Photo Courtesy of RockandRollBride.com

In exploring the many issues related to marriage, there is none more prominent than the ongoing state-by-state battle over the legal rights of same-sex partners. Today, the New York State Senate voted down a proposal to legalize same-sex marriage by a vote of 38 to 24. I consider this pretty depressing, given that New York is home to almost three hundred thousand members of the GLB community, the largest gay population in the United States.*

If only more people got the picture like New York State Senate Committee on Civil Service and Pensions Chair Diane Savino, who said most eloquently in the video below, “we in government don’t determine the quality or the validity of peoples’ relationships. If we did, we would not issue three-quarters of the marriage licenses we do.”

After watching this video, I am further convinced that there is something painfully wrong with a system that gives complete strangers the legal right to marry, yet will not afford the same opportunity to deeply committed same-sex couples. Unlike their same-sex counterparts, a straight couple can secure a marriage license in less time than it takes to update their car registration at the DMV. For fewer than one hundred dollars, I could marry my postman this afternoon, were I not already legally bound to Chris (and in some states, I could have them both, woo-hoo!)

To those who oppose gay marriage, I have these questions:

-If marriage is considered that sacred, why make it so easy for any (straight) person over eighteen to obtain?

-If you’re going to deny the rights of a minority, why not question who should be married out of the majority? Why not add a few restrictions, like pre-marital classes and stricter divorce laws?

-Which would bother you more: a same-sex couple together for twenty-five years getting hitched in a quiet church ceremony, or a heterosexual couple tying the knot as they drink out of their 7-Eleven rented slurpee machine? Which do you consider more “sacred”?

Photo by Lesley Bryce Photography

It’s possible you’ve been reading Wedding Road Trip because you’re getting ready for your own “perfect” day. Whether it’s your first, or even your second, you might benefit from some hot tips I picked up during ours.

You are not magical on your wedding day. Normal laws of biology and physics still apply to you. For example, if it’s a sunny day in California in August, you will burn without sunscreen. You don’t want to be lobster red and need to wear your sister’s foundation at the after party – not that it happened to me.

A little champagne can soothe the nerves. If you’re the groom, I prescribe a glass right before the ceremony. Please disregard this advice for Mormon nuptials.

People will cry, so carry a tissue. My mom cried, my sister cried, I even teared up (which normally only happens during playoff games).

Eat! You may be nervous and you’ll certainly be distracted, so even if you intend to, you might forget to fuel and bitch out. Luckily our friend Janet took it upon herself to be our designated snackee and plied us with almonds all day long. And drink water, too, or you’ll just find yourself wolfing down Coronas like I did.

Practice your first dance. Trust me on this one. Learn from my mistakes.

At the reception, put the head table in the middle of everyone, not set to the side. Just my perspective, but being in the mix with the rest of the tables made us more accessible but also allowed us to disappear into the crowd. And sometimes it’s nice to not have everyone looking at you.

It is so essential to have a concierge looking out for you at the reception. There is no way to make it to the bar without being rushed by three guests. My cousin Lara made sure to bring us wine – and brought us white so we wouldn’t stain The Wedding Dress.

Wear comfortable shoes. My back still hurts…

Everyone will be nice to you all day long. This sounds obvious, but it wasn’t to us beforehand – we were tired, stressed, and juggling logistics with emotions. A part of me was convinced we’d spend our wedding day fielding complaints and explaining directions and timetables. Instead everyone was SO nice and happy. Our guests were thrilled to be there. The vendors rocked. And people smiled and hugged and partied and did it for real – not to make us happy, but because they were so happy.

And after a six-week Wedding Road Trip and another month of setting up the final ceremony, talking so much in isolation, we saw that we weren’t an island but belonged to this big community that loves us. That, or free food and alcohol can make magic happen.

Photo by Lesley Bryce Photography

Looking back on my wedding, I have few regrets. Almost everything went as planned, from the Wedding Road Trip to our ceremony at the Yellow Umbrella Company. The after-party at the Candlelight Kitchen even came with some unexpected bonuses, namely a big, bouncy white pillow bed and a fantastic Father of the Bride toast, complete with junior high audio recordings that my friends still talk about.

But perhaps my favorite part of the whole schbang was a post-dinner performance by my friends Todd and Colleen. At first, I was adamant that all 80s rap was to be stricken from the playlist. I was convinced that crazy rap numbers would mar the perfect after-party images that were dancing through my head. Three days before the wedding, over margaritas and pop music, I finally relented and gave the contraband performance the thumbs up.

