Hitched.

[September 10th, 2003] Molly Kramer and Stiv Wilson
AUGUST 2, 2003

"If you ever want a ring on your finger, come and talk to me."

It was a brash declaration, but Stiv Wilson meant it. Sure, Stiv, now a 30-year-old writer and frequent WW contributor, was drunk when he said those words to Molly Kramer at a party in Missoula, Mont., five years ago. He admits that alcohol made him bold, even though he knew Molly, now 34 and an office manager for an environmental group in Portland, was in another relationship at the time.

In hindsight, Stiv says the proposition was as much the fault of inexperience as what he calls "liquid courage." Years of struggling with his weight left him inept at romance. Back then, he says, "I was a retard when it came to meeting girls."

And yet, he also knew that Molly was interested in him. The two had just spent the last eight months in clandestine meetings, getting together and flirting, Stiv says, "for coffee and innuendo."

Both were living as academics and, in Missoula, found each other's company invigorating. At the time, Stiv was in his first year of a graduate studies program in linguistics and writing, directing and producing plays, while Molly was on a break from a Rhodes scholarship in Oxford. The first time the two met, Stiv says, "We chatted. After a while I thought, 'Wow, that's the one.'"

Molly's reaction was mixed. "He was totally arrogant," she says, noting, "All he talked about was his play. He didn't look me in the eye the entire night."

Luckily for Stiv, Molly wasn't turned off by such behavior. "I was thrilled to meet another smart person," she says.

After months of skirting around a mutual attraction, the couple shared a kiss the night Stiv challenged Molly about the ring. Three weeks later, after her other relationship had ended, the two began dating.

On another drunken night less than four months later, things between them took another turn toward the serious. In the midst of an argument, Stiv shouted an impulsive proposal: He wanted Molly to marry him.

She thought he might be joking. When he said he wasn't, her reply was simple: "Yeah, I will. Of course I will."

Afterwards the couple shared a bottle of celebratory champagne but also an uncertain feeling. "We sat on my sofa, looked at each other and said, 'Holy shit, what did we just do?'" Molly remembers.

Turns out, they wouldn't do much about the actual wedding for another few years. In 1999, Molly returned to England to finish her thesis, and Stiv accompanied her. Though Stiv penned a novel while in England, he found life there difficult. Oxford, he says, was a "shithole."

They landed in Portland in October '99 and began wrestling with the idea of marriage. They considered not tying the knot, but then decided they could define the terms of not just their ceremony but also their relationship.

"Really, marriage is a foolish thing," Molly says. "We can't possibly understand what forever means because we're not immortal. The idea of it seems risky and foolish--and I liked that aspect of it."

The wedding, held on the beach in Manzanita this August, included their dog as the ring bearer and wedding attendants who took turns walking down the makeshift aisle on the beach, some playing music as they walked.

When the ceremony was over, the couple was pronounced not man and wife, but wife and husband. That's when they began their new partnership by retracing their earlier steps--but not in the style of the old-fashioned march. Instead, wife and husband, Molly and Stiv, danced past their guests up the sandy aisle.