNY is in the next room, reading. Awful hold music plays, then ...

VOICE: Good afternoon and thank you for calling the M-- Hotel. How can I help you out today?

ADAM: Hello. My name is Adam Wallenfang, and I'm getting married this coming June. We have a block of rooms currently reserved at your hotel, and I was hoping to get an updated reservation list e-mailed to me for planning purposes.

VOICE: Not a problem at all, sir. I'd be happy to help you with that. Can I please get your full name again?

ADAM: Sure. My name is Adam Wallenfang, W-A-L-L-E-N as in Nancy-F as in Frank-A-N as in Nancy-G.

VOICE: Great, thanks so much. And can I get the bride's name, please?

Beat.

ADAM: There -- there is no bride.

VOICE (not skipping a beat): Sir, I need the bride's name to look up the reservation.

ADAM: I'm sorry. I should have been clearer. I'm marrying my partner, John. There is no bride.

VOICE (absolutely not skipping a beat): Sir, if I don't have the bride's name, I can't look up the reservation.

Another Beat.

ADAM: Okay, but there is no bride in this wedding. We're two grooms. My name is Adam, and my fiancee's name is John.

Are You Counting The Beats Yet?

VOICE: Sir, I need the bride's name in order to look up any reservation in our system.

ADAM (ignoring the expectation for a beat): Okay, but again, there is no bride! My name is Adam ... my fiancee is John! We're two men. Getting married. This is a gay wedding. There is no bride!

Beat. Again.

VOICE: Alright, Mr. Wallenfang, I've found your reservation right here along with Mr. Tackett. I can send you a guest list right away.

ADAM: Ooookay. Thank you.

VOICE: You have yourself a great afternoon, Mr. Wallenfang, and thanks for calling us today. Sorry for any inconvenience.

The line immediately goes dead before ADAM can say another word. Still clutching the phone, he walks out of the bedroom. At the same time, JOHN walks out of the living room, meeting him halfway. They look at each other with silent hysteria -- no words are needed.

CURTAIN.

This was not an exaggeration. Sure, names and identities were altered to save the ignorant innocent parties involved, but that conversation happened. The first thing to notice is that this is extremely funny; the man I was talking to really did steamroll me that often, really couldn't understand that we were two grooms, and really couldn't work a computer system that wasn't predicated on the word bride. It felt like being stuck in a loop of "Who's on First?"

Okay, I know that many people in the country are still coming around to the idea of two men getting married. And I know that, on some level, I have to still give them a small space to acclimate. But come on, Connecticut. Gay marriage was legalized here in 2008, and we're getting married this year, in 2014. If you do the math, that means it's not only been a legal, binding contract between two loving people for six years, but it's also been a legitimate industry for anyone who has any business dealings with weddings. For six years!

That means it's been six years for people to correct their forms from "Bride and Groom" to "Bride and Bride" or "Groom and Groom" (you wouldn't believe how many forms we've received that either weren't specially printed for same-sex couples or that didn't give us the option to check a box indicating that we were two grooms!). It's not something that straight couples have to worry about, but we certainly do. Not changing the common language that you use in your given industry, like those who help coordinate wedding details, is just bad business.

Let me put it this way: it would be like Chris Christie not integrating "I'm sorry" into his vocabulary as his governorship radically "evolves" in front of his eyes and Rachel Maddow laughs at him in the shadows. It's all about keeping up with the times, y'all. Roll with the punches.

Until next time, Johnny says "ciao!"

[twoguysandawedding]

If we were ghosts ...

[twoguysandawedding]

We can't all be Carrie Bradshaw, genius.

In Sex and the City: The Movie -- the good one, not the one where Samantha Jones insults an entire nation's culture -- the incomparable SJP, slipping back into her role as Carrie Bradshaw, has the best entrance scene in the history of everything:

The hair. Her smile. That dress ... complete with the obscenely garish flower that no sensible person would ever wear, especially when walking through the streets of Manhattan. But it all works for SJP as she becomes everyone's favorite, modern version of Jane Eyre or Elizabeth Bennet ... minus their ability to rationally assess any situation involving a man, a wedding, and a tiny moment of cold -- no, I can't even call them cold ... lukewarm -- feet as her husband-to-be Mr. Big realizes, in a cold panic, that he's about to marry Carrie Bradshaw and all of her nervous irrationality and terrifying ability to impulse-purchase high priced items without suffering any tangible financial repercussions.

