New Traditions

So, in continuing with the Freedom to Marry Week, this is day 2 post. Today, according to The Other Mother, we have to post about something old. Pictured left, is an old picture of Leah and I before we got married. If you notice, we are dressed alike, hahahaha. We were in a phase. No, really, we went to Albany Pride and decided to make shirts about the recent announcement of marriages in California. The backs of the shirts say I love Leah or I love Brenda. We ooze cuteness, aaaawwww.

As for old, we did do that tradition for our wedding. My sisters had all been married before me and so they gave me my something old. It was so great. They gave me a hankie from each of my grandmothers. It was so sweet. Leah's Mom gave her a hankie from her grandmother as well.

What I want to talk about in this post is tradition. The old tradition has to go. This is one of the arguments that we hear to not give us marriage. It's tradition, it's always been done this way. Wake up people! Have we learned nothing about it's always been done this way. It's not always the right way. The tradition of slavery, women as property, institutionalization of developmentally disabled and those with psychiatric dianosis'. The list can go on and on. You can find it in everyday life, as well. At work, those co-workers at staff meetings who don't want to try a new idea because the old one still works okay. "We've always done it this way." "Why fix what ain't broke," is their motto. Well, I am here to say it is broke. Just because it works for you, doesn't mean it works for me. We grow as a person, as a nation, when we change for the better. As we evolve, we change. That is the process. That is the way things work. That is the way we grow.

So, I say, let's start new traditions. And someday, when our children say to us, "that's so old, Mom, no one does it that way anymore," I plan to say to them, "you're right, let's change and make some new traditions." Here's to all the new traditions.

For more information on Freedom to Marry Week click the link below: http://www.freedomtomarry.org/get_involved/freedom_to_marry_week_2009bl.php