I'M NOT WILLING TO SETTLE FOR CRUMBS: Kim Severson

...I would love nothing more than to marry my partner. I love this girl. I want the dinner and the dance and the promise of her Social Security check if, God forbid, she dies young. I want a joint tax return and the family discount at the health club.

I also want some return for the years I've spent giving straight people wedding presents. I want everyone at the office to gasp at my engagement ring and pitch in for a bad bakery cake to celebrate. I want the magic of the day I was conditioned to hope for.

That's not going to happen by going to Massachusetts, where same-sex marriage has been legal since 2003. Sure, I might get the cake and a little slice of symbolism, but any legal or financial advantage would dissolve once we left the state. For gay couples like us, marriage is about collecting paper. ...

Even if we did decide that one more piece of paper might actually make us married, the government wouldn't care. Consider, for example, our medical insurance. She is covered by the domestic-partnership benefits of my job. That's great, until you run headfirst into the federal tax law. Because the Feds don't think gay weddings are real, even if we did get married I'd still have to pay taxes on an extra $9,370.20--what her medical coverage is worth. ...

The truth was, we didn't want to rush it. Isn't the whole point of getting married to have your brothers make stupid toasts and your mother cry and your friends swear to help keep you together when you're falling apart--to craft a public sharing of love? Marriage is not about driving to a place where you don't live or settling for a ceremony that will be recognized only there.

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posted by Eve at 3:42 PM VOTE

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