Vows

The entire time we've been working toward our ceremony CK and I have known that we wanted to include the first five Grave Precepts. Both of us have spent a lot of time with these vows. We've each written about them and have taken them in a public ceremony with our community (sangha), friends and family present. At those times we looked at how these vows informed our own personal practice.

Including these vows as part of our marriage ceremony would reaffirm the most basic of the vows of our Buddhist practice together. Ultimately we sat down with several translations of these vows to write ones that we felt truly reflected the practice we share together in marriage. Of the many wordings we looked at, we were strongly influenced by the vows we both have taken within our Zen community, the writing on the precepts by the late John Daido Loori Roshi, and the interpretation of the precepts by Vietnamese Zen Master Thich Naht Hahn.

During the ceremony we each recited the following vows to one another:

• In the practice of our marriage, I vow to affirm, cherish and protect the lives of all sentient beings.
• In the practice of our marriage, I vow to be generous with my time, energy and material resources and to take only what is freely given.
• In the practice of our marriage, I vow to be aware of the suffering caused by sexual misconduct and to cultivate my responsibility to protect the safety and integrity of individuals, couples, families and society.
• In the practice of our marriage, I vow to manifest truth, to cultivate loving speech and deep listening. I will refrain from using words of discord and will make every attempt to resolve conflict, great and small.
• In the practice of our marriage, I vow to cultivate good health, both physical and mental, for myself, my family, and my society by practicing mindful eating, drinking, and consuming.

We each then wrote our own vows we were taking in our marriage. After reciting our own writing of the first five Grave Precepts we then gave our own vows. Here are mine to CK:

I will always remember seeing you on the first day of 2008. It was merely the third time I had seen you in person, but in the bright light of early afternoon I suddenly knew with certainty that my life was about to change in a significant way.

So it did, and here we are today in front of friends and relations. All of us gathered to honor the power of publicly taking vows to love, honor and cherish one another. It has been a mad dash to get to this dazzling finish, complete with unexpected news, arguments, wild passion, laughter, and tears. I’m told this is perfectly ordinary even though it feels to me rather extraordinary.

In addition to the precepts, which I have vowed to make a fundamental part of the practice of my marriage with you, I offer these vows from my heart:

• I vow to nurture unbridled joy in equal measure with gravitas.
• I vow to great each day with loving-kindness.
• I vow to nourish my health so that we may explore many more years together.
• I vow to create art, write, sing and cultivate playfulness together with you.
• I vow to admit when I am wrong.
• I vow to offer you cheer, humor, deep listening, and wise counsel. Whenever needed.
• I vow to challenge myself and you so we continue to grow fully into who we can be.
• I vow to read you poetry.

For my birthday last year you gave me a collection of Rumi’s poetry translated by Coleman Barks; an edition I did not have. It had been an amazing day spent celebrating my birthday and you fell asleep early. I stayed awake longer to read poems and enjoy my cake. One poem in particular really caught me; I knew I wanted to say some of the words from it to you at our wedding. Although I feel rather presumptuous playing with Rumi’s words, I do so as an act of love and from a deep honoring of the original poem, “The Self We Share”. These words especially speak to me of you and of this moment when written in this way:

The Prayer of Each

You are the source of my life.
You separate essence from mud.
You honor my soul.
You bring rivers from the mountain springs.
You brighten my eyes.
The wine you offer takes me out of myself into the self we share.

Doing that is religion.

I am a prayer.
You're the amen.


CK's vows to me:

My dearest Sherri: You are one of the most generous, compassionate and courageous spirits I have ever met. From the beginning, you opened your heart wide to me and while cautious at first, I have learned to take great refuge in your presence.

In addition the precepts we have already shared, I offer a few of my own vows:

Because our life together will not always be easy, I vow to meet challenges in our relationship with a sense of compassion and adventure.

Because our family is but one piece in a very large puzzle. I vow to live a life of service to you, to our marriage and to our community.

Because while love is not scarce, many resources are, I vow to make sure you always have the things you need most such as food, water, shelter and art supplies. I vow to utilize our resources wisely.

Because I want to spend the most amount of time possible with you and grow old together, I vow to care for my body and mind.

Because play is just as important as work, I vow to cultivate playfulness, laughter and lightness in our relationship.

