CHRIS AND KELE'S WEDDING

March 4, 2004

What happened:

I received news that Portland, OR would start giving marriage licenses to same-sex couples on Wed. March 3. Upon hearing this I started talking with Chris about getting married and we decided to get married. He had something scheduled for Wed. so we instead chose to drive down on Thurs. This was all short-notice planning so I wasn't really able to get a hold of most people to tell them in advance. We made arrangements to meet my friend Ross before going to the county clerk's office. The drive down was pretty uneventful. We picked up Ross then headed to the clerk's office. Upon arriving we noticed a sizable line so took some time to get lunch. After eating we got in line and waited about an hour before getting to the front of the line.

There were volunteers there to help couples fill out the application and it didn't take too long to do. Normally there is a 3 day waiting period upon getting the license before you can have a ceremony. The clerk's office has a waiver form that can be filled out to allow the ceremony to be performed immediately. They were encouraging all couples to fill out the waiver as there was already opposition attempts to block the marriages. We filled out the waiver form as well then waited in two more smaller lines to pay the license fee and finish off the paperwork.

We were also provided with information about a group of volunteers and clergy performing ceremonies near the clerk's office. By this time it was about 2:30pm. The ceremonies were scheduled until 4pm so we drove over to the location provided. Upon arriving we found they stopped letting people in at 2:30pm so they could get the ceremonies finished by 4pm. One of the volunteers came out and let us know they'd be open again on Friday to help out. We started to talk about what to do, drive home and come back or stay the night in Portland. She asked where we came from and we told her. She smiled and told us to come in and get upstairs, luck was with us.

We were given some more paperwork and a set of generic secular vows when we got upstairs. We had to wait about ten minutes then were led up even more stairs to the minister who would perform the ceremony. With just a bit more paperwork to fill out we were soon exchanging vows. The minister performed a secular ceremony as we requested. Upon examining the marriage certificate I discovered that she had come up from Modesto, CA to help out and was a minister with the Universal Life Church. By this time it was 3:30pm.

We decided it was time to head back to Seattle now. The drive up was a bit more eventful than the drive down was. Along the way we saw two rainbows. The first one was fairly faint and only partial. The second one though was very vibrant and a full half-circle. It also had a faint secondary rainbow around it. It was one of the best rainbows I've ever seen and we could even see where it touched the ground :) Since I'm basically a nature-worshipper this felt to me as if the Earth Mother herself had blessed our marriage.

Things settled down once we got home other than me telling everyone I could that I'd gotten married, something I'd never expected to do when younger, and never expected to be able to do when I got older and saw how the world was. We hope that the marriage remains legally recognized and hopefully also in Washington where we live. If it doesn't than I don't mind as it won't affect the love I have for Chris and I can at least say that I was part of history in some small way.

We haven't gotten our rings yet as of the writing of this due to the short period of time we had to get ready. Neither of us had even thought about rings until the minister asked if we had any. I've ordered a nice pair from a site I shop with regularly. They are sterling silver and made of three interwoven bands. Its not traditional rings but I can't wear gold and we felt these had the feel of 'us' rather than just going with the default.

About the album:

Below are two links.
•The first goes to a page of thumbnails for all the pictures and video clips. Clicking on a thumbnail will take you to the page with the full picture or video clip. The thumbnails are organized chronologically.
•The second link takes you to the first page of the album (which would be the same page clicking on the first thumbnail goes to).
•Each page of the album has links to the previous and next pages of the album. The page also has a link back to this page and to the thumbnail page. Each page also has a title and a brief description of the picture or video. Video clips also have a link that can be used to save the video clip (right-click and choose save target).

You can find the thumbnails here.
You can find the album here.

Contacting Us:

I can be emailed here.
Chris can be reached here.