So on the night of the Wedding Road Trip ceremony, my good friend Colleen and our “minister” Todd led the crowd in a rousing rendition of “Bust a Move,” complete with our mothers as backup dancers. Family howled and friends cheered as Todd and Colleen rocked Candlelight Kitchen in a way that few ever have (and probably ever will). Our photographer, Lesley Bryce, even caught a picture of me laughing, evidence that I loved every second of the Vegas-worthy performance. Every second was perfect, down to the last “you want it, you got it.”

Photo by Lesley Bryce Photography

Now, two months post-wedding, it’s “Bust a Move” that I remember. Not the tablecloths, not the entrees, and certainly not the flowers that I never ordered.

Instead, I remember how my moms (and future mother-in-law) let loose in the name of love and bad eighties rap. I smile at the moment that had me collapsed with laughter. I recall the way Colleen’s shoes lit up the dance floor like she was channeling Tupac.

And in the end, I am humbled by the reality that maybe, just maybe, some of the greatest moments in my life were not under my control or born of my imagination.

Thanks, Todd and Colleen.

Thinking…

Thinking…

Heidi Fleiss…

Thinking…

This morning, Chris and I took the first legal step in changing our names. For those of you who are thinking of taking on a new last name of your own, here’s the deal (at least for California):

1. You have to fill out five forms in triplicate and submit them to the Superior Court.

2. You have to write a check for $370.

3. You have to stand and wait for those forms to be filed while listening to the world’s most obnoxious woman argue over a small claims case in a voice that rivals that of the Giant from Jack in the Beanstalk. *

4. You have to repeat steps one through three for your spouse. Yep, that means you’ve just written checks totaling $740.

5. You have to walk down the street, past a selection of unsavory characters asking you for money… which you now don’t have because you’ve given it all to the City of San Francisco.

6. You walk up the stairs to the office of The Recorder, the cheapest local law journal in the City, where you file your public Change of Name forms for $49.75 each.

7. Eight weeks later, you show up at the Superior Court for a hearing that lasts approximately five minutes. Your chosen name cannot carry fraudulent intent and cannot interfere with the rights of others (ie: I cannot name myself Britney Spears unless I have a really good reason for it- which frankly, I’d love to hear if you’ve got one…)

8. You go through the process of changing your name on everything that defines you: your social security card, your driver’s license, your bank accounts, your credit cards, your gym membership, and so on. You can also change your name on your birth certificate (or gender- but that’s another story for another time.)

9. Two and half months and more than eight hundred dollars later, you’re the proud owner of a name that you’d better damn well like.

To those of you who are thinking of doing what we’ve done, a word of advice: have one person change his/her name before you file for a marriage license. This will cut the cost in half once you’ve signed on the dotted line. We didn’t go this route because we spent over three months trying to decide on the perfect last name…

*this may not happen to you. I hope.

As I watched the class finally settle into position, for a moment, just one moment, I wanted to switch places with one of those fourth graders. Each one represented so much potential, so much life. They had so many memories left to make: first day of high school, first date, first college party, first love, first heartbreak. They haven’t screwed anything up… yet.

Of course, like all bouts of nostalgia, the moment passed, but not before reminding me of a conversation Chris and I had on the road with our friends Matt and Chrissy. We had just finished belting out “High On You” by Survivor when Chrissy said, “we’ll totally recount this moment tomorrow morning. Nostalgia is a bitch.” And she’s right… I did find myself thinking about the Survivor moment the next morning, longing for the simple, pure second in which we were all (in our imaginations, anyways) in tune with one another. Funny enough, as I sit here writing about remembering that moment, I feel nostalgic about that too.

But I do agree with Chrissy… nostalgia is a bitch. Actually, it is more than a bitch… it is an enemy. A robber of joy and a spinner of false tales, nostalgia reminds of who we once thought we were, not of who we are now. Whether it be a wedding or a fourth grade class photo, nostalgia threatens to hold us in the past instead of allowing us to enjoy the present or move into the unknown future. Thanks to nostalgia, it’s likely that ten years from now, I’ll wax poetic about the days in which I was a newlywed freelance writer, meandering home from the corner store on a Wednesday morning.

I had so much potential, then.