Because what I was hiding, deep inside, you brought out into the light, and even thought it is terrifying at times, I vow to stand bravely in the light of your love.

My dearest Sherri, You are the first person who made me truly feel loved. I look forward to sharing a life of practice with you and I am truly honored that you are making this commitment with me here today, in front of our friends and family.

When we exchanged our stunning, one-of-a-kind wedding rings, handmade by local artist Barbara Covey, we each said the following words to one another:

May our marriage be nurturing, intimate and supportive throughout the years. May our marriage be a refuge to us as we cultivate kindness and compassion toward all sentient beings. I give you this ring as a symbol of my vows and commitment to you with body, speech and mind. In this life, in every situation, in wealth or poverty, in health or sickness, in happiness or difficulty.

Wedding Poems

There's been so much going on, joyful (our wedding) and hard (Mom being in the hospital and missing our wedding) that sitting down to write has been a far lower priority. I'll be getting back to it more since there's been a lot I've wanted to write about, but for now my return to posting is to share the three poems we had read during our wedding ceremony.

Oh, and a great picture taken by a friend after the ceremony!



CK's mother read this poem:

I Want Both of Us

by Hafiz

I want both of us

To start talking about this great love

As if you, I, and the Sun were all married

And living in a tiny room,

Helping each other to cook,

Do the wash,

Weave and sew,

Care for our beautiful

Animals.

We all leave each morning

To labor on the earth’s field.

No one does not lift a great pack.

I want both of us to start singing like two

Traveling minstrels

About this extraordinary existence

We share,

As if

You, I, and God were all married

And living in
a tiny

Room.

One of the Zen priests, a dear friend and inspiration to our practice, read this:

Entering the Shell
by Rumi

Love is alive, and someone borne
along by it is more alive than lions

roaring or men in their fierce courage.
Bandits ambush others on the road.

They get wealth, but they stay in one
place. Lovers keep moving, never

the same, not for a second! What
makes others grieve, they enjoy!

When they look angry, don’t believe
their faces. It’s spring lightning,

a joke before the rain. They chew
thorns thoughtfully along with pasture

grass. Gazelle and lioness, having
dinner. Love is invisible except

here, in us. Sometimes I praise love;
sometimes love praises me. Love,

a little shell somewhere on the ocean
floor, opens its mouth. You and I

and we, those imaginary beings, enter
that shell as a single sip of seawater.


Another friend from our Zen community read this:

The Plum Trees
by Mary Oliver

Such richness flowing
through the branches of summer and into

the body, carried inward on the five
rivers! Disorder and astonishment

rattle your thoughts and your heart
cries for rest but don't

succumb, there's nothing
so sensible as sensual inundation. Joy

is a taste before
it's anything else, and the body

can lounge for hours devouring
the important moments. Listen,

the only way
to tempt happiness into your mind is by taking it

into the body first, like small
wild plums.

Not Equal

As I navigated the best decision around my date to leave work CK and I looked carefully into the question of health insurance. Ideally it would have been great to stay at work until May, I'd have had time to wrap up some projects neatly. If I left at the end of February I'd be part of a federal subsidy to pay %65 of my COBRA costs.

What stopped us was not only the expense of covering me under CK's work-sponsored health insurance plan, but the hard fact that if we opted to choose that plan the employer-paid part would be considered taxable income for her federal taxes. So many people seem to be unaware of this tax burden. When I tell them about this they are surprised and point out that I'm her partner.

Partner. Not spouse. The Defense of Marriage Act (DOMA) makes it painfully clear that a domestic partner is not a spouse. Since I can't be a spouse I'm not entitled to a long list of spousal privileges that come with recognized marriage. Not being taxed for an employers portion of health insurance is on that list.

In Oregon we have the option of registering as domestic partners which affords us some privileges within our home state. Thanks to DOMA none of the privileges afforded to us in Oregon are required to be recognized by any other state. Thanks to Oregon's very own voters, including many in Multnomah county were we live, the State constitution was amended to declare marriage as being restricted to a single man and a single woman. Constitutionally making it clear that while we may be partners, we're not allowed to be married.

