A Queer Reflection on PNW Wedding Planning

Our two personalized Funko Pops

The Evergreen Echo

How does it feel to find your person?

Wedding planning during Pride month brings forth newfound realizations, opportunities for self-reflection, and chances to make amends with past traumas, which makes June all the more special. 

Back in the day, I didn’t think marriage was in the cards for me. As someone who grew up in the church, I formulated an idea of what marriage is and isn’t, who it was and wasn’t for. Once I came to terms with my sexuality, I learned what marriage could be and would be with me in the picture. It was something I wanted. 

Then, I didn’t think the world would allow me to take part in such a monumental milestone. If I did, it wouldn’t be genuine. Marrying someone when I didn’t fit the role of a stereotypical husband would bring a lot of hardship and stress. Was I to let the dream go? 

I started attending weddings in my adult life. As a guest, I learned I wanted to be married one day. Seeing the love between two people—any two people—inspired me to find my own love story. How would that happen? I began submerging myself into my queerness. 

As the great philosopher and Drag Queen RuPaul has asked, “If you can’t love yourself, how the hell are you going to love someone else?” many times. This question always rings true within the Queer community. We often find ourselves feeling unloved and unlovable; after thinking that way for so long, it is easy to believe it to be fact. It isn’t until we fall in love with ourselves for the first time that we can start to find love outside ourselves. 

There is a deeper level to this question. I think at times, people go into relationships and marriage with the wrong intentions. They hope to feel a sense of placement, involvement, and identity to achieve the title. They marry to find someone to tell them all the good things about themselves in hopes that one day, they start to believe it themselves. It was hard to picture me, of all the people on the planet, as someone’s first choice. 

After weathering my prior relationship trauma, marriage took on a new meaning for me. Witnessing divorce and infidelity, I vowed not to put myself in that position. Jaded, I was cutting myself off from a universal experience. Love doesn’t always have to lead to heartache. Marriage doesn’t always have to end in divorce. Sometimes we tell ourselves these lies to keep us from achieving what it is we ultimately want. Marriage is not about telling someone you love them, but showing them how it’s physically impossible not to love them.  

Planning a wedding is no walk in the park, no picnic, or any other relaxing outside pastime. With so many obstacles to overcome and ducks to put in row after row after row, sometimes it feels like the hassle isn’t worth it. But when I envision the final product and with him by my side, everything we have done together and independently for the wedding makes it worthwhile. 

The planning process allows a couple to incorporate themselves, their characteristics, and interests into their ceremony. When showing family members the venue, they couldn’t help but say how the place just screams ‘us’ due to its elements, aesthetic, and design. They’re excited to see what else we do with the space. Their encouragement gives me the final push to paint this picture into a masterpiece. 

Like us, our Funkos have climbed every summit on their way to The Big Day.

The Evergreen Echo

Choosing to get married here in Seattle was an easy decision. On one hand, doing it back in Texas where we met would make it easy for others. This was something I did in the past—the people-pleaser in me tends to cater to others’ wants and needs. On the other hand, choosing Seattle just made sense for a multitude of reasons that fit our vision. For most of our guests, this will be their first time in the Pacific Northwest. We get to introduce them to the place that we have been falling in love with for the past two years. We got engaged here, built a life here, and are now fortunate to get married here. Many other firsts will soon follow. 

When working on my vows (which you would think would be easy for my poetic self), I felt like a small boat in a vast sea of possibility. Which direction do I take? North: Comedian. East: Storyteller. South: Emotional Wreck. West: Sentimental Man. As long as vows are authentic and genuine, they can be all of the above. 

As someone who uses writing as a fundamental tool to process his own trauma and darkness, writing about love was foreign and unfamiliar to me. My words were clunky and forced. It wasn’t until I immersed myself in love for the first time that my writing began to take on a new form. All I wanted to write about was love. Whether it was the person or the ideal itself, love easily became a part of my habit. 

Coming down to the final stretch and with the last hurtles in sight, the anticipation brings me more joy and excitement than anything else. It is here, I am able to let go of past and present traumas to conjure a brighter future and a mosaic of a marriage. My fiancé is the epitome of the right time, right person. When I think back on everything we’ve gone though, I had no question about whether we would make it. Wedding planning, no matter the stress, has brought me deeper in love with my partner and deeper in love with myself.