A Day for Smiling
On the "Marriage Bureau" page of the Superior Court of [Washington,] DC, there is this note, rendered in red at the top of the page of instructions on how to get a marriage license in DC (thanks Jason):
NOTE: Pursuant to the Religious Freedom and Civil Marriage Equality Amendment Act of 2009, A18-248, effective March 3, 2010, same sex couples may apply for marriage licenses in the District of Columbia.
Isn't that nice! This morning I was seeing photographs here and there of same-sex couples who had just applied for their marriage license (and thus begun their three-day waiting period before they could be married) and, as you might surmise, it was smiles all around. Great big smiles, authentic, unguarded smiles of unalloyed happiness.
NB: actual happiness. Naturally this led me to wonder, ever so briefly, about the emotional response of the foes of equality. How could thwarting the happiness of same-sex couples in getting married possibly make them happy? If it does, should it? Don't we have epithets for people who delight in making other people unhappy? Perhaps, at best, I can imagine they feel some satisfaction for doing a job "well done" for their demanding and tyrannical god, but with gods like that who needs devils?
The weather here could have been better, but somehow it seems a very sunny day despite all the clouds.
p.s. I talked to Isaac as he was driving home from his job in DC; he reported seeing no evidence of civilization as we know it ending.