Many of my loving, wonderful friends remind me that it doesn't mean we can't get married. We can have the most beautiful ceremony possible. It will be filled with friends, family, delicious vegan food, and wonderful music. It can be just as good, no matter the legality of it.

Unfortunately I'm really very painfully stuck on the legality of it. I find myself struggling with the conflicting information that while this very body may well be the body of a Buddha and this land the Pure Lotus Land, a majority of the citizens of this world believe that I am not entitled to the same rights and privileges as anyone else. I'm welcome to what mostly unaffected heterosexuals have decided, at times very grudgingly, is "just as good" as civil marriage.

Why does "just as good" smack of the old "separate but equal" party-line?

Domestic partnership is not the same as civil marriage. It isn't. Yes, we can exchange vows in front of our friends and family. We can make a public commitment of our intention to practice and share together a wholehearted life. We can have a gorgeous reception filled with joy and dancing. It will be wonderful when it happens. I will most assuredly cry.

But at the end of the day we will not sign a marriage certificate. We will not have the same rights as the married, heterosexual couples who wish us well. It will not be fully equal.

Mom's Pastor, Marriage Rights, and I

Mom was in and now back out of the hospital again over the weekend. Has made for some rather up & down energy for me. I reminded myself, as Hogen has so often reminded me, that at least this is a stress I'm rather adept at dealing with. Mom's been sick that majority of my life. I've been to so many doctor's appointments and into so many hospitals over the years. It never is comfortable, but the knot of anxiety in my throat is familiar, known.

Sunday night we went up to visit her after having been out at Great Vow all day for service, a Jukai ceremony, lunch, and CK met with DT. It was a very long day and we were a bit tired up at the hospital. Mom's pastor and his wife showed up to visit her. I am uncomfortable around him, perhaps even more so these days. He represents a stress that is more new, but it brings up old, familiar pain.

During Mom's wedding ceremony a few years ago her pastor made a point to include his opinion on marriage. As we all stood there, I was Mom's maid of honor, her pastor went on about the importance of marriage being between a man and a woman. It brought pain to the entire day for me.

Right now with the trail of Proposition 8 in California I feel even more sensitive to this issue. Sitting there on Sunday with the person I love, but am constitutionally barred from marrying, I was aware of anger and dislike arising. These stress emotions take me right back to childhood feelings of not fitting in, not being wanted. Old stress, new triggers.

When I am around this man I try to stay polite, not giving rise to the anger I feel around this man, just watching it inside of me. I also try to focus on the compassion and concern he shows my Mom. In some ways it is more confounding and painful that this compassionate, loving person is so wrapped up in his own fear and judgment that he vehemently denies CK and I the right to the same benefits he enjoys.

I don't linger too long in my Mom's decision to stay with this congregation despite knowing how they feel about me and my partner. I know she's made a point to tell many people, including the pastor, that they are being narrow-minded, yet still some hurt arises for me that she continues to share spiritual practice with these people. I can feel the angry hurt of a child who feels abandoned, betrayed arise in this.

These feelings make this one of those times when I recognize that the most important thing I can do is Metta practice, to offer loving-kindness to myself and to CK. If all I can do is be polite to him and mindful of the need to offer love to the hurt I feel, then that is OK. When it doesn't hurt quite as keenly I can even try to offer him loving-kindness in hopes that if he is freed from his fear he won't feel the need to judge and deny couples like CK & I.

Acceptance & Inequality

It was so nice to be back with CK this weekend, just enjoying each other's company. We went to see Milk, which was very good. Although I already knew the outcome of the movie the telling of the story was riveting. I felt tears in my eyes during the last minutes of the movie.

Being reminded of the past helps. There is more acceptance now for same-sex relationships. I am very grateful to be living in Portland where that acceptance is even more widespread.

Afterward CK & I walked around downtown for a little while -- enjoying the lights in the tree at Pioneer Courthouse Square, having a coffee at Powell's and picking up a few things at Whole Foods to round out our belated Thanksgiving Dinner. The feelings of gratefulness and frustration at how same-sex relationships continue to be discriminated against stayed with me while we were at Powell's. We had been looking at books about parenting and observing all the notes and special cases about trying to secure the rights of the non-birth parent made my head ache a little. Absolutely worth the effort, without question, but it acutely highlights the unfairness of marriage inequality.

