Domestic Partnership

Last week, Brandon and I decided to formalize our relationship through domestic partnership. We see this as a long term commitment to one another, and although in the far (far) future marriage may have to happen to keep me in the country, for now this is our preference, and our choice, and we're extremely happy with it.

Brandon and I have talked about marriage, more and more over the last few months, but neither of us is particularly comfortable with various aspects of it - from religious, to financial, to inclusivity and pretty much everything in between. We both feel more than comfortable that we want to make a long term commitment to each other, and the domestic partnership lets us do that, with similar legal rights to those in marriages, and much less of the hassle. The reasons we didn't want to go the marriage route were varied - financially, we're just not in a place to throw the wedding we'd want, and we both have so many other things we want to do right now (house things, travel etc.) that doing that would impinge on; neither of us like the fact that not everyone as in love with each other as we are can get married in this country because of hopefully soon-to-change exclusivity laws; neither of us are even remotely religious - and yet we both want to move on with our lives together as an official couple, right now. Domestic partnership lets us do that. We're not ruling out marriage one day (like I said, legally it'll probably have to happen sometime) but we'd rather wait until we both really want it, and when we're ready to throw the wedding we want, and aren't just doing it as "the thing to do" to be an 'official couple'.

So the paperwork is in, and we exchanged rings with each other last week - on the 4th July, which is now our anniversary. We thought it would be a good day - the celebration of Independence from Britain, and the joining of an American and Brit - all rolled into one.