Alex Chambers:  It was a summer day in 2014 when Nancy and Kim found out they could get married.

Nancy Kalina:  I said, "Do you want to get married?" and she said, "What do you know?" I said, "We can do it. We can get married today if we want to. We can get married in Indiana and that I'd love to," but I said, "But you have a lunch."

Kim Davis:  This was noon. I had a lunch and she had a meeting [LAUGHS].

Nancy Kalina:  I had a meeting for sure.

Kim Davis:  So we said, "Okay, so let's meet back here at three," and...

Nancy Kalina:  And she was late.

Kim Davis:  ...and I was a little late.

Nancy Kalina:  I mean, seriously.

Alex Chambers:  Stories of love and citizenship with the Just Married podcast, today on Inner States, right after this.

Alex Chambers:  This is Inner States from WFIU in Bloomington, Indiana. I'm Alex Chambers. Same sex marriage has been legal now for about seven years. Just over a decade ago, less than half of Americans supported it. 2015 was the year the Supreme Court finally ruled that same sex couples' right to marry was protected by the 14th Amendment. At that point 60% of Americans supported same sex marriage. By 2021, we'd hit 70%, a pretty strong majority. And I think especially for younger people, it's a little hard to remember what an incredible struggle it was to get to that point. So, I wanted to bring in Jennifer Bass to talk about that. Jennifer's been working on a oral history project of same sex marriage and she's produced a podcast called Just Married based on those interviews. I was surprised by how moving they are and uplifting too which I think is something we can all use right now. So before we listen to the stories, Jennifer, I wanted to know what got you into the project.

Jennifer Bass:  Okay, well, can I just step back and say something about what you just said about how now today, of course there's opposition to same sex marriage, we know that, but, relatively most people support it and I think eventually it's just going to be marriage and for a lot of people it's just marriage like everything else and it will probably be more just marriage [LAUGHS]. Not just married but just marriage. So, Stephanie Sanders actually is the genius behind this project and she is the chair of the department of gender studies at Indiana University and she and I worked together at the Kinsey Institute for many years and Steph got married to her long term partner, same sex partner, and she was really struck by what an experience it was for her. Being a part of the Kinsey Institute for so long, both of us really appreciate the value of historical archives and people's day to day lives and their stories and how important it is for historians to have that information.

Jennifer Bass:  So, the project started as a research project with the idea of how has same sex marriage equality affected people who have gotten married in the last decade and also just creating this archive so that you can really understand that it was a phenomenon. It wasn't taken for granted in those days, so that's how the project got started.

Alex Chambers:  There's more to be said about the bigger picture, how the interviews affected Jennifer, what surprised her, and what this project might offer in our current political moment. But before we get to that, let's get into some of those stories. The first episode is called Two Days In June. What was significant about those two days?

Jennifer Bass:  In January of 2014, Indiana, for a brief moment, allowed people to get married who were of the same sex and that was because a federal judge had allowed that to happen but it was immediately stopped by then Governor Mike Pence. So it was a phenomenal moment and we just thought it would be great to capture the memories of people who had participated in that. So, we have a few couples who are part of that, telling their stories.

Jennifer Bass:  Marriage equality arrived in Indiana on a summer day in 2014. A federal judge ruled on June 25th that the state ban on gay marriage was unconstitutional. Couples who had been denied the right to marry for their whole lives rushed to County Courthouses to make it legal. Two days later, to no one's surprise, Governor Mike Pence appealed the decision, sending it back to the courts and halting new marriages. This is the story of those two days in Indiana when gay and lesbian couples could marry for the first time.

Jennifer Bass:  Nancy Kalina and Kim Davis were among the many same sex couples waiting to see what the courts would do.

Nancy Kalina:  I think we told people that we were waiting to do it and in the end people laughed at us.

Kim Davis:  They were like, "Oh, yeah, right, like that's gonna happen."

Nancy Kalina:  "That's not gonna happen."

Kim Davis:  We're like, "It will. [LAUGHS]. It will."

Jennifer Bass:  Kim was leaving her class at the Y when she heard that the ban had been lifted.

Kim Davis:  So I came home and she said, "What do you know?" I said, "Do you want to get married?" And she said, "What do you know?" I said, "We can do it. We can get married today if we want to. We can get married in Indiana."

Nancy Kalina:  And I'd love to but I said, "But you have a lunch."

Kim Davis:  This was noon. I had a lunch and she had a meeting [LAUGHS].

Nancy Kalina:  I had a meeting, for sure.

Kim Davis:  So, we said, "Okay, so let's meet back here at three."

Nancy Kalina:  And she was late.

Kim Davis:  And I was a little late.

Nancy Kalina:  I mean, seriously.

Jennifer Bass:  Kim and Nancy weren't really sure how to get married but they took off for the courthouse. As they rounded the corner of the County building, they saw their minister out on the steps.

