FWIW

Perspective can be quite a bitch, let me tell you.

If hindsight is 20/20, my family must be blind. It’s literally been nearly 25 years since my mother first declared my “obsession” with Captain Janeway to be “unnatural.”

As I type this now, I want desperately to be able to tell you that my mother and I have moved beyond this. That we are closer now than ever before. But it would be a lie.

On November 16, 2019, I proposed to my soulmate, Rachael, on the rocks at Lovers Point Park in Pacific Grove. I lured her there with the promise of a geocache (we’re those treasure-hunting, life-is-just-one-big-RPG lesbians), which I had cleverly tucked away inside a password-protected cryptex puzzle box. Dear friends helped by providing her with clue cards, upon each of which was inscribed a different riddle. Once solved, she worked out the password and pulled open the box to reveal the engagement ring. Of course, without even a millisecond of hesitation, she beamed down at me and said, “Yes!” We kissed. It was perfect. Minus the unholy amount of seagull poo that coated the boulders I had to kneel on when I did my schpiel.

It was true. I knew we were meant to be. The sheer serendipity of our love story continues to thread through us, and with each passing moment, we become that much stronger and closer as a couple.

My mother once told me she would not be able to attend my wedding, but at the time it was because she did not approve of the person, and she was right not to approve. That person was not good for me, nor were they good to me. The relationship was toxic, strife-filled and caustic. Its end came 5 1/2 years much, much too late. But it did finally end, and there was one more heartbreak to follow until Rachael and I found each other.

We met online, as most millennial lesbians do these days. OkCupid was the dating site I used at the time. We matched up nearly 100%, and I have to say, we really do match up that closely. From our names (my first legal name is also Rachel, which I am changing to Katharyn soon), to our dad’s both being professional drivers, to the exact same placing of beauty marks on our upper lips, we are alike in almost every way. The tie that I believe binds us is her innate ability to shower me with love, affection and unconditional understanding. She accepts me, all of me. We can talk about anything and everything, and we simply agree with each other. Our worldviews are identical, likely because we have led such closely paralleled lives.

She’s truly the love of my life.

My mother was with us on the day. She went ahead with my sister to wait for us to cue them to hide the puzzle box. I was afraid someone else might find it if we planted it too early on, so I waited til we were pretty close to text my sis and have her go ahead and pick a spot amongst the boulders.

My sister served as our official photographer, snapping oodles of adorable pictures of Rachael and I together, as well as pics of Rachael, my mother in between, and me off my mother’s right shoulder. We tried out a bunch of silly poses, and when it was over, I found myself really studying each shot with the intensity of a forensic criminologist. In the end, I was satisfied. My mother seemed genuinely happy for me. “She really likes Rachael, and she accepts her as an incoming member of the family,” I told myself.

We shared a lovely dinner and champagne toast at Beach House, which our gracious friends paid for (many, many thanks to Adrianne and Jesse Heinig). Near the end of the meal, my mother offered to requested to keep the glasses we had toasted with and then she explained to me that, if I let her know what we wanted them to say, that she would pay for the etching as a wedding present. I thought, “Wow! She really is happy for me!”

A week later, as we are all bracing for a storm we know will surely spoil our Thanksgiving Day plans, Rachael and I decide to stay home. With one small, teeny exception: a quick nip over to Wally World to see if we could snag ourselves one of them 65” 4K TVs for just $278!

I’d never in my whole life gone out on Thanksgiving Day, let alone Black Friday, so the whole affair made me feel like such a little rebel. They even had us pull around the back of the store to pick up once we had paid. It was dark and raining again by the time we exited the store and got back to the car.

I felt like some kind of mobster loading up my haul one dark and Bronxy night. It was like something out of a movie, I couldn’t stop laughing. I felt like we’d gotten away with something! With our cheap 4K barely fitting in the back, we head home.

We game and cuddle the rest of the week. All seeks well. Wedding plans are developing, friends are excited for us. Social Media is bursting with generous love and well wishes by all. I figure I should at least invite my father to officiate, knowing he will probably decline with some half-true excuse (which he basically does, except he does add a line about it not being “harmful” to attend, even if he’s not allowed to officiate).

It’s around this time that my best friend offers to officiate, and so away I go to find out how that works in CA. Turns out, it’s as easy as filling out a form online through one or 3 different churches that provide ordainment credentials. Of course, over-achiever that I am, I know I have to test it out, so I sign myself up. Lo’ and behold, I’m now legally ordained by three different churches! (Anyone need a wedding officiant?)

