An Anniversary Post

Five years ago today, my husband and I were married in the state of Massachusetts.  It was a small affair, with a ceremony at our church, followed by an afternoon reception at our house less than a mile away.  Sometimes it's still hard to believe we are married. Other times it's hard to decide which is our real anniversary: the day we met almost fifteen years ago or the formal ceremony with the minister and the marriage license?  Both are important, of course, but it's the formal union that we celebrate today.

How have our lives changed?  Perhaps a few examples will illustrate what a marriage license has meant to us.  First, my husband's two daughters from a previous marriage are now officially my stepdaughters.  This is enormously important to me because they have been, and still are, central to my life.  For years there was no name for our relationship.  Now there is.

Two years ago, I had a stroke a few weeks after I turned 50.  Quite a surprise, given that I was in very good health!   But I'll never forget the day Bruce and I went to the emergency ward.  It was a Saturday morning.  I had planned to see Avenue Q with one of my stepdaughters.  Instead I found myself singing Christmas carols as I tried to ignore the magnetic rumble of the MRI.  The results came in: I'd had a stroke, possibly two.  I'm fine now.  And I was in better shape then because of one word: husband.  As soon as I introduced Bruce as my husband, the staff knew exactly what he was to me.  He was in on the information as I heard it.  They treated him as my relative, my spouse.

The word partner just doesn't have the same weight.  For that matter, try telling a hospital worker that you are civil unionized.

I could go on and on.  Suffice it to say that our marriage has had unexpected benefits and comforts.

Now how is it that we weakened the institution of marriage when we wed five years ago?