In any case, the reason that I thought of that over-the-top moment of cinematic narcissism is because, lately, all I've been thinking about are the bridesmaid's dresses dresses for women in our wedding party (in case you haven't figured it out yet, there's no bride in our wedding. Surprise!). Even though I'm not a woman and have never worn a dress, I like to think that at least one polypeptide sequence on my gay gene gives me some command over style, so I figured that I could bank on my stereotypical sense of good taste to help select beautiful dresses for the women in our wedding party. Easy.

Do you see the problem yet? If you are an astute reader, you've probably already made the connection between my search for bridesmaid dresses dresses for the women in the wedding party and my vision of Sarah Jessica Parker walking down 5th Avenue. My dream for these dresses was always pretty consistent: we're having a summer wedding, so I wanted something short, fun, flirty, and that defined simple elegance. So I shopped around and found the hottest damn dresses that looked like they just arrived from the set of Sex and the City and thought to myself, "Perfect! This dress shopping thing is so easy ..."

This is the reaction that I was met with by some of the important women in my life when I tried to explain my naïve vision:

It turns out that women's bodies are different than men's. Who knew? I guess that, despite my gay man's affinity for strong, powerful, larger-than-life women and my educated, liberal sensibilities supporting feminism as a movement and critical cultural conversation, somewhere I lost the fact that I know next to nothing about the basics of being a woman for many obvious reasons, chief among them that I'm not a woman ... and I also have no intention of ever getting to know a woman that intimately (no, it's still not a phase ... for a lot of people, apparently!). As I learned, a dress that looks good on a model, who is paid to be size -2, won't look good on a normal woman with an actual figure. Again: who knew?

However, I am happy to report that my early check with reality did engender  positive final selections of dresses for the women in our wedding party ... man, that's a lot of prepositions for the sake of being gender neutral! Unfortunately, Johnny has sworn certain aspects of our ceremony to secret -- including his gag order restricting me from showing you the actual dresses -- to ensure that there's an old fashioned WOW factor on the Big Day, so I can't divulge specifics about the dresses or show them to you right now. However, I can give some basic facts about them:

There will be three complementary styles for the ladies in our party. One will be strapless, one will have have a single strap, and one will have two straps. They'll all be short and fun; perfect for a summer wedding.

The dresses will be a light shade of lavender called iris, which is meant to complement the charcoal tuxedoes that Johnny and I selected for ourselves and the men in our wedding party. They should also look great with the lime green accents we're planning on as part of our decorative colors.

Even though SJP never wore them, they still look damn good.

Apologies for not writing for so long, especially when, in the last entry, I specifically wrote that I would reduce the hiatus between posts. In any case, I have some more stories to share from the last two months, so my next post will absolutely not be separated from this one by months.

Until next time, Johnny says "ciao!"

[howdoiputthisgently]

WHEN I SHOW UP TO CLASS AND REALIZE WE HAD AN ASSIGNMENT DUE

(reality tv gifs)

[twoguysandawedding]

This is what my students look like ...

[twoguysandawedding]

Flamingos and Twerking Chickens

See that picture above? Let me set the scene for you, to give some context as to why a bunch of flamingos are the opening image for this blog post. A few days ago, I found myself crawling among those frozen flamingos, digging through the patchy grass and dirt clinging to their rusting metal legs, my mind frantically envisioning a worst-case scenario of what was going to happen when I got home from my run ... minus my wedding band.

Let me back up for a second before I explain how I joined the Worst Feeling in the World (if you own a wedding band) Club because I first want to give you some new updates about the next phase of our Gay Agenda.

First of all: we have a wedding party! When we first got engaged, we immediately knew who we would ask to join us around the altar (or gazebo, in our case) -- that was the easy part. The hard part was thinking about how to physically position our party around us. See, the straight way to plan your wedding party (although no longer the only way as non-traditional values continue to erode conventional, quotidian expectations) is to have the groom select only men to stand next to him in a line, while the bride does the same.

Gender segregation, gender segregation, gender segregation.

In all the weddings that I've been to, I've looked at the groom and thought to myself, "Hey, buddy. You MUST have at LEAST one best girl friend, or a sister, who would probably love to stand up there with you." And the same goes for the ladies ... maybe even more so for the brides. Isn't it true that behind every beautiful bride stands a meticulously groomed gay best friend ready to smooth her wedding dress, cry happy tears as "Here Comes the Bride" starts, and dance with her like they're at a club when those Gaga beats drop?