Mary Ann Macklin:  I am Mary Ann Macklin and I'm the senior minister here at the Unitarian Universalist Church. The couple came around the corner in the car and were hanging out the window, yelling at me, "We're coming."

Jennifer Bass:  This was not a typical day at the Justice building. The guard at the metal detector warmly welcomed the couples, judges were coming out of their chambers offering to officiate. It was getting pretty close to closing time. The steps were filled with people who were getting married, serving as witnesses, playing music, giving out flowers. Kim and Nancy thought they'd just get a license and maybe do the marriage later.

Kim Davis:  So we're running to get in there.

Nancy Kalina:  And then we're telling Mary Ann we're just getting the license and she said, "No, no, no, no."

Kim Davis:  "Just do it," she says, "Just do it."

Nancy Kalina:  She says, "You don't know how long this is going to last."

Kim Davis:  So we filled out the forms.

Nancy Kalina:  We had to decide who was going to be Mister and who was gonna be Mrs [LAUGHS].

Kim Davis:  Yes, because the form said bride and groom. They didn't say person and person or whatever.

Nancy Kalina:  Yes, what do you want to be [LAUGHS]?

Kim Davis:  You were the groom, I think.

Jennifer Bass:  Jean Capler was deeply involved with the marriage equality fight in Indiana. She and her partner, Jenny Austin, got together about 20 years ago. They were actually in the process of planning a wedding in Illinois when the news hit that couples could marry in Indiana.

Jean Capler:  I had just finished up with clients that day, I was at Bloomingfoods and Kathleen's husband John texted me about the decision. So I'm standing in the middle of Bloomingfoods crying, texting Jenny, saying we can get married.

Jennifer Bass:  Like Kim and Nancy, they also had a busy day and decided to wait till the next morning. Jenny tells the story.

Jenny Austin:  So we got up early because we wanted to be sure that we got there as soon as they opened because I get kind of anxious in crowds. It was kind of like, boy, there's a lot of people here [LAUGHS]. There's a lot of people here. Let's get it done.

Jean Capler:  Yes.

Jennifer Bass:  Just walking through the courthouse door had an effect on Jean.

Jean Capler:  I remember walking through that door and what it felt like because we could have walked through it before but we couldn't have done this.

Jennifer Bass:  Under all the excitement was the possibility that the court would issue a stay and halt the marriages until the case could be decided at the next level. In this case, the Supreme Court. Clerk Nicole Browne at the Monroe County Clerk's Office knew this was likely.

Nicole Browne:  We did not leave that day until any couple who was standing in line was married because, again, we knew there was this day coming, we didn't know how long that would last. We had ministers who came out and stood on the front steps of the Justice building. They married people.

Jennifer Bass:  As for that minister, Reverend Mary Ann Macklin, her day also started out like any other and her phone lit up with texts that the ban had been lifted. She grabbed her stole and rushed off to the courthouse.

Mary Ann Macklin:  I walked in, I went back to where everybody was waiting at the clerk's office and I walked in, I said, "Hey, anybody need a minister?" and everybody started laughing and then they all went, yes. It was such a joyful day. Just incredible.

Jennifer Bass:  Reverend Macklin herself was not able to marry in her home state. She and her partner held a commitment ceremony in 1992. They married in Vermont in 2010 when it became one of the first states to legalize gay marriage.

Mary Ann Macklin:  I've done over 500 weddings and I've also been doing commitment ceremonies for people who cannot legally marry and at that point I was saying, "And by the power vested in me, according to the laws of the state of Indiana." Every time I said that, it was just wow. We never thought we would hear this, be this, experience this in our lifetime.

Jennifer Bass:  And indeed, the court ordered the stay and the door slammed shut.

Kim Davis:  So are we or aren't we?

Nancy Kalina:  Are we or aren't we? Because no one could answer that.

Jennifer Bass:  In October the court lifted the stay and gay marriage effectively became just marriage in Indiana.

Unknown female speaker:  I felt like I could exhale. Those years of wanting to be married but not being able to was kind of like holding my breath and to just, "Ha, I'm married to the woman that I love, that I want to be married to."

Jennifer Bass:  In Bloomington, Indiana, over 70 same sex couples share the same wedding anniversary.

Jennifer Bass:  The next summer, the Supreme Court decided that marriage was a right for all Americans. Case closed across the country. Let the wedding bells ring.

Alex Chambers:  That was Just Married: Two Days In June, produced by my guest, Jennifer Bass. Aside from that first episode, Just Married focuses on the stories of individual couples. Most of the couples Jennifer interviewed had been together for a long time, like decades.