We had fun in the kitchen making mashed potatoes (note -- NOT in the Kitchen Aid food processor next time, the consistency was rather pasty although it was still very tasty) and heating up the leftover pumpkin I'd made on Thanksgiving day. The next day I taught my class and we spent the day talking, being close, and cooking more. Today she went with me to a doctor's appointment, making time to be with me when I was anxious.

How utterly ordinary and simple. I am biased; being that I'm part of a lesbian relationship of course I think same-sex marriage is fair. However, I know I'd think this way where I in a heterosexual relationship. There is nothing usual for partners in a loving relationship to want to pursue commitment, publicly.

CK and I love and live our lives together in such perfectly usual ways. We go to the movies, stroll around holding hands, we shop for groceries, and occasionally kiss each other lightly when we're stopped at a street light. We make meals together, answer emails, love our pets, and pay taxes. There are many other ways in which we are each extraordinary, but our relationship is as simple and ordinary as any other couple. That we should somehow not think we are not worthy of marriage because we are "different" seems beyond absurd. Or at least it would be absurd if it didn't hurt so much.

Walking Foward

Today seemed to bring a lot of news of deaths. In between trying to get phpMyAdmin running I updated the merit list for Thursday's service with the names that kept arriving in my email today.

I was happy that today brought the lovely news the George Takei finally was able to marry his partner of many years. It has been so beautiful to read news of so many people able to wed legally, even though at times there is great sadness mixed with the joy. It continues to astound me that people choose to be so narrow in their religion as to deny marriage to people, how this isn't so simple.

And then there's me. Married to a man, just what many of those same religious people would pray to come into my life. That I be "straightened" out by the love a good man. Only that isn't what happened at all. A good, even if flawed man, could see immediately I wasn't straight, wasn't even truly bisexual. He said to me tonight that one of the first times he really watched me look at a woman he knew I was a lesbian.

But here I am, I love my best friend but we can no longer ignore the (lesbian) elephant in the room. It is not the only reason he and I have drifted apart these past 4+ years, but my experience with it has changed and made it obvious the ways in which I've still be playing along. Maybe this time I've been doing it, working around my unhappiness, not because I'm tired of being yelled at. Still, doing it because I don't want to hurt someone isn't right either.

I have little hope that the people who currently would deny the right to marry to gay and lesbian couples would stretch even further to not judge me and my relationships. A lesbian married to a man in love with a woman. In a relationship with them both. Our middle way, but to the view of most people it was a path far out on the fringes. Regardless of that, I have to judge the way for me.

More people from my sangha finding me on Facebook. I am again reminded that I am not ashamed of my choices nor what I've written about, however, I am aware of the need to approach this with care. I never really entertained the idea that it would just be college friends, current friends (many in San Francisco) who I enjoy keeping up with. I am so glad to have spoken to my teacher some weeks ago now as well as speaking to the head of our community here in Portland. I am considering what steps I should take. Perhaps an email acknowledging that questions may arise and that I welcome them? Perhaps meeting with the Harmony Committee as was suggested by RP, progressing from there.

The biggest change for the house today was Bodhi finding a new home with a friend of AM's, J. This is a big relief and yet sad too. Bodhi was just too big for either AM or I with our physical limitations, he easily knocked AM off his feet several times. Because of it AM has felt himself growing into his depression. To top it off, Bodhi has just been unhappy. He loves us, but he loves being around other dogs more and has seemed to suffer being away from the kennel environment because of it.

J really loves big, playful, boisterous dogs. He stood there playing with a rope with Bodhi for several minutes, both of them looked utterly thrilled. He has a dog about the same size, but about 16 years old. J has apparently been quite at a loss at his dog's aging, no longer being able to play and get around as well. He's wanted to get another dog for some time now. It really seems to be a good fit.

It inevitably leaves me thinking of Juno, my last dog, an Alaskan/Siberian husky mix that was all energy. I have never been able to shake the feeling like I did the wrong thing by her and in the end she disappeared into the night, never to be seen again. I wasn't even there and, during a moment of pre-teen anger, DW once told me it was all my fault since Juno ran away clearly trying to find me. No matter how often I tell myself it wasn't my fault it is hard to really let this go.