Yep… one month in and I have yet to feel married. People keep referencing my “husband,” which always leaves me scratching my head and wondering who in the hell they are talking about.

The question remains… when will it feel like marriage? While fighting about money? Deciding to have children? Buying a house? Filling out beneficiary forms?

For Chris, the answer came last night. I had been feeling especially domestic, so I cleaned the house, popped dinner in the oven, and chilled some champagne. As he sat on the couch and admired my handiwork, he commented happily, “my wife.” While I appreciate his admiration, I have to wonder, would he have felt married if I had been sitting on the couch swigging a beer instead of dusting the windowsill? And in return, does he need to live up to husband stereotypes in order for me to feel like we’re hitched? Will I finally feel bethrothed when he shows up at home with his Christmas bonus, eager to put a down payment on the family pool?

And now… payback is a (fill in the blank).

Last week, an acquaintance on Facebook emailed me to saying he knew a writer who wrote a blog about our name change. The acquaintance went on to joke that maybe he’d considered taking the last name “Tesla.” It was a rude awakening to the sad fact that people who don’t know us well are going to make assumptions about our motivations for choosing the name Ford.

As a response, I’ve created an FAQ to answer some of the questions that have been circulating.

Q: Ford donated a car to your Wedding Road Trip. Did they bribe you to change your name?
A: Yes, Ford loaned us a car for our Wedding Road Trip. That being said, the name change was as much of a surprise to Ford as it was to our parents and friends. We haven’t discussed it extensively with anyone at Ford.

Q: But you get a free car, right?
A: Um, no. Roxy is being returned to the media fleet as promised. We might be able to purchase her at dealer auction in a few months- for those of you who are slow… purchase means that we’re going to buy Roxy.

Q: Oh come on. You totally changed your name to get a free car.
A: Pre-Roxy, both Chris and I went without cars for three years. Given the awesome public transportation system here in SF, we’ve never needed to own a car. By the way, if we wanted to capitalize on changing our name, we would have gone all out and taken Gates, Getty, Cyrus or Spears.

Q: Whatever. If you had driven a Hyundai on your Wedding Road Trip, you would have changed your name to that instead of Ford.
A: By your logic, it’s a good thing we weren’t given a SmartCar.

Q: It’s totally lame to name yourself after a product. I’m surprised you didn’t name yourself after Best Buy or Google, you’re that lame.
A: Ya, it was a real toss up between Ford and two other products we use quite often, Tampax and Trojan.

Q: I can’t believe Chris changed his name. If he were my brother, I would disown him.
A: He’d probably disown you too for being such a tool.

Q: What if you get divorced? Will you go back to your “normal” name?
A: We’ve been married all of two weeks and don’t plan on considering a divorce in the near or distant future. If we ever do, we’ll handle it in the same way that women have handled it for the last hundred years.

If you want to know why we really chose the name, you can always read about it here.

No matter what the movie, whether it be Monster in Law or Rachel Getting Married, parents are painted as the biggest cause of pre-wedding angst for cinematic brides and grooms. Chris and I, ever the gullible, expected that to be the case in real life. We tried to avoid the awkward parent meet up by combining it with our rehearsal dinner and were shut down by six angry parents who most definitely wanted to meet prior to any group activities.

Yep, you read that right: six parents. Chris only comes with two, while I have four on my side, three of which have been with me basically all of my life. Before you start thinking my dad’s a candidate for the next season of Big Love, let me clarify. My mom and dad split up when I was a wee little girl. A year or so later, my mom met and married my stepdad John. Given that he was around for all of my pre-teen and adolescent angst, he has pretty strong credentials as one of my parents. My dad’s current wife came much later in the game (last year), but is probably the feistiest of the bunch. Imagining these four teamed up with Chris’s nice, pleasant, mid-western parents was enough to make me consider smoking the grass, if you know what I mean.

Turns out that compatibility was not the issue I should have been worried about. The six of them got along like sorority girls at a trunk sale while Chris and I sat on the sidelines like last year’s fashion. I think we probably spoke a combined five sentences the entire night. It went something like this:

Jaime: So on Saturday, we’ll-

Mom #1: So Kathy, where did you get that sweater? It’s positively divine.

Chris: Well, that sweater actually reminds me that it might be chilly at Saturday’s ceremony and-

Dad #1: We should probably talk about Saturday’s ceremony. Dad #2, what do you think?