Jennifer Bass:  And you think about how you have to be so intentional to continue your relationship without some of those legal trappings that many of us have taken for granted in our lives and why would you choose to get married after all those years anyhow? But it was really intense and really amazing and almost everyone, when I would ask the question, "Did you feel any differently after you got married?" I mean, these are people that have been together 30 years. And I rarely had a no. It was the same. It was almost always, "It really struck me," and, "I felt like I belonged," and different things like that, like I was part of this world. I was part of this society like I hadn't been before. Maybe they hadn't even realized that they felt different. But it was very moving in that way.

Alex Chambers:  And it wasn't just about long term couples who were finally tying the knot. Jennifer also felt like she'd already heard about same sex couples on the coasts and in big cities. She hadn't heard as much about same sex marriage in the heartland.

Jennifer Bass:  Some of the experiences of people right here in Indiana and southern Indiana especially had not been told and we could talk about Judi and Lucy for instance. Judi is in Spencer, Indiana. She was in Indianapolis and really did not have much of a community and was not out, because if she'd been out, she and Beverly could have lost Beverly's child in that experience. I mean, you just cannot believe what the laws were in those days. So, they were very much closeted. But to here her story of their love and their relationship and getting to the point where they could actually get married is pretty amazing. And then Beverly died. I actually had not met Beverly and so Judi's interview starts off with just Judi and then there's a little change in there, so keep listening.

Alex Chambers:  Yes, keep listening. Especially since we're gonna take a short break before we hear about Judi in Spencer, Indiana. This is Inner States. We'll be right back.

Alex Chambers:  Welcome back to Inner States. I'm Alex Chambers. This week, we're talking with Jennifer Bass about a podcast she produced. It's called Just Married, a podcast about love and citizenship in the decade of marriage equality. We're about to hear the story of Judi in Spencer, Indiana.

Jennifer Bass:  Judi Epp was just out of high school when she settled down with her first girlfriend, Phyllis. It was the late 1960s in Indianapolis in Indiana. Phyllis was ten years older than Judy and had two children. They led a secret life, even secret from the children they were raising.

Judi Epp:  We were so fearful that if we talked openly to them and they talked to somebody else, and then here comes somebody to snatch the children away, it was a very, very real fear at the time and we all could have lost our jobs.

Jennifer Bass:  Phyllis died when Judi was just 26. The children were 18 and the family dissolved. In steps Beverly.

Judi Epp:  And Beverly and I had already known each other. In fact, we had run in the same circles, the four of us, she and her girlfriend and me and my partner, wife at the time, ran around together. Beverly and her girlfriend broke up and so it was just kind of a natural progression we got together.

Jennifer Bass:  Judi and Bev made a life for themselves eventually retiring and moving to their late cottage in Spencer, Indiana. They traveled, raised a handful of dogs and kept a low profile in their small town community. But then everything changed, at least for Judi.

Judi Epp:  We were in the living room watching TV and there was a report about Hawaii and the organization or the people or whoever had asked to get married and they were denied. I remember distinctly looking at Beverly and saying, "You know, I never thought we would get married, I never would have been the one to ask could we get married, but now that somebody asked and they were denied, it's really pissing me off. We're gonna have to get married, and I'm gonna have to work to make this a reality." And so she's like, "Okay, fine." I chose Canada because at the time there were a few states where you could get married but not many and some of them had restrictions, like you get your license one day and you wait two days and you get married, and so on. And I had a theory, a feeling, which didn't turn out to be the case but I thought maybe if we get married in another country, we would be accepted quicker than if we got married in one state. Canada, interestingly enough, we went to Niagara Falls and you can get married the same day you get your license, but if you want to get divorced you have to live there for a year.

Judi Epp:  So, okay this is good [LAUGHS]. We're good with this because we got married to celebrate our 30 year anniversary so, yes, we don't have to live in Canada.

Jennifer Bass:  In January they celebrated their wedding at the Unitarian Church surrounded by their kin and their chosen Spencer Pride family. Judi wore a red strapless dress, Bev wore black jeans, a black wool jacket, a white shirt, red vest and black cowboy boots. They vowed to love and care for each other, as they had for 30 years, till death do us part.

Judi Epp:  At the time of the ceremony when you're pronounced legal, there's just something about that and it's really hard to describe but you can be anywhere in the world and tell people you're married and everybody knows what that means. You're married, you're married, everywhere, all over the world. I remember when years ago, digressing a little bit, I started with a new nail technician and we were having a conversation and I said something about my partner, this was before we were married of course, and she asked me what business we were in. So therein lies the problem [LAUGHS]. Well, the business of love, actually, but she was a little embarrassed 'cause that is what I said. But I didn't have to say that after we got married.

Jennifer Bass:  After the wedding, Judi dove into political work around marriage equality and helping to develop the Spencer Pride organization. Beverly stayed out of the fray.

Judi Epp:  She was not a joiner. She was not an activist, she was a stay at home with the animals.

Jennifer Bass:  Ten years after she and Judi were married, Beverly died in their home in Spencer. Judi was heartbroken. As she said, "No-one will ever love me like that again."

