A Nice Day To Be A Californian
by dday
Today at 5:01pm, Mayor Gavin Newsom will officiate a private wedding ceremony between Phyllis Lyon and Del Martin. At 6:00, Mayor Ron Dellums (yeah, he's back, for those of you who remember the longtime House member) will officiate marriage ceremonies in Alameda County, with Rep. (and new DNC member) Barbara Lee on hand, among others. All over the state, couples, regardless of gender, will engage in the basic civil right of marriage.
And all over the state, stories like this are appearing in the morning papers.
It's 9 a.m. on a Thursday and Paul Waters and Kevin Voecks are paging through photos of cakes at the Vienna Bakery in Thousand Oaks.
"Would you want something like that?" Voecks asked, pausing briefly on one.
"Hmmm," Waters replied.
It's 12 days until their wedding.
Voecks, 51, pointed to another, a four-tiered cake, with icing studs running down its side. "This one reminds me of a tuxedo shirt, it's not effeminate."
"I think bow ties here," Waters, 53, said. "And I like the wedding bells on it."
"Bow ties would be awesome!" Voecks said.
His soon-to-be mother-in-law, Peggy Waters, 80, looked on as her only son and his groom finalized the order.
"Kevin's a 10," Peggy Waters said. "All the women Paul brought home, I never liked. This is still a dream come true."
It's pretty special to witness this, although my real hope is for the day when this is unexceptional. These are our neighbors, our mail carriers, our office workers, our waitstaff, our bosses, our dogwalkers, our friends. And they have their personal lives as do we. And starting tonight, there are no barriers between us.
There is an enormous political battle ahead. But today is simple and special.
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