On this day in 2001, at midnight in Amsterdam's City Hall, Mayor Job Cohen married four same-sex couples — the first legal same-sex weddings in the history of the world. The Netherlands didn't stumble into this moment; it took decades of organizing, legal challenges, and a society-wide conversation about what equality actually means. When the clock struck midnight, couples who had waited years — some who had been together for decades — finally heard the word "married" applied to their love under the law. Twenty-five years later, same-sex marriage is legal in nearly 40 countries, and each new nation that joins that list traces a direct line back to that Amsterdam city hall. The fight is far from over globally, but on April 1, 2001, the world changed in the most real way possible: someone who had been told their love didn't count got to stand in front of witnesses and say it did.
If you have been to a same-sex wedding — your own, a friend's, a family member's — what moment from that day has stayed with you?