As a kid, I loved mail.

Three o'clock every afternoon I'd zip across my rural street in Wisconsin to the family mailbox. I'd flip open the box to find a pile of different-sized envelopes, the smell of new magazines, and the feeling that I was falling in love every single day.

Dave and I met at the gym where I worked and where he worked out. After four months of checking him in at the front desk, Dave finally worked up the courage to say to me; "Hi…um…. I race here on my bike almost every day to see you before your shift ends."

Nervously, I responded, "Well… I stay later waiting to check you in."

For our first date, we went to a jazz club on the north side of Chicago. Over cocktails, unpredictable beats of jazz, and a smoky nuance we discovered there was more to us than mutual attraction. Four years later, we are still together. Like every couple, gay or straight, we've lasted through everything, from what color we are going to paint a wall ("Cyan, Dave. It's the new 'in' color that everyone is doing and we won't be any different!"), to major family issues ("What do you mean after four years your grandma still calls me your 'friend?!?'").

One night, a few weeks ago, Dave took me to my favorite Sushi place. It was in this old warehouse with exposed brick, low lighting and tables so small you can do nothing but be close to the person you are dining with. We shared a bottle of red wine and toasted our first glass when Dave said: "So, you know, we've been together for awhile and... well... I want you to know that I can really see myself spending the rest of my life with you..."

This was like a proposal. Marriage! In that moment, I imagined people watching us at the end of a long aisle smiling as we walked towards the altar together. Then, after we said our vows, I imagined him slipping a platinum ring onto my finger. I imagined wedding pictures that I'd share with others for years after years to anyone who would ask me what my wedding was like.

"But... I want a real wedding... that's, you know, legal.. .and, you know, it's not yet... so I think we should wait until then."

Since then, getting the mail has been hard. I go to our little cubicle mailbox in the apartment lobby. Tucked between a GQ or a cell phone bill might be a light blue or pink or green envelope. It's a couple's name in fancy handwriting inviting us to their wedding - their straight wedding.

And all the gifts we buy, toasts we hear and the first dances we watch for,  these couples sometimes make me feel as heartbroken as finding an empty mailbox.

Still, I still believe that one day our family and friends will open their mailboxes to discover an invitation on the most captivating paper you've ever seen. In the upper left hand corner, in a modern-style font will be the carefully printed names: "Byron and Dave."

It's the easiest thing we all can do. Believe. It's what we lost in the mail.