Enamoradas:A series on love
Jesse & Melissa
Enamoradas/Enamoradxs is a series about love, dating, and relationships.
Enamoradas started as an idea back in 2018. I was having conversations with my friends about relationships and looking for answers.
I decided to interview queer couples and single people that I knew from my community. It has been important for me to put the stories of queer women/non-binary people, and especially queer women and non-binary people of color, out into the world. We exist and we are here and our stories matter.
As a closeted person growing up in the red state of Arizona in the early 2000’s, I didn’t know any lesbians or queer women. It wasn’t until I moved to Los Angeles in 2014 that I met people like Jesse and Melissa.
Jesse and Melissa are two people I admire and adore. I first met Melissa back in 2015 when we both played on the same team in a feminist basketball league in Los Angeles. Jesse is an amazing, thoughtful teacher and musician.
This interview was conducted in the early summer of 2018 at a park in Glendale, California, during the sunset. I am extremely grateful for Jesse and Melissa’s vulnerability and openness to be interviewed for this project.
What follows and what I hope comes through is the inspiration and love I felt from talking to Melissa and Jesse. When this interview was done, Melissa and Jesse were dating. They have since married.
Editor’s note: this previously unpublished interview and photos that accompany it are from 2018. Photos by Yezmin Villarreal. Graphics by Bridget Ore.
YEZ: How long into the relationship did you start to feel like, this is really my best friend?
Melissa: I think it was just hanging out and building trust and knowing I’d show up or she’d show up and having each others back over the couple weeks. For me, it was 3 or 4 months and I was, like, OK, I feel totally good about this one hundred percent. You’re better at dialogue, so explain.
Jesse: Well, I mean I think we both have our own answer because it didn’t both click at the same time. I really think for me it was a slow journey of accepting that I really like this person. I didn’t want to give away my independence. I was still clinging to it so much and that was a lot of my fear-based things from being lost in a relationship in the past. I kind of set these arbitrary rules: we can hang out 3 days a week, but I have to make sure I have my own time.
Melissa: Yeah, we only hung out like once a week or twice a week and then we were in an open relationship. I was freaking out the whole time for the first couple weeks.
Jesse: That makes it sound so terrible. I mean, I was going to school and I was working; we have friends. I just didn’t want to throw it all away. I started to really give a little bit more and a little bit more. In January, we started dating and then over the summer -- and who knows if it would have happened if this hadn’t happened -- one of my best friends had a serious accident. Things happen in your life. So, then I was like, what am I scared of? I really love this person. I’m just going to go for it. That happened in September, so for me that was that.
YEZ: What was part of your hesitancy?
Jesse: My hesitancy? I think a lot of it for me stemmed from the fact that Melissa had been in an 8 year relationship and had just broken up. It seemed so hazy to me. I projected a lot because when I broke up with my boyfriend, it took me like 4 years to feel and that was because it was so messy. I was scared.
YEZ: Do you feel like all your past dating and relationship experiences that brought you two together was worth it to get to this point?
Melissa: Yeah, for sure. Like she was just saying, when we first started dating I had just gotten out of a relationship, but that relationship was really over two years before it was over. If I actually would have ended that relationship two years earlier, I would have met somebody else. I would have never met Jesse, so I feel like it all worked out perfectly.
Jesse: Yeah, and I couldn’t have just jumped into anything probably still. I needed that time. Last year I was really unhappy where I was working and spending all my time at Melissa’s. I was questioning why I was paying rent at another place.
I’ve never just lived with one person before, let alone my partner. It’s so exciting. Even though I’m really stressed about a lot of stuff still. Yeah, it wouldn’t have happened in this way because there’s so many things I had to learn about myself to get to a place where I would then even reach out to her in the way I did.
I’ve never just lived with one person before, let alone my partner. It’s so exciting.
Melissa: Yeah, being in other relationships, she learned, Oh, I really dislike that; I don’t want to let another person that I date do these things; or allow them to continuously happen. It’s nice to know. We both just know what we want. It’s really cool.
Y: How do you feel about labels? Do you call each other girlfriends or partners or do you not like either?
