Why I’m Marrying Eljay

For 34 years I was alone in the world. I love my family, and I have great friends, but to them, I was always the eccentric brother, or just a little ... different. Then I met my soulmate. With Eljay, I don’t feel eccentric or different. I feel understood; I feel like everything I do and everything I believe is perfectly sane; I feel like a regular guy, like part of the human race, for the first time.

Some people say that your soul is split into two halves when you’re born, a male half and a female half. I don’t know if that’s true, but I do know that for better and worse, Eljay and I share the same inner spirit, the same desires and ambitions, the same view of the world. I’m not sure what is involved with sharing a soul, but if I ever figure it out, I’m pretty sure I’ll find it in Eljay.

I’d like to tell you all how we met. We both attended a writing workshop for a weekend at a big house on the seashore. The instructor, Eljay’s friend Mopsy, introduced us. We wrote our first story together at midnight the next evening. It was the hit of the weekend. You know the old cliché, “We could make beautiful music together”? Well, Eljay can’t sing for beans, and I’m only slightly better. The beautiful music we make together is with words on paper. Writing alone, I’m competent but my readers fall asleep by the fourth page. Writing alone, Eljay can’t be bothered with details like punctuation or grammar or editing. Writing together, we create something that neither of us can do alone. We feel a synergy, like two halves of one soul reuniting.

A lot of you are meeting Eljay for the first time today, so let me tell you what she’s like in less formal circumstances. Eljay is pretty kooky, in a charming way. Her kookiness is unself-conscious — she just is kooky, without thinking about it — which is the source of her charm. She charms everyone she meets and she charmed me.

You can all tell she’s beautiful — one smile from her makes my whole world glow — but you can’t tell by looking how smart she is. Yes, it’s true, I’ve found a woman who can beat me at Scrabble — even when we play by the Gordon Scrabble Rules. And I feel like the luckiest guy in the world that I found a beautiful, intelligent woman who loves me.

If you’re lucky enough to get to know her better, you’ll see the list a mile long of why I fell for her: Because she has this law degree that she keeps on a shelf, once used for Fighting Injustice as a Public Defender. Because she put it aside to be a writer and a good mother. Because no one other than her actually likes Spirulina. Because she can’t go more than a week without sushi. Because she has two whole rooms lined with alphabetically-arranged books and it’s still not enough space to keep them all. Because she has another room full of photo albums, which she somehow keeps organized despite the surrounding disorganization. Because she believes in karma and arranges her life around the number nine. (She knew I was The One when she found out my birthday was July 2. 7/2. It equals Nine.) Because she doesn’t believe in claiming one side of the bed. Because she does believe in changing the world.

Maybe someday we’ll get around to changing the world together, but for now we’re just changing the world for ourselves. We’re building a home together, raising a family together, and creating a life together with a future full of endless possibilities. Yeah, I guess I’m finally “settling down” — as Spike and Coco say “That’s why” we’re settling down together, because we love each other and we love the idea of a home and family together.

I’m not just marrying Eljay today — she’s a “package deal.” I don’t think of Eljay’s package as just her kids — I think of it as her friends, her career, her lifestyle, and everything else in her life. When I was still undecided about marrying her, I thought about whether I wanted to spend the rest of my life hanging around with her friends. The answer was unambiguously Yes. Her lifestyle? Unambiguously Yes. Her kids? Unambiguously Yes. I didn’t stay undecided for too long after realizing that.

I’d like to talk more about her kids. I met Spike when he was 4. At age 5, he declared that I should be his daddy. Today, Spike gets his wish. I met Coco when she was 3. At age 4, she declared that she wanted to marry me. Today Coco gets her wish, too. I’m marrying Coco and Spike as much as I’m marrying Eljay. My commitment to them is the same as to her, in sickness and in health, in good times and bad, for better and worse, forever. I hope I can be as good a daddy as they imagine.

I used to think that children meant the end of freedom. Then one day I came home, feeling tired and worried and miserable, and when Coco saw me she jumped up and screamed “Jesse’s home! Jesse’s home!” Spike climbed up on my shoulders as Coco gave me a big hug, and I forgot why I was tired and worried and miserable. I felt free.

I never thought that I could learn from a four-year-old. But Spike and Coco taught me about unconditional love. They don’t care about what I do, or how I look, or if I’m successful, or about getting them things. All they care about is that I be there with them. If I love them enough for that, they’ll love me unconditionally too.

And ultimately, that’s all Eljay wants too. I promise today to be there forever for Eljay. All I ask in return is that she jump up and scream when I come home.

