PORTLAND, Maine — Steven Bridges and Michael Snell look back on their wedding day a little differently than most.
"We sat there for two hours," Bridges said.
"It was crazy," Snell said. "We didn't really have time to think about it. It just kind of happened."
They didn't have tuxes, just T-shirts. There weren't any guests, either, except for the throng of reporters gathered around them at Portland City Hall.
"Our daughters were texting us, 'You're trending on the news channel 6 website. You're trending on this,' over and over, making us a lot more nervous," Bridges said.
When it struck midnight on Dec. 29, 2012, the two became Maine's first gay couple to legally marry.
"We finally feel equal and happy in Maine," Bridges told reporters that day.
But truth be told, they were overwhelmed by the attention. The story quickly made national headlines.
"I think it really hit home for me the next day," Snell said. "I went into my office, and somebody stopped me in the hallway that had seen the news and said, 'Oh my God. You're part of Maine history now.'"
That history took years, even decades to create.
Mary Bonauto, an attorney with GLBTQ Legal Advocates & Defenders (GLAD), was a big part of that journey here in Maine and nationwide.
"There's a way, in which, the road to marriage nationally certainly flows in part through Maine," Bonauto said.
In April 2009, the Maine Legislature passed a bill to legalize same-sex marriage, but just months later a ballot initiative allowed voters to overturn it.
Activists came together again to prove they weren't giving up the fight, and in 2012 voters sided in favor of gay marriage.
"I'm not sure any state could have won a ballot measure on this issue in 2009, but Maine was a big part of making it possible, to show the way of how to win. Directly with the people," Bonauto said.
Maine became the first state in the country to legalize gay marriage by popular vote.
Bonauto, who previously fought for the right to marry in states like Vermont and Massachusetts, took the momentum straight to the U.S. Supreme Court to fight state bans on same-sex marriage and won.
Same-sex marriage was legalized nationwide in 2015.
"Today the court stood by a principle in this nation that we do not tolerate laws that disadvantage people because of who they are," Bonauto told reporters on the steps of the Supreme Court after the ruling.
Now, eight years later, many advocates say the fight is not over.
"I understand there are going to be setbacks," Gia Drew, the executive director of Equality Maine, said.
Drew and her organization advocate for the rights of LGBTQ+ Mainers every day. She got her start on the campaign to legalize same-sex marriage in Maine, but nothing prepared her for recent setbacks.
"The scary moment was last June the Supreme Court overturned Roe v. Wade," she said. "In that conversation, we heard other Supreme Court justices say, 'If we can do that, maybe we should reexamine all the things we ruled on LGBTQ rights.'"
It is why recent attacks on gay and transgender people have hit so close to home for Drew, who is trans.
Right now, lawmakers in Augusta are considering a number of pieces of anti-LGBTQ legislation. The issues have even reached local school boards.
"That's what I'm most worried about. Our young people today feeling like they can't be themselves," Drew said.
As for Steven Bridges and Michael Snell, they now realize their story is more important than ever.
Even though their wedding captured more than 10 years ago by news outlets across the country is not the one they hold onto.
"We actually had a commitment ceremony because we didn't think it was going to happen any time soon," Bridges said.
The ceremony years prior was what they remember as their wedding day. The legal component challenges they faced then were what made them feel like they were not equal.
"Prior to being legally married, we had to spend thousands of dollars with an attorney to put wills, powers of attorney for medical, for financial, all of that in place. And we used to keep copies of it in our luggage when we traveled," Snell said.
Even still, the couple says their love was real from the start, regardless of what the law was.
"It was pretty special right from the first time we met face to face," Snell said.