E-Mail This Article to a Friend The day we are given (continued)

"Chaos" doesn’t do justice to what happened next. The Goodridges managed to hustle through the horde with their eight-year-old daughter, Annie, in tow. Wilson and Compton followed suit, although I heard one of them say as they walked past, "Hold on. Don’t lose me." At one point, I found myself beside Horgan and Balmelli, who were moving at an almost casual pace, seemingly unfazed by the limelight. But when I asked Balmelli how he felt, he looked around at the crush of reporters and said, "All this attention, it’s overwhelming." By then, the press had swarmed around them like a living organism. Realizing that I, too, was hounding these people on their wedding day, I stepped aside as the mob chased the three couples across the plaza and down Cambridge Street.

Back at City Hall, a dozen anti-gay-marriage protesters had shown up. They sang hymns and displayed a large banner that read JESUS, MARY, AND JOSEPH. WE PRAY YOU KEEP THE HOLY NAME. Occasionally, they dropped to their knees, praying, "Lord God, have mercy on America."

One of the protesters, a lanky black man whose sign read BORN WITH SIN. BE BORN AGAIN THROUGH JESUS CHRIST told me that he came down to the plaza because "I feel people have lost their right. We should have voted on this first." His name was David Guillaumen, and he was a 25-year-old Hyde Park resident. I asked him if his presence on the plaza today — a day of joy for same-sex couples — actually helped his cause. Didn’t he fear people would see his protest as hateful? "No," he replied, "because I have love for all. Love brought me here today."

Not surprisingly, those who backed the gay and lesbian couples standing in the soon-to-be-married line didn’t see things that way. A dozen of them stationed themselves in front of the praying protesters to hide them from the couples’ view. Some chanted, "We’re here. We’re queer. We’re married. Get used to it!"

May 17, 11 a.m. to 3 p.m.

Things seemed to be heating up among true believers on both sides of the struggle for same-sex civil-marriage rights at Boston City Hall, but I had better things to do than listen to sparring factions. I had a few weddings to attend.

So did Devan Dewey and Frank Bellistri, a gay couple I found myself standing next to on the T while heading to the Arlington Street Church, where plaintiffs Wilson and Compton were going to wed. Dewey and Bellistri told me they knew the soon-to-be newlyweds from church; in fact, they said, the couple had generously invited the entire 1000-member congregation to attend their ceremony. Needless to say, Dewey and Bellistri were looking forward to the event.

"It’ll be a celebration of their love," Bellistri told me, "a celebration of a new era."

"It’ll be a celebration of our own humanity," Dewey added.

The Arlington Street Church, with its white Corinthian columns and Tiffany stained-glass windows, would make a gorgeous setting for any wedding. Yet from the start, it was clear that the Wilson-Compton wedding would mark one of the sanctuary’s most beautiful and poignant moments. The ceremony was short in duration, yet long in meaning. Wilson’s two small grandchildren carried the couple’s wedding rings down the aisle on red-velvet pillows. Wilson’s son, Scott, and his daughter-in-law, Lori, offered touching readings, while the Boston Gay Men’s Chorus — singing a tune titled "Marry Us" — left guests welling up with tears. I shared the surge of emotion and had to swallow hard to keep from crying.

As soon as the Reverend Kim Crawford Harvie (a lesbian who is marrying her partner in a dawn ceremony at the church on May 20) announced those hard-won words — "and now, by the power vested in me by the Commonwealth of Massachusetts" — the wedding guests went wild. They stomped their feet on the floor and erupted into applause. When Harvie signed the marriage license for the "legally married" Wilson and Compton, the audience gave them a standing ovation.

Leaving the Wilson-Compton wedding, I was reminded of the adage "Every good wedding makes you cry." This wedding was a downright tearjerker.

By contrast, the Goodridge wedding — which took place at the Unitarian Universalist Association headquarters next door to the State House — was light-hearted, reflecting an oft-cited attribute of the couple. Hillary and Julie passed out tiny champagne bottles to their 100 guests. They wrote their own processional song poking fun at the fact that they’re able to get hitched because they won a lawsuit. ("Here come the brides, so gay with pride.... Lovely to see, legally free. Finally hitched by a four-three decree.") They shot confetti into the crowd at the close of the ceremony. And they held a private reception in an area of the building overlooking the offices of top elected officials, including that of gay-marriage foe Governor Mitt Romney.

Still, the Goodridges didn’t forget to emphasize the day’s political message. In a brief press conference held after they were pronounced "fully and legally married" — and after they gave each other a show-stopping kiss — the couple told reporters they felt "exhilarated" to have won access to the institution of civil marriage. Though happy to step out of the media limelight, they weren’t about to turn their backs on the upcoming battle over a constitutional amendment to ban gay marriage, establishing civil unions in its stead, they said. As for those opposed to their wedding, Julie offered one final thought: "We are no different than anyone else. Our marriage will last forever, just like any other committed, loving couple."

And with that, they picked up two glasses of champagne and joined the party.

May 17, 3 to 5 p.m.

By the time I returned to Boston’s City Hall Plaza at around 3:15 p.m., the marriage-license-application line had disappeared, and the crowds of gay-marriage supporters and opponents had dissipated. Instead, dozens of people lounged in the bright afternoon sun on the plaza steps. Some of them held psychedelic signs that READ LOVE HAPPENS and YAY! Every five minutes or so, a soon-to-be-married gay or lesbian couple would emerge from the building — and the stoop dwellers would roar.

In the middle of the plaza stood a twentysomething man wearing a round white sticker that read IT’S THE LAW! EQUAL MARRIAGE! He was engaged in an animated theological debate about the city of Sodom with a middle-aged woman in a pink plaid skirt. The woman had her finger on an open page in her pocket-size Bible.

Suddenly, the man began clapping vigorously at the sight of a gay couple, walking hand in hand, holding up an official-looking piece of paper.

"Why are you clapping?" the woman softly asked the man.

"Because I’m happy for them. I feel joy for them," he answered.

"The only joy," the woman retorted, "is in Jesus Christ."

I approached the couple, who had just left City Hall. Andrew Cohen and James Packman, of Pittsfield, told me they never intended to show up in Boston on May 17, but while driving into the city on some errands, they decided to take the plunge. "We didn’t plan this at all," said Cohen, whose glasses hung by rainbow-colored string. Packman, a thin man with a braided ponytail, said the whole process took them "five minutes, tops." When they arrived, city officials designated them couple number 101. They didn’t even have to stand in line. He added, "The people paying parking tickets were waiting longer."

Sitting down on the plaza steps, I thought of something State Representative Byron Rushing repeated over and over during the constitutional convention in March. On May 17, he liked to say, the sun will rise, same-sex couples will marry, and life will move on. That’s pretty much what happened outside City Hall on Monday. Alison Koyberg, 20, a Boston University junior, was sitting next to me as I contemplated the rather uneventful scene. She had come downtown to witness the day’s events. She arrived right before 3 p.m., only to find that the plaza didn’t look much different from how it looked any other day. True, there were people with balloons. And rainbow-colored flags. Some were even blowing bubbles. But the day had gone off largely without a hitch.

"I’m struck by how positive it’s been so far," Koyberg said. "It’s nice. Everyone’s happy. This is all about a celebration."

Kristen Lombardi can be reached at klombardi[a]phx.com