We knew that for us, being two gay men, there was no way we would or could have an all-male wedding party. After all, isn't it equally true that every meticulously groomed gay man is propped up by a caravan of smart, funny, and gorgeous straight women? With that in mind, we ended up asking men and women to join us on our wedding day as a statement of community. People will be paired around us -- girl to guy, guy to guy, girl to girl -- in couplings that make sense for Johnny and me and that provide a statement that our wedding was enabled by a system of support linking gay people, straight people, family, and friends. Hopefully that vision looks as good in real life as it does in our heads because the sentiment and the idea is sure nice.

Okay, so we had a feel-good moment by asking our party to join us and by fleshing out our communal concept for their role on our wedding day. But the pendulum always swings in the opposing direction. Which brings me to the Worst Feeling in the World (if you own a wedding band).

My motivation to run in the hot, muggy Connecticut summer weather is approximately nonexistent. All summer, I retreated to the gym in our building, avoiding the 85% humidity like Lamar Odom is currently avoiding Khloe Kardashian. But when the fall starts to roll around, banishing the suffocating heat with breezy days and rustling leaves, I love to run outside. Therefore, last week I found myself outside for my first run of the fall.

Have you ever had your normal psyche (usually rational, totally logical) suddenly begin a terrifying descent into crazy-town? Like all sense and reason and memory have vacated your brain, only to be replaced by prickling, restless, and needless panic? Well, there are two ways to experience this right quick, in case you're unfamiliar with what I'm describing. First, you could watch Miley Cyrus's VMA performance to see what exactly goes on in your brain when that feeling creeps up on you. If you can't stomach that -- and who in their right mind could? -- then go out, get engaged or married, wear your wedding band religiously, and then look down at your finger to one day find it missing.

That's what happened when I finished running in downtown New Haven. As I stopped next to those flamingos, I realized almost instantly that I was missing something, and that's when the panic set in. As I lost my grip on reason, the flamingos turned into huge, frowning bears that stuck their tongues as if they were wannabe members of Kiss ... Robin Thicke materialized, decked out in a prison-inspired suit of white and black ... and then the twerking. Dear God, the twerking.

Okay, I'll get over the inanity of Miley's performance "art." But still, that's how crazy I felt when I thought I lost my ring. Thankfully my iPhone never leaves my side, so I called Johnny and told him to get down to the flamingos to help me look for it. In less than a minute -- probably because he's so skinny and light he just jumped from the window and wafted down to me on the gentle, late summer breeze, kind of like dandelion fluff -- he was helping me look through the gutters, along the curb, and in the road.

But after we started looking, ignoring the curious stares of passersby, I never thought to ask him the obvious question: "Did you check to see if I took it off at home before you came down?"

And with another upswell of warm air, Johnny disappeared back into our apartment, leaving me alone among fluorescent birds.

Dear reader, my craziness was for naught! I don't know a Victorian author-to-reader address a la Jane Eyre was necessary, but I felt that I needed to personally connect with those of you waiting breathlessly to see if I had actually lost it. For some dumb reason, I had taken my ring off before I went running and left it in our bedroom. Problem solved. I felt reaaaaaaaal cool.

But maybe this simple realization was something more -- perhaps it was solved by divine intervention? Take a look at the picture of the flamingos again. See what building they surround? Look closely at the billboard: "United Church: An Open & Affirming Congregation (cue rainbow flag)." For those of you unfamiliar, an affirming church is one that wholly and unconditionally accepts gay people, performs gay weddings, and fights for civil rights. It seems a little like happy irony that I thought, falsely, I lost my wedding ring outside of this building. If those flamingos could talk, maybe they'd be saying "it gets better."

Until next time, Johnny says "Ciao!"

[twoguysandawedding]

Shakespeare in the park! (at Edgerton Park)

[twoguysandawedding]

Best way to get ready for #sharkweek? Hang out at the beach. (at Hammonasset Beach State Park)

[twoguysandawedding]

Back from the Gay ol' Bay

Who doesn't love going on vacation? As a society that's generally overworked and underpaid, looking forward to any form of escape is an important impetus to just keep going, right? To just make it through one more day at work, to just stay awake during that final quarterly meeting, to just grin and bear one more talent show. Don't get me wrong, those little things in life are important because they represent our day-to-day existence. But seriously, does any of that sound better than lounging on a beach, taking a romantic getaway to a new city, or exploring a brand new country? I didn't think so. Vacations offer us the chance to flee from our normal life circumstances so that we can come back refreshed and ready for more of the same that's always the same.

