Equality grew under Obama: Gay lawmaker's partner

Barack Obama's presidential farewell address summoned up happy memories of the way minority groups have been treated these past eight years in a city that has not always been prepared for the faces of the future. I want to offer a few personal stories from my experience in Washington with my partner, Democratic Rep. Jared Polis of Colorado.

When Jared was elected to Congress in 2008, he became the first openly gay man to run for and win an open seat in the history of our great country. The days of hiding one's identity to win votes were already disappearing. At the time, I don't think either of us understood the way this simple evolution would affect things going forward. There are more lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender lawmakers and staff, people with partners, spouses, and children. Congress is truly beginning to reflect the diversity of America.

In the early days of Obama's administration, our presence in Washington was quite a novelty. We were welcomed, if not always handled all that delicately. Many people, not realizing how funny it appeared to me, approached to say, "I have a gay friend back home. He's been doing my hair for 30 years." Stereotypes are often perpetuated in the absence of personal contact. I never blamed people for trying to relate to me as if I were a caricature from a TV show, or a toy they found wading somewhere at the bottom of a cereal box. But I realized a responsibility to change these viewpoints while I had the opportunity.

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I made many friends among the other congressional spouses, both Democrats and Republicans. I had meaningful conversations with each of them. We recognized a common humanity in one another, and in time, there was no more awkwardness between us. We no longer encountered one another as "others" needing to be sorted into categories and boxes.

This isn't to say that it was easy being different in a cast of characters that had looked the same for over 100 years. The fact is, many of the congressional spouses eight years ago were women. The spouse program offered to us often involved stereotypical views a woman’s "role," even though many of us were now men. I would often laugh inside when our Spouses Foundation presidents suggested that we pack an extra "shawl" for Inauguration Day, because it would be cold. Or, somehow, we would get around to discussing what to wear to inaugural galas. Where could we buy a ball gown that would be simultaneously traditional and boundary pushing?

I remember more serious hurdles, too.

Once, I hoped to accompany Jared on what is known as a CODEL — a congressional delegation — of members of Congress visiting a particular place in the world to investigate an issue. The day I arrived to board the bus that would take us all to Andrews Air Force Base, all the other spouses boarded with no trouble. But the military would not allow me to get on. There seemed to be a question about my status. So I was left standing outside while the armed police radioed the House Speaker Nancy Pelosi’s office to debate whether I was a "real" spouse.

Eventually, I was permitted to board, after the speaker's office told the military that there would be a problem if I was denied. But it remained a deeply embarrassing moment.

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Perhaps my greatest memory — one I will always cherish — was the day Jared and I were invited to bring our children, CJ and Cora, to meet the president in the Oval Office. When the door to his office opened, Obama knelt down to CJ and he told him to "high five." I was so proud. And when we entered, he allowed Cora to run around the office in her typical mad fashion, picking up items on desks, selecting from the bowl of perfectly shaped apples on his coffee table. The president laughed when CJ asked him if he could also have an apple, and was it time yet to receive his special box of White House M&Ms? These were profoundly human moments.

Though I was quaking inside to think we were standing alone with the leader of the free world, another part of me stood in awe that he was such a kind man with a true heart. He saw our family no differently than any other. He treated us as equals.

No doubt, there will be debate for years to come about what kind of president he was. My memory, however, will be of a man who showed that he cared.

Marlon Reis is an author and partner of Rep. Jared Polis, D-Colo.

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