Melissa: We actually talked about this once because I don’t really care for the term “partner.” I feel like everyone uses that now, whether you’re gay or straight. It doesn’t matter. I just don’t like that word because there’s no love in it for me. I definitely call Jesse my girlfriend. If somebody called her my partner I wouldn’t care, but I don’t use that term.
Jesse: I get really bugged at the baby boomer generation’s use of “girlfriend.” Even my mom will say, I went out with my girlfriends last week, or my girlfriend came over and she did my nails. It seems so thrown about to me. It loses its meaning in this way, but I also never defend it, so who knows. I’m ok with girlfriend or partner definitely. I don’t identify as a lesbian. I really loved queer for a long time and I’m getting my love back for it recently. I feel it’s so overused. I love gay. I really like gay, especially for women.
YEZ: how would you describe each other to another person?
Jesse: If someone asks, what’s your girlfriend like? I would say: she’s super sweet and supportive. A libra, so she’s very balanced. Super creative. I am always repping her pins at my school because no one has met her there and she has a business where she works with bands she likes. She has a bowl cut. Just brilliant and fun and shy.
Melissa: Jesse is very headstrong and hilarious and musical. That’s really, really sweet. Incredibly creative. She sings all the time and knows every song to everything. She’s amazing. I thought I knew music really well and then I started dating Jesse. I don’t know anything. Jesse knows so much. I’m in this narrow indie scene and she really loves world music. She loves so much more than I’ve ever been exposed to and it’s really, really impressive.
She sings all the time and knows every song to everything. She’s amazing.
YEZ: What’s a big thing you’ve learned from each other that you never knew?
Jesse: I just never knew what it was to be in a relationship with someone who puts you first. I learned that’s what I want forever. I’m not okay with anything less than that. It’s just so amazing. They have your back. They’ll do anything for you. I don’t think you should put everything on one person but, like, that that can exist. That’s mine.
Melissa: I’ve learned to go outside of my comfort zone. It’s really fun cause I’m shy and when I don’t want to do something, I just sit back and I let the world do its thing. Jesse is a Leo. She’s very forward in doing things. So when she wants to dance to this song in the middle of an empty bar, I gotta go dance with her. In other situations, I would be really shy and think, no, I don’t want people to stare at me. Now I think, who gives a shit? The whole world disappears when I dance with her. It’s amazing. Just being present and doing what you want.
The whole world disappears when I dance with her.
YEZ: How would you define love?
Jesse: Romantically?
YEZ: Yes, or platonically. At the heart of every romantic relationship is great friendship, no?
Melissa: I think it’s this yearning for this person all the time in everything that you do. Anything that I do throughout my day, I just want to do it with this other person, you know? Yeah.
Jesse: I think love is empathy. In all of my different types of relationships, whether that is Melissa, my mom, or my friend Caity, what I appreciate the most is that there is always an understanding of where I’m coming from in a non-judgmental way. I just want to be understood, or heard.
YEZ: Everyone does, right?
Jesse: Everyone wants to be loved.
Melissa: That’s one thing I’ve learned from you. Sometimes a person wants to be angry in the moment and you need to sit back and let it happen. They’re not really asking you for help. They don’t need your opinion; they just need to do their own thing. As opposed to in other relationships, I would have tried my best to make them feel better. They don’t always need you to make them feel better; they just want to feel how they want to feel and get over it.
YEZ: Yeah, and that makes me think of self-love. It’s this internal work that each person has to do on the inside with themselves.
Do you feel like you have that? Did it take you a bit to get there?
Jesse: It’s going to be a constant journey for me. I struggle with depression and a lot of obsessive or negative thoughts. It doesn’t feel good, obviously, and it’s not positive stuff about myself. It’s not that I don’t love myself. If you really don’t love yourself, you’re destructive. At this point in my life, I’m not like that. I have my periods.
I think it’s just accepting those times as an adult. I’m at a really great place because of the work that I’ve done. I’ve only really ever shared this part of myself with myself or verbally with my friend, Caity. I got to a point where I was accepting myself enough to show Melissa that side of myself through our relationship. It’s a process of trying different things, like talking to yourself in the mirror. I’ve gone through that or just trying to remind myself to take myself out of the equation and look at the sky, or, hey, these people that I’m working with they need my attention. For me that’s all about love. What about you?