A conflict between my mother and her husband becomes known soon after the holiday passes. A conflict about which there seems to be quite a lot of hedging. A week later, my mother and her husband still haven’t spoken since Thanksgiving. My mother says it’s a “philosophical issue”.

At this moment, I know exactly what it’s about. And then she says it.

She says her husband is “uncomfortable” with gay people in the house. She tells me she told him she had two gay kids when they met, and that he seemed fine with it.

After speaking with said hubby to get a fulller picture of the whole messy situation, he tells me it’s about being uncomfortable with us there when the two of them aren’t getting along. Also, he reassures me he is happy for me and has no problem having us over. However, he does also let me know-for the first time since meeting him 2 years ago-that he sorta has this house rule-type feeling about people who are unmarried sharing a bed in his home.

Apparently, this came up last Thanksgiving when I was staying with them. I was dating Rachael and she would sometimes stay overnight. No one ever brought it up.

We have been living together in our own place since the late spring/early Summer. So this has not been brought up.

Bottom line: my mother was about to end her marriage because she believed her husband doesn’t accept her gay daughter. It’s not because they can’t simply get along. It’s because of me.

My mother goes on about how I shouldn’t be okay with just being tolerated. She seems to feel the need to vehemently defend me. And my sister, who currently identifies as bisexual.

My sexuality has not been a source of conflict for years now, and suddenly now I am being told it’s why my mother’s marriage is over? Oh hell no. I am not going through all this again. We did this dance with my sister’s dad, and I am not going through it again. Are the smiles in these pictures fake? I have to take them all off my profile if they are.

I am in a place in my life where I can no longer tolerate other people’s discomfort with who I am. For the first time, I am truly, authentically happy. I am loved by someone incredible, someone who deserves to be showered with the same unconditional love and partnership that she gives to me. No one can steal our joy, not anymore.

Their marriage is their problem, and their hypocrisy is not mine. I am not responsible for other people’s discomfort.

My mother finally told me, in front of her boss and my colleague (we work together), for the first time in years, that she had been uncomfortable the entire time we were up in Monterey. She even admitted she wanted to leave and go back to San Jose to hang out with my sister’s Aunt. I guess I never could believe it was always going to be an issue for my mother, no matter how hard she tries to accept me. She must be trying so hard, poor thing. It had been her all along, and she was caught. She tried to follow up with a “...but then I worked through it.” But now I am not sure I believe her.

What if she was only saying that to save face in front of her buffer who, by the way, enthusiastically offered to do the flowers for the wedding and whose daughter will be our ringbearer in the ceremony.

AWKWARD!

I mean, what progressive teacher-mom wants to be seen as being intolerant? What mother wants to be remembered as not being there to support her daughter on one of the most important milestone days of her entire life? In one hand, her PFLAG pin, and the other? Her Bible. Her faith. But that was before I met someone worth marrying. She must feel so conflicted.

I’m actually getting married.

It’s happening to me.

She’s seeing me kiss my fiancee and hold her hand. Be affectionate.

“It was different with Pam and Julia because there wasn’t much affection,” she stumbles before adding, “but, obviously, it’s because you’re happy...” she trails off, hoping I understand what she’s trying to say. And I wish I do, but the truth is that I don’t understand.

All these mixed messaged have mixed me up to the point where I am now constantly asking myself what the hell is going on and can we just settle this once and for all?! GAAAAAAAAAH!

Yet again, my gayness is the massive elephant in the room.

Well, guess what?

If anyone feels uncomfortable seeing two women get married, I honestly respect that. I cannot change how others view me, I cannot change who I am. I view marriage as sacred, something I only intend to do once and, to me, it is forever. And so, to that end, I release my family of all feelings of obligation. Stay home. Pray. Read your Bible. Watch your soaps. Heal your heart and restore your marriage. Do your thing. Live your truth.

But if you bear me even one tiny iota of love, you will not come to my wedding. You will not taint the joy of our day with your discomfort. You will leave us be. And you will still love us.

We are going to have a beautiful forest wedding on October 24, 2020, at Lake Arrowhead, and we are only inviting those who fully accept and support our marriage. There can be no more ambivalence, no more grey areas.

And I’m going to bring a lot of people like me together in holy matrimony. Because that’s my mission: to bring people together in joy.