Same-sex couple looking forward to marriage in northwest Iowa

(Photo by Kris Todd) Saturday will mark Lee and Tony's 15th anniversary. The committed same-sex partners, who have worn matching rings since October 1994, are among the gay and lesbian couples looking forward to marrying in the Hawkeye state. [Click to enlarge] [Order this photo]

Lee and Tony are eager to celebrate their 15th anniversary together.

Ecstatic about an April 3 Iowa Supreme Court ruling unanimously rejecting a state law restricting marriage to a union between a man and woman, the same-sex couple hope to formally mark April 18, 2010, with their wedding.

The Dickinson County couple admit they're still a bit apprehensive, though, on whether they will be allowed to exchange vows then due to current protests and conversations occurring throughout Iowa. If the matter turns into a 2012 constitutional amendment being placed on the ballot, which has been discussed, both report they'll proudly cast their ballots on the issue.

"Right now, though, we're happy about it and we will have a wedding," Lee declared.

The 41-year-old Lee was born in Huntsville, Ark. It wasn't until three years into his Clarksville, Ark. college education that Lee "came out" and dated his first male, who he was introduced to by his friend, Meredith.

"She told the guy that she thought I was gay. But I said I wasn't gay. He looked at me and said, 'He's not gay. But if he decides to come out of the closet, have him come talk to me,'" Lee reflected.

The 34-year-old Tony, who grew up in northwest Iowa, differed from his partner in that he knew his sexual orientation at a young age.

"My interest just wasn't the same as my counterparts. They were more interested in sports and I was interested in band and drama throughout high school. I just wasn't the football-coated jock," Tony recalled.

He publicly announced his same-sex preference in January 1994. Those close to Tony weren't shocked, he recalled. Instead, his declaration seemed to simply confirm their suspicions.

"You either get one of two responses," he said. "You either get, 'You're still our kid and we love you no matter what' or you get the 'Get the hell out' speech. I got the first one. Mom and Dad were always supportive -- and still are."

Lee, on the other hand, who'd already been forced to announce his lifestyle preference, received the second response initially from his mother. His homosexuality was revealed in October 1992 when he asked to borrow a credit card in order to purchase plane tickets to view the NAMES Project AIDS Memorial Quilt on display in Washington D.C. Following a heated exchange in which Lee's mother told him he was not her son anymore and she hated him, she telephoned the next day asking if he wanted to talk.

"We're getting you help," she told him.

To which he replied, "If we need to see a psychiatrist for your health benefit, then I'd be glad to. But understand this: It's not for my benefit; it's for your benefit. Because I have come to terms with who I am."

"No, it's for you -- to help you. It's a disease," Lee's mother responded.

She was then told, "No, Mother, it's not a disease. As of 1973, the psychiatric community finally said homosexuality is not a disease. They will help you, not me, come to an understanding of who I am."

"I am your son and I will always be your son. I understand that you have some issues and you're going to say some very hateful things to me. I have to be above all that. I understand lashing out is your way of letting it all out," he continued. " ... As for your hating me, three days ago you didn't know I was gay and you loved me then. You can't turn love on and off like a light switch."

As their exchange wound down, she started to cry and told Lee that his father wanted him to know that he still loved him. After beginning to feel guilty about the mean things she'd told her son, and Lee's words having had a chance to sink in, she telephoned again to tell him, "You're right. Love is not like a light switch. I still love you."

The two men also drew vastly different experiences from their collegiate days in Fayetteville, Ark. While Lee came to terms with his sexual orientation and who he was as a person, Tony found college a chance to move away and finally be true to who he felt he was inside.

The two, who'd developed mutual acquaintances during the early 1990s, happened to meet one night at the local gay bar. Lee made the first move and asked Tony to dance with him.

The two have been in a committed relationship since shortly after that night.

Lee's mother, who was told by the pair, "With love will come your acceptance" of our relationship, reportedly "came around" over the years.

"She pretty much sees Tony as my spouse and her son-in-law," Lee said. "They started out, more or less, with him being more like a brother or another son to her."

The couple had marked seven years together when they first attempted to find a nondenominational church to join together. They remembered appreciating what they heard in sermons until asking a pastor following his message about the recent passage of a law prohibiting sexual discrimination among city employees based on their sexual orientations and hearing his personaal viewpoint on the matter: "Homosexuality is wrong. I'm against it."

"The messages they gave during the sermons were good up until that particular Sunday. As soon as he basically said that we weren't welcome there, we saw no reason to continue going back," Tony said.

"If you watch almost all religions, they say that homosexuality is wrong and they teach hate. Well, we come to terms with it (by believing) if there is any kind of God, it's about love, not hate. So, we've kind of turned our backs on the Bible per se and spiritually believe in a God," Lee added.

The two men lived together in Arkansas for 8 1/2 years. Part of their decision to move to Kansas City in the summer of 2001 was due to some of their so-called friends alleged attempts to sabotage their relationship.

"Gay people can be mean," Lee said. "If they're not in a relationship, they don't want anybody else to be happy or in a relationship."

Tony noted their move to Kansas City also marked a need for change for them. They not only found more acceptance in the larger city, Lee and Tony encountered a more relaxed and open-minded atmosphere in it in regard to their sexual orientation.

"In the first place, you have the anonymity that a city offers. Secondly, we noticed when we first moved there, you'd see other couples out and about. It wasn't like they wore a big sign around them announcing it," Tony said, "but you could tell. On the other hand, they didn't go to any great lengths to hide it."

While the two were among the hundreds of same-sex couples who planned to participate in a large commitment ceremony following the U.S. Supreme Court's rejection of a Texas gay sex ban in June 2003, Tony suggested they chose not to go through with it at the time because they "didn't want to be turned into a media circus."

Lee and Tony moved again in 2004 to Houston. In search of a larger coastal city, they relocated in the middle of Houston's "gay ghetto," a centralized 8-10 block residential and business area owned and operated primarily by gays and lesbians. While they enjoyed their stay, the two men chose to relocate in northwest Iowa in May 2006 following Enron's massive layoffs and an ensuing sour economy.

"Having grown up here, it's not been much of a culture shock for me. It's small town living. People know who you are," Tony said.

Lee, however, didn't find living or working in northwest Iowa as enjoyable initially. An area factory he was employed by soon became a very uncomfortable place for him to enter each day.

"I had to stay quiet, and I did. It was awful. I hated to go into that place every day. I'd hear their derogatory remarks or jokes and it's not easy being put in that situation," he said.

Throughout their courtship, each has experienced discrimination on the job.

"You just learn to turn around and walk the other way," Tony said.

"But I think our experience has been very fortunate in that respect," he quickly added.

Lee, meanwhile, has found a place to work in which domestic partnerships are recognized, protection is offered against disparaging slurs and insulting actions, and benefits are offered for both he and his partner. While neither openly broadcasts his sexual orientation, area friends and close confidants know.

Having encountered a dozen fellow same-sex couples in the area, 25-30 single gay or lesbian individuals, "a lot of married men who play on the side" and "a lot of closet cases here who are absolutely scared to death" of being identified as gay, Tony and Lee recognize they're not living as guarded as they may have in the past.

And, thanks to this month's landmark decision, their and other same-sex couples pending exchange of wedding vows stand to become a foreseeable reality in the heartland as early as April 24.