Melissa: I’ve gotten really good in this relationship about having my alone time. In other relationships, I was more insecure and I would think they must be mad at me if I took time to myself. I don’t think that at all now. If Jesse needs to do work, I will go catch a movie, go to the gym, or go to the bookstore. I will have a really cute afternoon date with myself and that’s important for mental health to do things alone. Sometimes I will go out with my friends and she goes out to have burritos with her friends. That’s super nice.
YEZ: What’s the best thing about being with each other?
Melissa: My favorite thing is I constantly have literal moments of bliss that I don’t think I ever really felt before. We can just be waking up and Jesse will just have me laughing at the top of my lungs and it just feels like fucking bliss. It’s amazing. It’s not even sexual or anything; it’s just a really good time for whatever we’re doing.
We can just be waking up and Jesse will just have me laughing at the top of my lungs and it just feels like fucking bliss.
Jesse: That’s so sweet. Whats my favorite thing? My favorite thing is just nighttime cause what’s better than snuggling? I don’t know if that’s a basic answer but it’s that someone is going to be there. It’s in every movie. You wake up, you have a nightmare, and you can say, hey, this is terrible and they’re there. It’s always being there. You’re always there and I appreciate it.
Melissa: Yeah, it’s also a really cool partnership. This one is very even and it doesn’t even feel one-sided at all. I’ll cook dinner and then she’ll cook breakfast or simple things like that. I’ll cook all these lunches and then she’ll do all the dishes. It’s just simple shit that feels really even. We don’t even have to ask each other or tell each other anything. We just have each other’s back.
Y: Everyone has different ways of showing care, but it’s nice to feel like you’re valued and appreciated by your partner.
Melissa: Yeah, we generally want to help each other out. If she has finals and she’s stuck studying, I’ll go fill up her car because I know she won’t have time to do that in the morning.
YEZ: Who does that???
Jesse: I know!!!
YEZ: I’m constantly that person that puts off refilling my gas tank and then the next day I’m screwed when I’m in a rush to get somewhere and my tank is on E.
Jesse: I don’t remember who, but someone once told me, be nice to your morning self. Be nice to your future self! Yes, totally, I don’t want to go and get gas right now. I don’t want to make my lunch but you just do it because it’s for you. Yeah, it applies to a lot of things. You really don’t want to go to the gym but you need your body to work.
Melissa: Yeah, I started going to the gym because she was, like, you gotta be healthy. When you’re older, I can’t take care of you; i’ll also be old. OK, I gotta be healthy. OK cool.
Jesse: Love is… it’s so interesting. Working with kids has been really interesting because you’re not trying to bring your personal life into it but then they hear things. They know. That’s just something that I wonder about because all the teachers that are married to men--it’s just so free flowing for them to talk about it and everybody knows.
I work with another queer teacher but she’s really private about her life. We went to the Halloween carnival and the kids were like, who was that? Your friend? Your roommate? I didn’t know what to say.
It just sucks that now maybe you have to go home and have a conversation with your family about what that even means. That sort of thing. Educating our children. I don’t know if people think there's a certain appropriate age.
That is confusing to me, like they're not old enough to understand or something. There’s some kids at our school who are trans. There’s such a spectrum with regards to how people talk about that. Some people ask, are they allowed to go into this bathroom? I say, they’re a boy, they're going to go. That sort of thing is still present and I’m at a pretty progressive school.
It’s cool you’re doing this. I want everyone to hear about gay love all the time and maybe some kid will read it and be like, wow, cool!
Melissa: Kids are so open and understanding. I feel like they're more willing. They're clueless and they're like, cool, great! They don’t have issues like adults. If people just tell them when they’re little. I was raised like that and it was great. It was never, like, oh, they’re gay? It was just, cool, they love each other. That’s cool!
Jesse: In your family?
Melissa: Yeah, because there’s so many queer people in my family. It’s great. I remember specifically being a little kid. I lived in this house with my mom and her best friends. They’re all gay men and they ran a salon. They used to throw huge Halloween parties at their salon and I was never allowed to go because I was a little kid. I used to be so mad every Halloween because they had the most amazing outfits and I couldn't go to the party!
YEZ: That’s a very rare, beautiful experience.
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