My husband and I attended the wedding of a friend on Sunday, the first wedding we’ve been to since Australia’s marriage equality bill passed in December 2017. And it was…different.

If I count the number of weddings I’ve been to over 35 years, there aren’t that many. Movies have given me a thankfully unrealistic expectation of the numbers of weddings I’d attend as an adult, though maybe that’s a feature of living in a relatively godless country like Australia (hallelujah!).

At quick count I’ve probably been to ten and that’s including my own. At most of them I didn’t think about the ‘marriage is between a man and a woman’ line that was inserted into the legal portion of the ceremony in 2004.

But over recent years it became a ‘thing’ that rankled me when I heard it. I’m happy to say that for most of those weddings, the couple has dealt with it in a way that showed they don’t agree with the sentiment set out in the law. Despite this, after the change happened, I hadn’t thought how I’d feel once those words of exclusion were no longer there.

It was a shock to say the least.

Bracing for impact

I had prepared myself for them in the split second before they would have been spoken before and then remembered that I didn’t have to steel myself any longer, that those words wouldn’t be there to mark me as different, to exclude me from this celebration of my friend’s love and commitment.

It was a brief thing, a small yet legally important part of the ceremony, the words now simply being ‘between two people’, but it had a profound effect on me. I wonder if it will affect me the same way next time, or if so, how long it will be before I am no longer surprised at this change in our society. I think it will be awhile, and there are bound to be flare-ups along the way that make me aware of it one way or another.

Reality reminders

Every now and then I am struck with reminders that this is the new reality. I have occasion to call Glen ‘my husband’ in situations where it would be normal for a woman to say such a thing, and while I was getting used to it in Canada where we lived and married, in Australia it takes a mental gear shift to remember that I can say it and it’s legal in the country I’m living in (and was born in).

The other day while Glen and I were at a restaurant, I noticed he was wearing his wedding ring. He normally does wear it (as I do mine) but perhaps it was because it was a bright day and the light reflected off it or made it especially shiny it caught my attention and I became aware again of my reality, that we were married, that it was legal, that it came with a weight that hadn’t been there before.

And then, at my friend’s wedding, to be made aware by the absence of hate and that we were now part of the normal fabric of society was a special thing on a very special day.

There’s obviously still work to be done (and of course this was a non-religious ceremony) but in that moment and little moments throughout the days and weeks and years, it means a lot to belong in this way.