Sometimes, however, vacations represent a little more than the usual "escape" that we seek. Johnny and I just got back from spending almost two weeks in the San Francisco Bay area (thanks again to our friends and family for hosting us!). It represented the perfect retreat: Johnny had just finished his second year of residency, which means that his workload will slow way down (comparably) as he works in a lab for two years; I had just finished teaching a summer course helping students write their college essays (imagine how thrilled they were to be there. Now, subtract 100 from that. Boom -- that's summer school). So we were ready for our vacation to San Francisco, a city that we first discovered and fell in love with on our cross-country road trip three years ago.

San Francisco has so much to offer, and here's just a snippet of what we did while we were there:

Checked out the awesome de Young Fine Arts Museum for their Friday night mixer

Were gluttonous on delicious food courtesy of State Bird Provisions, the restaurant Bon Appetite named the best in America, which meant we had to wait in line for an hour and fifteen minutes to get a table

Discovered old CDs of our current diva obsession, Barbra Streisand, at Amoeba Records (favorite part: our bearded, tattooed, and gruff salesperson told us he thought Barbra was the "real deal" and "fucking gorgeous back in her heyday")

Plodded through an incredible thirteen mile hike through Point Reyes National Park, during which we dodged poison oak, ate lunch on the beach, and watched the famous Bay mists roll in and out of the surrounding woods

Like I said, just the smallest amuse bouche of our adventures.

However, the other thing we got to do in San Francisco was combine our escape from reality with the sense of normalcy. That phrase may sound like something from Inception, but let me break it down for you.

One thing that San Francisco is famous for is being really gay and really gay-friendly. For those of you not familiar, the Castro is a well-known area of the city that is almost exclusively gay: gay businesses, gay bars, gay people, etc. etc. etc. And the Castro affords gay people something that many other neighborhoods in many other cities do not: we get to totally be ourselves. If you're gay, you can walk down the street in the Castro holding hands with your boyfriend/girlfriend, and nobody bats an eye at you. Want to steal a quick kiss after a date, like most straight couples do everyday, everywhere? Well, you don't have to first cast a nervous look over your shoulder like so many gay couples have to do elsewhere. In the Castro, you can feel free to listen to Madonna, dance to Britney, be nostalgic for Barbra, and sing your heart out to musical theater with 100+ other people doing the same thing at the bars on Musical Monday.

That's not something that we as gay people can do everywhere. Thankfully, Johnny and I have lived in cities that are very liberal and very down with the gays: you can't get more liberal, in fact, than Madison, Wisconsin, and New Haven isn't too shabby either. And while I know that some of our gay friends have no qualms about being themselves wherever they go no matter who they are with, too many people -- sometimes us included -- temper aspects of our personalities and relationships to make those around us feel more comfortable; it's not right, it doesn't help our community's situation, but it's true. A hard-hitting example: I think that our wedding will be the first time that most of our straight friends and family will see us kiss.

But if we were in the Castro? No problem-o.

Being in San Francisco and spending time in the Castro was great, but as we flew on our ungodly uncomfortable red eye back East, I couldn't help but conclude that the Castro is an island in a roiling sea of distrust and unease. But gay people certainly don't own that feeling. Think about the bastions for safety that other minority groups must either create to protect themselves or are forcibly pushed into by others: reservations for Native Americans, the clustering and segregation of minorities in poverty-ripe areas of large cities, the us (whites) versus them (Latinos) attitude that is only increasing in the border states. It's a sad irony that we define ourselves as a country that welcomes diversity ... only to then isolate it upon itself. Sometimes we do it willingly. Sometimes we do it unconsciously. But it happens all the same.

It would be great if someday we could rent a Mini Cooper convertible and drive through whatever city we live in, top down, blasting and singing along to Barbra's "Don't Rain on My Parade" (which may have actually happened in San Fran ...), but we're not there yet.  Someday soon, though, the sun really will be our ball of buttah. We just have to keep working towards that day.

Until next time, Johnny says "ciao!"

[twoguysandawedding]

People need to be more aware of this, especially in light of the progress that America has made.

[twoguysandawedding]

I wish I had seen this before I uploaded my new blog post! Thanks, New Yorker -- Scalia the party animal! twoguysandawedding.tumblr.com

[twoguysandawedding]

A Long Time Coming

When I first started this blog chronicling our not-so-Abigiously Gay Duo adventures, I promised myself that I would write a new post every week. It seemed pretty easy; as a writer already, I figured that this new writing project would be a welcome distraction from my never-ending quest to polish off my novel and get it published ... or to at least stand out from my comrades in the crowd of would-be writers and land my very own literary agent (still working on this one ... ).

