After reading sweet (and highly anticipated) engagement stories like these, I become keenly aware of the downside of being a post-feminist liberal left-coast gender-fuck dating an equally liberal raised-by-lesbians Euro-weirdo: I miss out on all the romantic traditions.

Andreas and I are deeply and completely committed to each other, four years behind and another 70 ahead of us, but the traditional proposal/wedding thang just ain’t going to happen. And while I like that (I envision matching wedding dresses, ala Qathi and Chris), there is some sad little part of me that mourns the thought that I’ll never see Dre proposing on one knee, and that I’ll never choke on an engagement ring hiding in the bottom of a champagne glass.

Oh sure: I still get heckled. I can’t get within half a mile of a wedding without some well-meaning person leaning over their hors d’ouerves and whispering “So, are you next?” In fact, as I wrote in a journal entry a few months ago: Speaking of my partner, did you know that yet ANOTHER friend asked me when/if Dre and I were getting married? Why does no-one ask HIM these things?? Why does everyone assume *I’M* the one picking out the monogrammed napkins?

It’s gotten to the point where people like my mother just crow “Oh for fucksake: I don’t care if you actually get married, just have the party so we can give you presents!” Right. Presents good.

I had a discussion Christmas of 1998 with my mom, aunt Cherie, and three lesbians (aunt Andrea, her partner, and Nancy, Andreas’ mother) about whether or not Dre and I planned to get married. (Keep in mind that this was after Dre and I had been dating for less than a year. Needless to say, I was stuttering and twitching from the pressure of the question). I said “Well, we’re really committed to each other, and we might have a commitment ceremony some day to acknowledge that, but I’m not sure if we need the legal institution of marriage to make it official.”

Nancy, Andrea, and her partner all commented on the irony that Dre and I, the straight couple who COULD get married, would choose not to enjoy the legal rights that so many committed gay and lesbian couples fight for. Nancy and her partner Susan have been together for 15 years, and Andrea and Stacey have been together for 7, and yet they can’t enjoy spousal rights. The irony stung.

Regardless, at this point we’ve only got 2 and a half years until the common-law spouse rules apply, so whatever. We’ll see. There is something decidedly unromantic about being like “Oh look, Love: we’ve been around each other so long, the government considers us married.” But I’m not sure if you can have it both ways: radical lefties can’t reject the traditions and then be like “Oh yeah, but that fancy big wedding with the white dress? And him proposing? Yes, I want that. And my dowry should pay for it.” I’m sure we’ll find some other way to be romantic.