Gay Marriages Celebrate Marriage Equality

Unlike Cinderella, for gay couples in New York State last night's stroke of midnight was a good thing. From Niagara Falls to Long Island marriages were performed as close to midnight as possible in a good-natured scramble to be "first." Among the newlyweds were couples who had been together for decades and couples who were in the early stages of commitment.

I celebrate with them as I privately give tribute to a dear friend who did not live to see this day. To a man who loved his partner through sickness and health until death parted them and yet was never able to emerge from the closet of subterfuge and euphemism that his religion and training had constructed around him. A man who lived a difficult life with courage and fortitude. I will not speak his name here. I have no right to break the silence he kept so painfully while he lived.

But in his memory I rejoice that others can choose openly what he could not.