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Before March of 1998, we never thought we could be married. One night a few month before, Dave mentioned to Mike that if we were a heterosexual couple, Dave would have asked Mike to marry him. Mike told him that he would have said "yes" and that was the depth of the discussion of the issue. We considered ourselves a couple, and lived as one, and this was the face we showed the world.
When Mike's mother told them about the forum that was being held at Temple Israel on gay issues in Judaism, we agreed to sit on the panel, to give the community our impressions of what it was like to be a gay, Jewish couple. The panel went well, with a liberal crowd the usual discussion of Halacha, social justice, and the like. Someone asked whether the synagogue would perform same-sex commitment ceremonies, and they gave the expected answer that no oen had asked, but certainly they would consider it, yadda, yadda. At this moment, Dave turned to Mike on the dias and whispered "Let's ask them, right now." Dave's goal was to prove to these people that they really weren't considering the issue. He wanted to have a Jewish wedding, and would have been delighted by a yes, but knew the answer would be no. They were simply "talking the talk." Mike was kind of surprised by Dave's reaction, but Mike thought it was a cool idea, and so Dave then popped the question.
"We're two gay Jewish men, and we would like to make a public commitment to each other. We would like to have a ceremony at Temple Israel"
Needless to say, many of the people in the audience were surprised at having to make good on their promise so suddenly! Somebody mentioned that they only did weddings for members of the synagogue, and Dave immediately said "the check will be in the mail tomorrow!" And so it was.
Now started a long and very frustrating process. We met with the Rabbi a few weeks later to start planning. He was very enthusiastic about doing the ceremony and was looking forward to it. However, the policy-making board for the synagogue wanted to go slow, and make a "study" of the issue before allowing it to take place. It was expected that the study would take a few months, and so we planned to have the ceremony around the Labor Day weekend 1998. For the next few months, we went up to Omaha occasionally to meet with the Rabbi, and were generally in a holding pattern as we waited for the committee to do its work. The board delayed their findings several times, and as the months rolled past, we became more and more frustrated. We heard rumors that some congregants were upset at the notion of gay Jews in their congregation, and we heard other rumors that the board was worried about what happened across the street at the Methodist church. Our Labor Day weekend date went by, and by the middle of Fall, we were both become very angry with the delay of the synagogue. The largest complaint by congregants is that if the Rabbi were allowed to marry same gender couples, he should marry mixed religion couples. Finally, in November they, along with the 838 other families making up the membership of Temple Israel received a letter from the synagogue board affirming the Rabbi's freedom of the pulpit. In other words, it was going to happen. We set a date of June 6th, and as 1998 rolled into 1999, the real work had to begin.
When most heterosexual couples plan their wedding, they only have to concern themselves with the "usual" stuff -- who the groomsmen should be, what color to choose for the place settings, what music to play, and so on. We had to plan all of that, but we also had the added challenge of finding gay-friendly contractors, and most important of all, figuring out the ceremony itself!
We decided from the start to have a fairly tradition Jewish wedding. One of Dave's biggest concerns when he realized he was gay was that he would never fit into Judaism. He dreamed of the rich symbolism of a Jewish ceremony and felt very out of place without it. The problem was that there is no standard liturgy for same-sex Jewish weddings. We had a collection of programs from other gay weddings, but most were secular, and very few were Jewish. The ceremonies seemed to try to separate themselves from traditional ceremonies. We believe we are the only male couple to have such a tradtional ceremony at a "mainstream" synagogue.
We found one ceremony of a lesbian couple, both of whom were rabbis, which helped greatly. We decided to call our wedding a "brit ahavah" which translates to "covenant of love." Much of the liturgy would be adapted from the heterosexual Jewish wedding liturgy, but we still had to make some changes, including rewording some of the prayers, and making certain statements egalitarian. We had great help from Dave's friend Amy Greenbaum, a rabbinical student in Cincinatti, as well as our Rabbi and Cantor in Omaha. We had to translate items to reflect the meaning of the prayer, without reference to gender or to procreation. The Hebrew words chosen would have to flow properly in both Hebrew and English. The eventual result was a Jewish commitment ceremony which was both functional and beautiful at the same time. You may download the ceremony program to get the specific details of our liturgy.