Dad #2: Well, maybe we should ask the kids when they’re around.

Chris and Jaime: We’re right here!!

During dessert, we finally got our moment in the sun when we announced our name choice. We figured, hell, they gave birth to us and stuff, which probably gives them some special privileges over the rest of Saturday’s guests. I must say, I was quite relieved when Chris’s mom positively beamed at our selection, given that she shares quite a history with the name.

Special Note: I think our parents would have caroused late into the night if I hadn’t put the kibosh on the evening around ten thirty to get my beauty sleep. This just proves two things. 1) I need a lot of rest and 2) I am officially older than my parents.

Both thoughts=disturbing.

Thankfully, our friends and family were rather gracious, so no one made too much fun of us. That being said, the smirks on peoples’ faces in most of the pictures tell the real story.

Incidentally, we only had two slow songs at our post-ceremony party. The first was “My Mona Lisa (The One)” by Billy Schafer, a friend of ours. The second was “Oh” by Dave Matthews, not a friend of ours. Both songs are available on iTunes.

You’re probably wondering why, especially if you weren’t around this past weekend to see us get married. While I’d rather be writing about our amazing weekend right now, this decision seems to require some explanation for people, so here we go.

Let’s recap how Chris and I went about deciding to choose our own last name:

1) I didn’t want to take Chris’s name and he wasn’t quite comfortable with the idea of there being two Mrs. Hodges (the first being his mother).

2) Chris didn’t want to take my name, which is fine, because Mr. Case is in fact, my father.

3) We didn’t want to hyphenate our names, thus creating a new disease, the Case (of the) Hodges.

4) We wanted to choose a name that would work for the whole family, which may or may not someday include children, dogs, and random goldfish.

When we first started talking about the idea of coming up with our own new name, we were sitting at a breakfast table in Charleston, South Carolina. The name “Ford” came up immediately, given that we were having such an amazing journey and we felt like the name encompassed our common experience. We quickly tossed the name aside as pandering and considered everything from Solstice to Equinox, Katmar (our moms’ first names combined) to Dwyer (Chris’s grandmother’s maiden name). We even established a few rules:

1) The name had to be American, because neither of us thought it was appropriate to take on an ethnic last name just because it “sounded cool.”

2) It couldn’t be the maiden name stolen from a good friend.

3) It couldn’t be a first name, last name. (ie: Chris Ryan, Jaime Bruce)

4) It couldn’t hurt anyone (ie: taking my stepdad’s last name would hurt my father)

5) It had to be easy to say and spell so that we don’t torture our future kids.

After two months of long conversations, intense fights, and hours of thinking, we both realized that the first name we came up with, Ford, was exactly the right choice. Here’s why:

1) The word “Ford”, as defined by dictionary.com, means “to cross a river.” It implies strength and determination, two qualities Chris and I hope to embody in our marriage.

2) President Gerald Ford, an adopted member of the Ford family, was from Grand Rapids, Chris’s hometown. Chris holds Gerald Ford in high regard, as does the rest of his family.

3) Betty Ford helped raise awareness for breast cancer and was considered a leader in  the Women’s Movement. She is also the founder of the world-famous Betty Ford Clinic, which helps treat substance abuse and addiction.

4) Ford is the only American car company that didn’t take bailout money.

5) Henry Ford founded the Ford Motor Company with the idea that the common man should and would be able to afford his own car. The Ford Motor Company still works to achieve this goal today.

6) Roxy has been like a family member to us, and since her last name is Ford, we’re happy to share it with her. Even though we’re going to have to say goodbye to her this week, she’ll always live very large in our memories.

7) Driving around the country seeing the Ford sign everywhere made Chris and I feel like a part of a larger family- we loved that.

8 ) Chris’s mother has an extensive history with Ford.

9) My father, who was the student body president of Fresno State, was given a Mustang fastback during his presidency.

10) My first truck was a Ford Ranger- a vehicle that is infamous to anyone who ever drove with me in high school. My brother, who was one of my best friends growing up, always had Mustangs.

11) My grandfather Bud loves driving around the entire country in his Ford Ranger.

It goes on and on. No matter what other names we came up with, Ford kept coming back.

Now that we’re married, we’ll begin the process of changing our name legally. We plan on keeping our maiden and bachelor names as our middle names, so that people will always know where we’ve come from.

If you have any questions, feel free to ask.