Little Love Stories: "Who I Was Without a Wedding Ring"

Modern love in miniature, with reader-submitted stories no longer than 100 words.

A portrait of father and son< p class="css-at9mc1 evys1bk0">Growing up in the 1950s, I was an unathletic, slightly effeminate gay boy. In my late teens, I finally realized my "difference". My dad sensed it and went out of his way to "gay-shame". It did not work. At my mother's request, my parents attended the Pflag meetings (Parents and Friends of Lesbians and Gays). In June 1979, they participated in New York's Gay Pride Parade. My dad carried an "I'm proud of my gay son" sign. Someone asked to take our picture. The shutter clicked. We faced each other and laughed - until tears came to our eyes. — Mark N. Reiter

ImageA portrait of me in 1962 when I was 7 years old and not yet out.

Thank you for sheltering me

The apartment was 1,300 square feet of uncertainty, the red front door welcoming me to life after divorce. For three years, it sheltered me, a single mother of two children, allowing me to rediscover who I was without a wedding ring. When love struck again, I was ready to let it in, eventually creating a new beach house with my boyfriend. My old apartment empty, I ran my fingers along the walls that held the secrets of my most vulnerable moments, my grief for the future I had imagined. I closed the red door behind me, got out, continued. — Heather Sweeney

ImageWith my boyfriend with the keys to our first house together.

My radiant light

My close friends know that I lost my mother to ovarian cancer. Little do they know that five years later I lost my brother in a fatal accident - and that a few months after his death my father also passed away, his lifelong smoking catching up with him. Sitting motionless on the bedroom floor, unable to accept my orphan status and the death of my brother, I desperately needed hope. At that moment, my one-year-old son's little hand reached out to me. He was like a radiant light driving out the darkness. Sobbing, I hugged him, promising to let him know my missing family through my memories. — Jasmine Jaksic

ImageMy son, my sunshine.

Biblically aged Bertie

Would I have gone on a date with my future wife if I had looked carefully at her Tinder profile? Probably not. There was a dog in his picture...