But, just like my New Year's resolution of working out a consistent four times a week, this goal, too, fell by the wayside of OLPs ... Other Life Plans. Like hosting a parade of visiting siblings and parents. Like catching up on season two of New Girl. Like finally reading a book that wasn't included on the syllabus for my students. And, most importantly, like finishing the end of my first school year as a high school teacher -- which, by the way, felt a lot like this toward the end:

But while these OLPs have wrestled with my dedicated writing time of late, part of why my blog has been a bit barren is by design. Although Johnny and I have made some more progress on wedding planning during this last crazy month (which I'll get to in a moment), I was waiting for the Supreme Court to issue their rulings on DOMA and Prop 8 before I wrote a new entry. Like most of the gay community, I was incredibly adrenalized by these two cases when they were argued before the Court a few months ago (by the way, if you're not up to speed on how striking down DOMA positively affects married gay couples, check out this quick fact sheet courtesy of Buzzfeed: 12 Things Repealing DOMA Would Change). Naturally, I figured that this energy would translate into an impassioned post that raved about the gay marriage heroes (thank you, Edie Windsor and Anthony Kennedy) and railed against its villains (I'm looking at you, Antonin Scalia). But writing this post now, I find that the combustible excitement I experienced during the oral arguments has since suffocated, disappearing faster than Amanda Bynes' lasting relevance.

So what quelled my initial vigor? What's stopping my fingers from blogging a rousing battle cry to continue this noble fight across the rest of the country? Well, here's the thing: even though these rulings were more than a long time in coming, and even though they directly impacted Johnny and me, while we were waiting and hoping and crossing our fingers for a resolution in equality's favor, OLPs happened. Specifically, while those nine old, straight people who are relatively removed from the spotlight of society's political scrutiny (I mean really, they're practically faceless entities compared to other political leaders like the President), Johnny and I had other stuff going on -- we certainly couldn't wait around for the Supreme Court to sanction our vast, conspiratorial gay agenda. So instead, we advanced our nefarious plans: we went on a couple of dates at restaurants; we spent time with friends and family; we managed finances and budgeted for our wedding; we planned a vacation; we responded to changes in our jobs; and -- here's the coup de grâce -- we booked a DJ for our wedding next year. When we signed the contract on that one, we felt the pillars of American moral society buckle beneath the weight of the sheer strangeness of these OLPs, and I'm sure that at least three straight marriages must have ended as a result of our forthcoming union.

Alright, in all seriousness though, I am excited about these rulings, and I am glad that our federal rights will now be insured once we've married in Connecticut, but ain't nobody got time to plan their life around the fact that Antonin Scalia, Clarence Thomas, John Roberts, and Samuel Alito -- whose beliefs are on the verge of becoming heirlooms of a failed conservative vision for the country -- are squeaked out by gay people. The important thing for us to consider, to keep in perspective, is that the opinions of these four people will continue to be lysed by the overwhelming, evolving, and progressive shift in our nation's ideology towards the LGBT community and towards minority groups and "others" in general. And you know what? Johnny and I will keep riding that wave of opinion and philosophy so that all of our OLPs can continue to be realized -- so that we can pay our bills and go to movies and escape to New York to see some new show that Johnny's been begging to attend. Even in the face of monumental change and legal conundrums and philosophical warfare, OLPs don't stop, and we keep rolling with them.

Speaking of, here's some wedding "OLPs" to announce. After being engaged for about three months, we now have the trifecta of major vendors booked! I've already written about the venue: The Pavilion on Crystal Lake. but we've also crossed off our photographer (the brilliant Erica Camille) and our DJ (frankie z of LMX Mobile Entertainment -- he just did a wedding at Kathie Lee Gifford's house in Connecticut ... some serious street cred, in my book). Taking care of these three components now leaves us with our next task: finalizing our guest list, wedding party, and sending out save-the-dates.

... Maybe the hard work is just getting started ...

Until next time, Johnny says "ciao!"

PS If you want to check out any of our vendors' information, their links are attached below.

Click here for The Pavilion on Crystal Lake (or here to read the previous blog post).

Click here to check out Erica Camille's incredible photography.

Click here to see how DJ frankie z is going to make this the best party ever.

[twoguysandawedding]

New post coming soon; here's the evidence.

[twoguysandawedding]

Happy Pride!