A Jewish wedding ceremony needs several objects to be valid, among them the rings, and the Ketubah, or ritual marriage contract. The rings were pretty easy, and fun to get. We, accompanied by Mike's mother walked into Borsheims, the largest jewelry store in the Midwest. We walked over to the mens' wedding band area, where Mike's mom said to the clerk "my son and my son-in-law are getting married. Can you please show us your rings." Without batting an eye, the clerk said "Congratulations!" and proceeded to help us find a pair of beautiful rings, both of which reside on our fingers as we type.
The Ketubah was a bit harder. We wrote a custom text for this Jewish wedding contract, which the rabbi translated into Hebrew, and we then picked out a colorful and beautiful parchment. The only thing left was to find a company who could do the document. The first company we went with was informed that we wanted a custom text (which we would provide) for two gay Jewish men When we ordered the document, we were told there would be a "slight" delay. That delay lasted a few months with no response. We suspect problems arose here when we found that most Hebrew calligraphers were Orthodox Jews, who are prejudiced against homosexuality. We finally found a wonderful woman in Canada who ran a company called Jesse Judaica, and she was, in her own words "honored" to do our Ketubah.
With the Ketubah taken care of, we were on a roll. Thankfully, Mike's mom was more than happy to take care of a lot of the grunt work in Omaha, helping us find a gay-friendly photographer and videographer, as well as working with the same Marriott hotel catering service that had done Mike's sister's wedding 18 months before. The Mariott really went overboard. Every other word out of the wedding consultant's mouth was "we'll throw that in at no charge." She was able to accommodate all the details, including "white glove" service by the servers. The florist also went out of his way to make sure it was perfect. We weren't necessarily "flower" people, and his selections were simple and elegant. Apparently the florist was "family" since he said "I'm so proud of you guys" and gave us a hug. Everyone was absolutely wonderful, with nary a whiff of homophobia anywhere. We decided on what food to serve, our colors, and musical selections, and as May approached, almost everything was ready to go...except for the most fun thing, registering for gifts.
We registered at Homeplace on a sunny April morning. We walked in, waiting until the bridal consultant wasn't busy, and went into the alcove to register. Dave said that we needed to register for a wedding, and the bridal consultant asked without even blinking if it was for the two of us. Mike answered yes, and she said "congratulations" as she seamlessly choose "commitment ceremony" from the menu on her computer screen. Five minutes later we had the price gun and we were off on an orgy of shopping! We later registered at Target too, where the entire process is computerized. Target is a bit behind the times with their registry, though, forcing one of us to be the "bride!"
May was a busy month for Mike. In addition to running up to the wedding, Mike was having a busy month at work, including business travel, and laser eye surgery. Towards the end of May, with all that behind him, Mike's office threw us a wedding lunch party, and a day later, we were on the road to Omaha. Everything was coming along smoothly....a bit too smoothly.
The biggest crisis of our wedding planning happened when the woman doing our Ketubah mailed the ketubah via UPS ground instead of UPS next-day, making it likely that it would not arrive in time for the ceremony. She felt terrible about it, not realizing that it takes a few extra days to make it to the Midwest. Dave called UPS to try to get them to upgrade the shipment, and by the time it was over, managed to speak to the president of the entire corporation! In spite of this, they could not find the document, and the calligrapher was preparing to rush out an emergency copy, when, miraculously, the ketubah showed up in Lawrence the day before our ceremony. One of the wedding guests picked it up on his drive to Omaha, and everyone breathed a huge sigh of relief.
As the wedding day approached, We did some last minute preparation. We met with the Rabbi to go over some final details, did a brief rehearsal, and in a first for both of us, got our nails manicured for that ever-so-important ring shot. On Friday we picked up Amy Greenbaum, Dave's rabbinical student friend who had been so helpful and supportive during our planning and we went out to lunch. She had prepared a special sermon and Havdallah (end of Shabbat) service for the prenuptual dinner.
The pre-nup on Saturday night was amazing. It was so cool seeing all these friends and family who had come from so far away to be part of our celebration. Mike's old high school friends ("the Road Trip Boys") were there, as well as a college friend from San Francisco, Dave's friends from Ohio and Texas, and all kinds of relatives from across the US. We gorged ourselves on Big Fred pizza, the first of many culinary feasts in June, and after we were done eating, Amy presented her Havdallah service, which was one of the most beautiful and touching spiritual events we have even been part of. The party broke around 10, and Dave went off with his friend Mobeen. Mike went out to get a beer with the Road Trip Boys and his friend Derek, and after a drink, Derek and Mike went to check out the Max, a palacial gay nightclub in Omaha. Ironically, so did Dave and Mobeen, but they didn't even realize that they both went to the same place. That night, Dave slept at the hotel and Mike slept at his parent's home to symbolize our last night as single people.