Why I’m Marrying Jesse

He writes essays with titles like “Why I’m marrying Eljay”and inspires me to. Maybe I was more like my four year old daughter, “La di da, I love you” , whistling away through life, then I would like to believe. Maybe I didn’t think about things as much as I should; I knew I wanted to save the world, but was vague on the specifics. Jesse gave me the specifics, and the power to make my own specifics. We have the same values and goals, even though he is (17 1/2 months) younger- and taller- than I am.

I love him as deeply as I love Spike and Coco. He has the same raw energy, intelligence, humor-I get his jokes, he gets mine, no explanations necessary- as me, with the additional factor of knowing grammar and occasionally being able to fix a computer. Yes, he knows more about politics, and no, I don’t need naps, but we are still the same person, two parts of the same strange shaped spiralina mold, despite coming from different backgrounds and different experiences.

He GETS excited, he GETS mad, he IS happy, he IS a whirlwind, a tornado in a dry town, he makes me feel completely OK and “normal”; a word I have avoided all my life, as have other people when describing me. He understands the unfairness of a class structure in society. He relates all too well to injustice, particularly when someone hangs up on him or doesn’t return a book he loaned them. Like Superman, Underdog, Hunter Thompson, and Thelma and Louise, he supports the notion that Justice Prevail.

He believes in me totally. In what I write, in what I want to do, in what I feel is important. I believe in him and what he wants and needs to do. In l996, summer was approaching, Jesse was leaving us for four months to save a river in Arkansas. I resented the river under my breath, cursing it for taking Jesse away from me and Spike and Coco all summer, when we needed him terribly, terribly! I finally told Jesse my feelings, five days before he was supposed to leave. (As he is never punctual, thirteen days before he actually left.) He sent me an e-mail letter explaining that this was one of the ways he was going to save the world, and specifically why this river, this place, this time, was important, and the economic benefits of it. The Buffalo River was never an issue again. Me and Spike and Coco suddenly became the participants in a Star Trek episode. We had to give up immediate joy and love and unity as well as take the trash out alone, for the greater good of the world at large. Captain Kirk let Edith Keeler, the love of his life, DIE, so mankind, as we knew it would not be altered, so time would progress as destiny ordered. The very least WE could do, was support Jesse in his Arkansas Adventure. I understood why he needed to do this and even though our house was unusually quiet and neat that summer in Cambridge, we were with Jesse on this.

He makes me laugh when times are desperate. The year we first met was a difficult year for both of us, I was going through a divorce, Jesse was lost and disorganized, the only good thing about his year was his KY JELLY phone number. It was a long bleak winter, and one night after a (rare) date without the kids, we discussed our respective plights sitting on the cold cement rocks in Longfellow park outside of Harvard square in Cambridge. ”Sometimes I feel like I should kill my ex-husband and then kill myself”; I told Jesse in a typically melodramatic, but very real, albeit Draconian, moment. “My problems have no easy answer like that Elj”, said Jesse protesting and asserting as usual the fact that his problems were worse than mine. I accepted this proposition briefly, while listening to Jesse discuss how None of his Things were in the same place and furthermore, someone had hung up on him that very day! Then I came to my senses; “Jesse, murder and suicide aren’t exactly simple options”. “Oh ya, I suppose not”, admitted Jesse, with uncharacteristic humility.

I’ve always admired a sense of truth and nobility that is not usually found in 20th century civilization, that usually only exists in the dreams of teenage girls, Civil War novels and corny song lyrics from the seventies. Jesse is the only real person I have met that actually personifies these traits. When I was dealing with a truly evil and malevolent person, who despite being roly poly and having a pleasant exterior, was nefarious and calculating in nature; Jesse risked his life and freedom challenging him to a duel in the traditional manner that one has challenged one to a duel throughout the ages, slamming the mat at their feet and slapping them in the face. The person declined, the town police made fun of Jesse; but he was, and is a hero in my eyes.

My children, Spike and Coco, love him unreservedly and want him around. He comforts them, he teaches them the important things about life, he makes them laugh, he bakes bread(without yeast) with them, gives them double shoulder rides, with spinnies, and builds tree houses with them. He does repetitive songs and games with them and THEY get bored first. He makes their dreams, and mine, possible. When they see that first star at night or when they are throwing that penny into the fountain, they wish that Jesse was part of their family, forever.

Today, he is granting our wishes and we welcome him with joy into our family. I hope, we, like the headlights that shine on the dark highway at night, like the single visible lighthouse on a rocky shore, are constant beacons of hope and happiness to Jesse. I hope, together, we create something that neither of us could do separately, an article, a book, a child, a major, NOT a minor, change in the world to make it a better place for people like us. I hope we can get all of Jesse’s things in one place. Together, we are magical. I love you Jesse Gordon.