Jennifer Bass:  But wait. That's not the end of the story.

Judi Epp:  Life deals you things and you have to make do with what happens and go forward.

Jennifer Bass:  Enter Lucy, a wave of fresh northern wind blowing down through Canada. Her partner Susan died just three months after Beverly, and she, like Judi, sought comfort and support through a gay widows website. They were part of an online community helping each other deal with grief and loss, like only those who are going through it can do.

Judi Epp:  She had posted something on the list, the widowers list and I thought, "Oh, she's really hurting." It came through and I hit the thing to call her and she answered, and I said, "How are you doing? I read the post, are you doing all right?" And she said, "I don't know." I said, "We're going to talk about it." She's not really wanting to. "I don't feel like really talking." And she talked for two hours.

Lucy:  We did wind up talking, talking, talking.

Judi Epp:  I let her unload. So we talked off and on.

Lucy:  And I was on the road, the [UNSURE OF NAME] was sold, went on the road into the states. My journey, my own trail of tears.

Judi Epp:  So Lucy was going back to Canada.

Lucy:  Yes.

Judi Epp:  On her way she said, "I'd like to come through Indiana and have dinner and meet in person," and I said, "Okay, that's fine." So she came through Indiana. We met up at a truck stop in Indy and then went to a restaurant and had dinner and it was just a friendly meeting and that was in May.

Lucy:  23rd.

Judi Epp:  The memory is incredible. So, then in October, Spencer Pride went to a conference in Saskatoon, Saskatchewan, and my geography skills are nil and so I knew Lucy was in Canada somewhere.

Lucy:  And she said, "I'm gonna be in your neck of the woods," and I said, "You're gonna be in New Brunswick?" She said, "No, but it's Saskatchewan." I said, "That's 1,800 miles from here." So, by the time she came there, we kinda knew something was gonna happen.

Judi Epp:  Yes.

Lucy:  I'm a goner. If this goes good, I am so gone. Oh, my God [LAUGHS].

Judi Epp:  I was thinking no such thing. Keep over there. I said repeatedly after Beverly died, I couldn't imagine being with anybody else, 40 years. So this just kind of happened which is the best way anyway.

Lucy:  And I wasn't looking either.

Jennifer Bass:  Lucy was a goner and Judi was open to letting her into her life.

Judi Epp:  When we first started moving from friends to this might be turning into something, she said, "You know, if this is gonna work, we have to talk about everything."

Lucy:  Yes.

Judi Epp:  Crap. [LAUGHS] So we proceeded to talk about everything, so I heard all these stories of her young life.

Lucy:  Which I asked if it was all right, or if it bothered her. She said, "Oh, no, go ahead."

Judi Epp:  I loved hearing the stories about her childhood and her young adulthood, for one thing because it was so joyful. She had such a good childhood and a happy family and such a good time as a young lesbian and so I was almost kind of vicariously reliving my childhood through her.

Jennifer Bass:  Her first visit to Spencer meant the inquisition, a test of Lucy's intentions and worthiness among Judi's chosen family in Spencer. She sailed through it. On Christmas Day they announced their engagement from a condo in Key West, the wedding's in March in Spencer.

Judi Epp:  So Lucy will wear a button with Beverly's picture on it and I'll wear a button with Susan's picture on it, which was her [UNSURE OF WORD]. So when I'm looking at Lucy, I'll be looking at Beverly, and she'll be looking at Susan when she's looking at me because to us they are part of this relationship. I had 40 years with Beverly, she had 17 with Susan. There's not much we can talk about in our past that doesn't include them. So they're part of our relationship and actually we met on a widows Facebook page, a gay widows Facebook page, so we wouldn't even know each other if it hadn't been for them.

Lucy:  Judi just is actually my twin flame. Susan was my life soul-mate, but Judi is my twin flame and there's a difference.

Judi Epp:  I'm sure I remember telling you and seeing it, nobody will ever love me like that again and that's not true because Lucy does love me like that.

Alex Chambers:  That was Judi and Lucy on the Just Married podcast, produced by Jennifer Bass. For people like Judi and Lucy who spent decades with their partners before they could get married or even just be out, marriage equality must have felt like a long time coming. But as they said at the beginning, public opinion changed pretty fast. As Jennifer says, there was a tipping point.

Jennifer Bass:  And I can't tell you what that tipping point was, but state by state, it was happening and then there was a tsunami, it just, kaboom! And actually the head of Freedom To Marry, Evan Wolfson, was here in Bloomington, I think, maybe in 2013, and I remember his comment to the question, "Do you think it will ever happen in the Supreme Court?" And he said, "We just need five. We just need five." Meaning five of the justices. But I don't think anyone expected it to happen that fast. But what's interesting was the Supreme Court decision was decided on the basis of four plaintiffs, four cases, and they were all from the Midwest, so it was Ohio, Kentucky, Tennessee and Michigan. So isn't that interesting? [LAUGHS].

