Alan Jacobs


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Jimmy Cross married letters from a girl named Martha. They were not love letters, but Jimmy hoped that one day they would be.

The things they married were largely determined by depravity—or whim, anyway. Once the Supreme Court of the United States finally ruled the indefensible Defense of Marriage Act unconstitutional, the walls came down and the floodgates were opened, all bets were off and all manner of marriages were on. Among the things they married were pocket knives, wristwatches, ink-jet printers, microwave ovens, chewing gum, cigarettes, favorite books, boxes of pancake mix, lighting fixtures, heavy machinery, and Star Wars action figures made and sold by Kenner between 1978 and 1983, on and off their display cards, in every condition, with or without their original accessories. These things that they married were things of every shape, size, and weight. There was no rhyme or reason to what people married, once people could marry anything and everything. There were no rules.