Marriage gets real: newly married same-sex couples in Massachusetts are fitting in--as long as they stay local and don't ask the feds for recognition.

A few months after being legally married to her lesbian partner, Hillary Goodridge stood in the couple's backyard in Massachusetts trying to knock her child's toy loose from a tree where it was stuck. Site tried to throw a broom at the toy only to have it come crashing down, cutting her face.

Goodridge and her partner, Julie-both plaintiffs in the historic court case that led the state's supreme judicial court to rule in favor of legal marriage for same-sex couples--rushed to the hospital. At that moment the pair realized the practical benefit of legal marriage.

"We were in the emergency room when the doctor asked if she was married and then asked where her husband was," remembers Julie. Hillary responded that she was married to a woman who was sitting in the waiting room. Julie was soon by her side. "It. wasn't a big deal," Julie says, "but that was the first time we got to use our marriage to get treated with that kind of respect."

For the gay and lesbian couples who have married in Massachusetts since May 17, these tiny slice-of-life moments are the best measure of why their unions are so important. So far, those who were married and live in Massachusetts seem to be making relatively easy transitions to obtaining rights to health insurance, to property ownership, to getting names changed in school directories and on health club memberships, and so forth. With the election coming up in November, the political uproar ha the state appears to have simmered down.

Thus, life for married gay men and lesbians in Massachusetts has for the most part become, well, average.

Since they were married on May 17 at Newton City Hall, Maureen Brodoff and Ellen Wade say they haven't encountered any real problems. "There's a lot more acceptance mat there titan you might think," says Brodoff, who recently rented a car while traveling in Texas and was able to acid Ellen as a driver without the $10 to $15 surcharge. "Sure, it's not much, but in a small but practical way, it was nice to be afforded the same courtesy as other married couples."

Yet the couples who were married in Massachusetts but aren't residents of the state are facing a much tougher battle. On August 19 the supreme judicial court ruled in a preliminary decision that out-of-state couples' marriage licenses from Massachusetts are not legal.

Additionally, the federal government continues to deny married same-sex couples equal rights. Many Massachusetts couples have already been informed by their tax attorneys that the U.S. government will not allow them to file joint tax returns in 2005.

And there are other ways that the federal government continues to deny gay Americans equal rights. Donald Henneberger of Springfield was denied a request for an official name change from Iris former surname, Smith, by the National Passport Center in New Hampshire; the agency wouldn't accept a Massachusetts marriage license for a same sex couple as proof his name had been changed. Katy Gossman, an FBI agent in New Haven, Conn., received a notice from her employer that her wife, Kristin, was being dropped from its spousal health coverage plan. The couple, who live in Connecticut, had been receiving spousal benefits since getting married in Massachusetts in May.

"And as it's working out, these [marriages] are being recognized fully within the state, but as you get outside Massachusetts, they are virtually meaningless because the federal government won't recognize them," says Joyce Kauffman, a Boston attorney and chair of the family law section of file Massachusetts Lesbian and Gay Bar Association.

Other issues have unexpectedly arisen. When two people are married, any previous wills they had signed be come nullified, meaning new documents must be drawn up soon after the wedding. Also, due to the complexity of tax law, oftentimes people will have to file two sets of forms--one joint return for the state, which accepts the marriage, and two separate forms for the Internal Revenue Service, which doesn't. Furthermore, the way benefits trod income are taxed can vary. "My employer provides benefits to nay wife, but since the federal government doesn't recognize it as a marriage, her health insurance is taxed as income," Brodoff says. "So I pay a couple hundred dollars per year extra because of that."

Daniel Vaillancourt and David A. Lee were married in Canada in April. As Vaillancourt boasts dual citizenship in the United States mad Canada, the couple could well have expected that their marriage would he respected by the [U.S. government--as is done with most traditional marriages. But they have yet to win that argument with Uncle Sam. The couple are currently fighting Lee's former employer, Continental Airlines, for the fight to use a flee flight for Vaillancourt, one of Lee's annual benefits. "It was part of his early retirement package and is normally extended to spouses," Vaillancourt said. "They had no problem with it until they discovered David married a man."

Continental spokesman Rahsaan Johnson maintains that the airline is gay-friendly, adding, however, that "in this economic environment, we're in no position to extend complimentary travel benefits." On September 2 the airline announced layoffs for 425 workers; it has lost more titan $500 million in the past four years.

Meanwhile, sociologists expect that marriage equality won't arrive in all 50 states for years. "It's the pattern of change as the nation goes through a patchwork," says Evan Wolfson, executive director of Freedom to Marry, a New York City-based partnership to promote marriage rights for same-sex couples. "Some states will move toward equality, while some will resist and even regress."

Although the timing is up for debate, it appears that until then a foothold for stone-sex marriage has been obtained in Massachusetts, with couples experiencing the joy and pain that married couples have gone through for centuries. "It's been a phenomenal experience for us, getting to share our relationship with our families in a real marriage," Julie Goodridge says. "But as soon as we got our license, I made sure to get a copy for both of us to carry around in our wallets so that we'd always have that to prove we're married."

Hudson has written for The Detroit News and the Knight Ridder newspaper chain.