Sunday morning dawned bright, and Mike tuxedoed himself, and had to make an emergency call to Mobeen to have him bring over his razor, which Dave had inadvertantly packed up the night before. That is probably something that never happens to a straight couple! Mobeen, the perpetual gentleman, helped make sure Dave looked perfect. Dave was not used to tuxedo and had to be dressed every step of the way At this point Mike wasn't really nervous, it was more the feeling you get when the roller coaster has started to pull away -- the ride has begun, and you are kind of staring ahead in anticipation. Dave become more and more nervous as the day went on. A few regrets that his parents weren't there and wondering if he was a bad person because his parents weren't there. Amy reassured him that he had never been more happy and shined so brightly until he met Mike.
After we got to the synagogue, we spent the next half hour doing the posed photographs outside. It was a madhouse, trying to figure out which poses to get with whom. It became an assembly line, with Dave trying to coordinate it all. We forgot a few shots, but we did the best we could. The photographer wanted to know if we would feel comfortable kissing in public, in front of a major road. I'm sure the Sunday churchgoers were a bit shocked, but hopefully a bit enlightended. Of course, this was across the street from Jimmy Creech's congregation, so maybe they weren't *so* shocked. Then we went immediately into the library to do the ketubah signing. We didn't realize we would have to sign our names in Hebrew. The Rabbi "helped" us, ok he did it for us in Hebrew. We also didn't realize we should include the Cantor, so we had to quickly add that line to the bottom. "With great honor I sign my name to this document" said the
Rabbi, and with that the deed was done. Five minute later we entered the sanctuary hall.
Mike didn't move during the entire wedding. It seemed to take only a few minutes, and he stood with knees locked the whole time. The Rabbi and Amy gave beautiful sermons, and the Cantor sang the seven blessings with real feeling. The whole time Dave was waiting for someone to rush in and end the ceremony, he never considered that this could really happen. Someone would prevent it at the last minute. But they didn't!
We each slipped the rings on each other's fingers, and it was almost done. Traditionally, the groom breaks a glass at the end of the wedding. Since there were two grooms, we each broke a glass. After the recessional, Dave and Mike were alone in the library. Mike said "we're married" and Dave sobbed uncontrollably for about five minutes. He had to accept the fact that it happened and he again cried his parents did not attend.
Afterwards we went over to the Marriott with our parents, and as soon as we arrived, we formed an impromptu reception line and finally had a chance to say 'hi' to many of the people who came up just for the ceremony. After this was done, we entered the banquet room to the cheers of the crowd, and the next two hours went by quickly. The hall was magnificent. After toasts (Mike's sister and Mike gave short ones, Dave's lasted for 15 minutes!) we were led through the buffet line by white-gloved assistants, and had a great meal. Mike loved the white glove service. Dave was annoyed and begged the server to carry his own plate. Light Klezmer music was playing in the background. We cut the cake an hour later, but by then people had started leaving, so we had lots of leftovers. Finally, we escaped upstairs to the honeymoon suite, and we finally were able to get out of the tuxes!
That afternoon, we went back to my parents' house to open gifts. The gifts were incredible. People really went out of there way to get us perfect gifts. We received a large number of Judaicia. Dave cried again, overwhelmed by everyone's generiousity. Then we returned to the Marriott, where we relaxed and enjoyed room service, including complimentary chocolate-covered strawberries and champagne. Ever diligent, Dave began working on Thank You cards. The following morning was Mike's niece's baby-naming ceremony, and then the long drive back to Lawrence. We were married, united for life as a couple, recognized as such by faith, family, and friends.
Public reaction to our ceremony was very limited, primarily because we decided not to speak to the news media at the time. A few media outlets called both Mike's parents and the Temple. We took a united front and responded to media requests with the statement. "That was a private religious ceremony. We have no comment on the issue. There was a short story in the World Herald the next day, but nothing came of it. Last we heard, several other same-sex couples at the synagogue were planning on following in our footsteps.
We took our honeymoon in Provincetown, a beautiful little resort town on the tip of Cape Cod. We spend three days sightseeing, relaxing, and shopping, and eating.
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