CEDAR RAPIDS, Iowa — Less than 48 hours after making the United States Olympic wrestling team in front of 13,000 fans, Stephany Lee arrived at the wedding chapel in a Ford Explorer carrying Colorado plates and a small entourage. She changed into jeans and a striped shirt. Beaming, she made her way to an altar sitting in front of five rows of padded pews.
Lee, right, with McDonald. “I’m not trying to be a spokesperson for lesbians as an athlete,” Lee said.
With the power vested in the Rev. Jonathan Harnish, in front of her girlfriend’s two children, her Olympic teammate Clarissa Chun and a family friend, Lee married her longtime partner, Brigg McDonald. No one objected. They just smiled and took photographs.
The serendipitous combination of time and place — the Olympic trials being held in Iowa, where same-sex has been legal since 2009 — was too perfect to let pass.
“It was an opportune time,” Lee said.
And so a wedding to sanctify a long-term relationship was hastily arranged, four years in the making and about four days in the planning. Paperwork requirements were scouted online last week. Documents were retrieved earlier Monday at the Linn County offices, housed in a dying mall west of town because the main courthouse was flooded by the Cedar River four years ago. And the chapel on busy First Avenue was reserved for 3 p.m.
McDonald wore a dress and a light sweater. Her 12-year-old son, Ethan, was the ring bearer. The five-minute ceremony stalled for just a moment as the ring would not fit over Lee’s swollen finger.
“That’s what you get for wrestling,” the reverend said. Soon enough, the union was sealed with a kiss.
While some well-known Olympians have come out after their athletic careers ended, Lee heads to London as one of the few active athletes in history to publicly — and officially — acknowledge being gay.
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