Alex Chambers:  It is interesting. I didn't realize that.

Jennifer Bass:  Yes, so the early adopters were, like you said, Massachusetts and Vermont, New York and Hawaii and even Iowa was an early adopter. But then it just kind of went full steam ahead and yes, even Indiana wasn't the last one.

Alex Chambers:  [LAUGHS] Good for us. I mean, it's interesting to think of the Midwest being part of that tipping point, being the center of the country both geographically and maybe politically. But when we think about the Midwest, I think it's important to remember that we're not just isolated between the coasts. There are all kinds of communities here that are connected to every part of the globe. Which brings us to Yousuf and Salil.

Jennifer Bass:  So I wanted to record Yousuf and Salil because we're talking about the Midwest and we're talking about same sex marriage in America and in the Midwest, but the Midwest is not just one kind of person who grew up in rural America. The Midwest, and especially when you're in a college town, are all kinds of people from all over the world. So here we had a couple, one from India and one from Bangladesh, and they met in this country and, wow, what a great thing. So, their story is just a different view of a newer relationship. They're a little bit younger but suddenly they had this opportunity as well and what that meant for them and their family is I think pretty wonderful.

Jennifer Bass:  Salil and Yousuf met on the first day of orientation at Miami University. They were both starting a graduate program in neuroscience, two of five graduate students and both Indian. You would think it would be instant friendship.

Yousuf:  We met on a day of orientation and he thought I was the most arrogant person in the world.

Salil:  He was. Everyone said hello and he wouldn't say hello and I was like, wow, why would you do that? And then I called my mom, it was like, there's this guy from Bangladesh and he wouldn't say hello, and it's funny, my mom said, "But Bangladesh is so poor. Why would he not say hello to a fellow Indian?" [LAUGHS] I don't think that makes sense but he should have said hello.

Jennifer Bass:  Salil is close to his mom. He calls her regularly. She couldn't understand why someone from a poorer country than India would be snobby about meeting another Indian but she didn't quite have the whole picture. Yousuf would be the first to admit that he was raised with an eye to social status. Why would he, an outgoing, fun-loving brilliant scientist, travel across continents and countries to befriend another Indian? That was August. By November they'd become friends and then the weather had its way as it does in romantic stories everywhere.

Yousuf:  It happened, I think, during a tropical storm and he could not go home.

Salil:  So I stayed back.

Yousuf:  And the rest was history [LAUGHS].

Salil:  Things happened. Nobody knew about us. I mean, people would have their speculations but we were not out, we were not out openly. Maybe it wasn't his first relationship but he was my first relationship. So we graduated and he moved to UPenn and I moved to UCL and we were committed to each other but I told Yousuf, "I don't know how this is going to happen because whenever I go back, my parents were always saying, time to get married and time to get settled." I told Yousuf, "Yousuf, I don't know how I'm gonna come out to my parents, but one thing is very sure, I'm not going to get married even if I have to stay single." Marriage in the sense married to a girl. Because I'm never going to ruin someone's life. But then one day he called me and he was crying. I said, "What happened?" And he said, "l got cancer and I'm going to die so you should move out, get a better life for yourself." And I said, "Calm down, calm down, what happened? Tell me in detail."

Yousuf:  So I was stubborn. I didn't want to become down. I didn't want anyone to come down. I didn't tell my parents because I was really angry with life in general. So I went for four rounds of chemo. Everything was treated so it changed my perspective in life.

Jennifer Bass:  It changed Salil too. He really wanted to talk to family. He called his mom but she was with friends and couldn't talk.

Salil:  I don't know what happened. I was thinking that I had to talk to someone. So I called my dad. I was sobbing and he was saying, "What happened?" I said, "You know about Yousuf." They knew about him, they knew him because he was his son's best friend. I said, "Yousuf got cancer and this and that," and he said, "Lo, everything is going to be okay." And then I said, "Papa, I'm gay." And he said [LAUGHS], "That's okay," and I was like, "Wow. We never talked about this." And my dad, he said, "Oh, it's your choice but don't tell anyone because we still have to live in this society."

Salil:  You have to live in that society. I have to live in the society, it's not like America is the best place for gay people or everything is rosy here. Then my mom called me that night and she said, "What's going on?" And she was angry too. I told her clearly, "I'm gay and I'm not ashamed of it. I just let you know I had a moment because Yousuf got cancer and I love him, but if you think that there's anything wrong with it, then it's your problem. I mean, you can go ahead with your life and I can go ahead with my life. I know who I am, I'm dealing with it. If you can support me, great. But if not, then let's just move on."

Jennifer Bass:  As their commitment to each other grew stronger, Yousuf also thought it might be time to come out to his family.

