On Feb. 14, Barb McMillan and Roseann Szalkowski walked into the DuPage County Clerk’s office and asked for a marriage license. However, things were not going to go the couple’s way that day.
‘We did not talk to the clerk, but were referred to the office supervisor, who was very nice and as supportive as she could be from, in her words, ‘the other side of the counter,” the partners explained in an e-mail to Windy City Times. ‘She referred us to the state statute [that] we said we were familiar with, but we asked her to understand why it was still important to us, knowing they could not give us a license, to ask for it anyhow.’
This was not the first time the couple had gone to ask for a license. ‘She seemed prepared for us, possibly because of the confusion we caused when we went last year and no one seemed to even know what we were asking,’ they noted. ‘With the whole staff eavesdropping—and not so subtly—we explained about the rights we are denied and that this is a matter of civil rights. We also told them about Freedom to Marry week, which they were unaware of.’ McMillan and Szalkowski were more than civil; they were downright personable. ‘We [even] brought the office a box of candy, which was well-received,’ they stated.
The partners also said that ‘ [t] he supervisor wished us luck, advised us to contact our legislators and didn’t mind when we said we would be back next year—and every year until they can actually give us that license.’ For them, it was definitely ‘a worthwhile experience.’