Yousuf:  I decided to tell me brother first because he is very close to me and I called him and I didn't realize that it would be that emotional, but it was and I could not stop crying. He was fine when we were talking but he said, "Okay, I'll talk to you tomorrow," and the next time when he called me, he had a lot of questions and then all of a sudden he stopped calling. So he told my parents that I'm a changed person and so he doesn't feel comfortable talking to me. So I went back three times to tell my parents but I was stopped by my brother or someone.

Jennifer Bass:  After a few years apart, the couple moved to Indiana where they both had work at Indiana University. Mike Pence was the Governor and the Religious Freedom Restoration Act was in full swing.

Salil:  The first thing when we moved here was they were having a protest right outside the courthouse here in Bloomington.

Yousuf:  Yes.

Salil:  For the Religious Freedom Act.

Yousuf:  Religious Freedom Act, yes.

Salil:  I saw this huge line of people and I'm like, "Oh, my god, this is so early in the morning and people are standing outside Kilroy's," Kilroy's is a bar. I was like, "My god, this is really a college town, students get drunk so early in the morning." And then we found out [LAUGHS], this was a protest against the Religious Freedom Act and I was like, wow.

Yousuf:  And when gay marriage was legalized, he really wanted to get married. I didn't want to get married but I wanted to be engaged. I wanted a nice ring.

Salil:  [LAUGHS] That defines the relationship.

Salil:  So, the year before, I'd gone to India and my mom was just arranging her cousin and she sees her wedding outfit, so it's a sari, it's a beautiful sari in gold and I don't know, her eyes kind of welled up and I'm like, "What's wrong?" And she said, "Why don't you take this with you?" I was like, "Oh, my god, Mom, this is so heavy, it's easily a few kilos and I can only take so much luggage." And I don't know why she wanted to give that to me. I said, "Fine, I'll take it." I don't know what to do with it, maybe I can make a nice tablecloth [LAUGHS] or curtains or little dresses for my dog. It was sitting in my suitcase and then when we were getting married, we used that sari and we hung it there. It was just there but it was so beautiful. It's like, wow, maybe this is her presence in my wedding.

Yousuf:  I never thought it would be a reality.

Salil:  Yes. Me neither. When I was dating him, everything was okay, but I never thought I would get married.

Jennifer Bass:  Salil and Yousuf moved to Chicago a few years ago and I called recently for an update. I was surprised to hear that they had a visitor.

Jennifer Bass:  What happened with Salil's mom? Did she ever come to visit?

Yousuf:  No, she's here.

Salil:  She's here right now [LAUGHS].

Jennifer Bass:  Oh, my gosh.

Salil:  Yes, the second visit.

Yousuf:  What I love about her is she's just such a warm, nice person. It's not even about accepting me, or us, but she just made it feel so normal, treating me like her other son.

Yousuf:  I came out after we got married and they were completely shattered and sent me a long email saying that I was wrong and this is the wrong life. How society reacts and what does society feel, what her friends would feel is more important. We both feel so blessed to have careers that we love and friends who are so supportive. This sense of belonging finally is settling in.

Salil:  I just hope Yousuf's immediate family becomes more receptive and then life would be ideal. Perfect.

Yousuf:  I have very little bit of hope that maybe, when you go through things in life, you evolve, so that little bit of hope, it's still there that she would be accepting one day.

Alex Chambers:  That was Salil and Yousuf on the Just Married podcast, here on Inner States from WFIU. When we come back, we'll hear from Jamie and Donna. Their story involves a mobility scooter, a high speed car chase and planning a wedding in 36 hours, not in that order. We'll be right back.

Alex Chambers:  This is Inner States. I'm Alex Chambers. We're listening to stories of love and citizenship in the heartland on the Just Married podcast. Jennifer Bass produced it and she's going to introduce our final story.

Jennifer Bass:  I met Jamie and Donna at the Spencer Pride festival. They were at a booth for the church that they belong to and it's a very inclusive community in Bloomington actually. They live in Bedford but they come up to Bloomington to go to this church and I met Jamie and we started talking and they agreed to be interviewed. She and Donna were working at this event with their son and I was just impressed that here was this couple from Bedford, which is a small town in rural Indiana and not known for being the most progressive place in the country, but, like everywhere, there are wonderful stories to be told.

Alex Chambers:  Here's the story of Jamie and Donna, narrated by Jonah Chester.

Jonah Chester:  In 2014, several legal cases and a series of overturned and then reinstated rulings opened up a brief window of a few days in June when same sex couples could legally marry in the state of Indiana. This was nearly a year before the Supreme Court legalized gay marriage nationwide. During this window, couples across the state rush to tie the knot. Few of them had to do so while riding around on a mobility scooter however.

Jamie:  So I was on what they call a knee walker. It's like a giant scooter for adults.

Jonah Chester:  In the spring of 2014, a few months before the initial ruling that allowed gay marriage in the state, Jamie had shattered her ankle and wound up partially immobilized. That did not stop her from getting married to her long time partner, Donna. Love finds a way even when your short one usable leg.

Jamie:  We did all this scurrying around trying to find something to get married in and get wedding rings and get a little bit of something for a reception and get everything hammered out and here I am on my knee walker rolling all over southern Indiana trying to figure out how I'm going to get married.

Jonah Chester:  Donna and Jamie were one of only a few dozen same sex couples who married in Lawrence County during the initial two day window. The couple still lives in Bedford with their son Jack.

Donna:  The second we found out we could, in Bedford-- What was that? That whole week, when it first became legal in Indiana.

Jamie:  Yes.

Donna:  The people in Bedford were like, "Well, we don't know how to fill out the marriage license." We lived in Bedford so we needed to get our license in Bedford. But when we heard that they figured out how to fill out the marriage license, we were like, "Okay, let's go [LAUGHS]. " So we planned it.

Jamie:  In 36 hours.

Donna:  In 36 hours [LAUGHS]. Well, I actually did propose. I didn't think she was going to get off her knee walker and go to the courthouse with me.

Jamie:  I knew it was coming and everything. It was kind of a bad pun but I guess I was being a foot dragger.

Donna:  But when she said something about that they said that they figured out how to fill out the marriage license, she was sitting in her chair in the living room, so I just got down on my knee and grabbed her hand and said, "Well, do you want to get married?" [LAUGHS].

Jamie:  I'm delirious.

Donna:  Yes, [LAUGHS] that's what she said.

Jonah Chester:  After the heartwarming and romantic proposal and the hectic dash to the county courthouse for a marriage license, the couple now had to plan the actual wedding. It was modest and they opted for a small chapel instead of a larger church. There were a couple of issues on the day of the wedding however. I'll let Jamie explain.

Jamie:  So, my dad was the last person to get here so once Dad got here, I got him in the chapel, then we came in and went down the aisle and I'm on my granny walker and it took so [LAUGHS] long, so somebody starts singing, "We're going to the chapel and we're gonna get married," [LAUGHS] and I'm going clunk, clunk, clunk, clunk, down the aisle.

Donna:  Can you sing a little bit?

Jamie:  No, I can't. I can't carry a tune in a bucket. No-one's singing for you. So, the longer I stood up there, the more the sweat was just rolling off of me. I was drenched. And after a while, my leg started shaking because I was just in excruciating pain and I'm like, "Wrap it up, wrap it up," and then everybody's dabbing their eyes and everything, and Jack, our son Jack, notices that people are crying and he starts to get emotional, so then the ceremony's largely over and he just comes running up to us and just hugs us and hugs and just sobs. He just cries his eyes out and everybody's thinking, "Well, there's something wrong," and I'm like, "No, he's fine. He's just feeling the moment." And he was. He was just fine.

Donna:  And he was probably tired from being at Boy Scout camp all week [LAUGHS].

Jamie:  I kept telling Jack, I said, "Jack, the only thing that's different now is it's going to take an attorney to get rid of her [LAUGHS]. " And our friend Ellen overheard me say that and she goes, "Oh, so romantic. You said it's gonna take an eternity to get rid of her." Okay.

Donna:  And I corrected her. I went, "No, that's not what she said [LAUGHS]. "

Jonah Chester:  Jamie and Donna acknowledge the stereotypes about southern Indiana, but in spite of those stereotypes, the couple was greeted with nothing but warm and loving support the day they went to get their marriage license.

Jamie:  So, when we went to the courthouse to get our marriage license, all my experience at the time is male, in the newspaper in Bedford, they're all like, "Jamie, we wondered if you were coming in." See, I know a lot of gay people in this area think that Lawrence Countians are a bunch of knuckle-dragging mouth breathers but those girls in there could not have been sweeter to us and they were genuinely pleased that I had managed to make it in there and so that was really nice that they were so happy to see us.

Jonah Chester:  Jamie and Donna have never been shy about their relationship. They never describe each other as friends to avoid criticisms or bigotry from others. As Jamie puts it.

Jamie:  I don't do things like that with my friends.

Jonah Chester:  By being open and honest about their relationship Jamie and Donna began to attract and meet other LGBTQ couples in the area. Now the couple is part of a growing community in Lawrence County.

Jamie:  Yes, like I said, I was 23 years old before I even knew another gay person. As far as growing up in the gay community, no, there were nothing like that. When we moved back to Bedford, it was so funny. Bedford is a pretty small place and we were at the store and I saw one of my high school classmates at the store and she was with this other woman and they kept giving us the side eye. I'm like, "What is all that about?" So we get home and then everybody still had landlines and our phone's ringing and they're like, "Hey, this is Janet and Chris. We were wondering would you guys like to come over and play euchre one night?" And I'm like, "Ching! [LAUGHS]. I think we would."

Jonah Chester:  Sometimes however finding members of the LGBTQ community in a rural area is not as easy and straightforward as bumping into them in the grocery store. Sometimes it involves high speed car chases.

Jamie:  We're old [LAUGHS]. I see these young girls here. We're old. We didn't have Facebook and cellphones and stuff. When I was at the Times-Mail, I had got in the habit of parking on a certain place and everyday I would see this girl drive by in her car with her rainbow vanity plate and she did smile and wave at me and I'd smile and wave and go into work and be like, "Hm." And then I noticed that I didn't see my friend in the car anymore. And then I saw a new girl in a little mint colored Suzuki Sidekick and she'd just smile and wave at me and I never made the connection because I'm a dunderhead, but it was the same girl. So, one day I was driving along on 16th Street and I didn't have anywhere to go and I didn't have anywhere to be and there's a mint colored Suzuki Sidekick pulls up alongside me. I'm like, "That's it, it's old Donkey Kong." So I've gone down 16th Street after this woman [LAUGHS], I'm like, brr. So finally she pulls into the old Stone City Mall parking lot and I throw it in park and I jump out of my car and I'm like, "Hey" I want to talk to you." And she's like, "Hey, I want to talk to you." [LAUGHS] I'm like, "Where you headed?"

Jamie:  She's like, "I'm gonna go get my nailed did," and I'm like, "Okay, I'm not gonna go get my nails did but give me your phone number and we'll hook up later on." She's like, "Okay." So, we've been friends ever since then, through ups and downs. She and her partner have split and they're with new partners now and everything. So, if you don't have a community, you need to form a community, whether it's skulking thorough the grocery store or chasing somebody down 16th Street, community is where you find it.

Alex Chambers:  That was Jamie and Donna on the Just Married podcast. Their story, really all these stories, but Jamie and Donna's story in particular, really shows the importance of community and personal connection, especially in rural Indiana before that landmark ruling in 2014.

Jennifer Bass:  Right. Well, a few years before that happened, there were bills in the state house to have an amendment against gay marriage. It was unreal. I think one of the big tipping points, I hate to say it, well, it wasn't just businesses, okay, because business had a lot to do with it, because the big corporations found that they weren't able to get people to come and work for them who felt like they were being excluded. So that was one thing. But I think really it's a person to person thing, when your child or your niece or nephew or your neighbor identifies themselves to you and invites you to their wedding and you've never really been behind this idea that there should be anything other than opposite sex people getting married and you see what a great couple these people are, and why shouldn't they have the same right that we have, I think it was really that kind of personal experience that changed people's hearts and minds and thank god for that.

Alex Chambers:  Are there any lessons that we can glean from that process for what we are experiencing now in other realms of our political situation?

Jennifer Bass:  There was a lot of discussion, there was a lot of talking to people who didn't agree with you. There was a lot of storytelling and I think, like I said, I feel it very strongly that making those emotional connections and personal connections is what changes things for people and that's what we have to do in our life today, is find ways to find little issues, little places where we can connect with people who we may not agree with but who basically agree on the basic right to health and happiness, no matter who you are, so I think we can learn from that.

Alex Chambers:  Yes, nicely put. The Just Married Podcast was produced by Jennifer Bass with recordings from Allison Quantz's radio innovations class at Indiana University and Betsy Jose. Their music is from Grey Larson, Malcolm Dalglish and Blue Dot sessions. The theme song is by Carrie Newcomer. Support for Just Married comes from Indiana University's Department of Gender Studies, the Office for the Vice President for Research New Frontiers Program and the IU Bloomington Arts and Humanities Council. You can listen to more episodes at soundcloud.com/marriageequalityheartland. That's it for today's episode. You've been listening to Inner States. If you have a story for us, or if you've got some sound we should hear, let us know at WFIU.Org/innerstates. Speaking of found sound, we've got your quick moment of slow radio coming up but first, the credits.

Alex Chambers:  Inner States is produced and edited by me, Alex Chambers, with support from Eoban Binder, Aaron Cain, Mark Chilla, Michael Paskash, Payton Whaley and Kayte Young. Our executive producer is John Bailey. Special thanks this week to Jennifer Bass and everyone who helped bring Just Married to life. Our theme song is by Amy Oelsner and Justin Vollmar. We have additional music from the artists at Universal Production Music. I want to acknowledge and honor the Miami, Delaware, Potawatomi, and Shawnee people on whose ancestral homelands and resources Indiana University Bloomington, home of WFIU, is built, as well as the generations of workers who built it.

Alex Chambers:  Alright, time to take a breath and listen to a place.

Alex Chambers:  You've been listening to metal recycling off the B-Line Trail in Bloomington, Indiana. Until next week, I'm Alex Chambers. Thanks for listening.