For Better, For Worse

originally published in Sunday Life, September 2005

By Alex May

Teacher Luisa Hayson, 24, and real estate agent Peter Gordon, 26, had been going out for five years when the producers of ABC-TV’s Outback House, a reality show set on a farm in 1861, convinced them to get married on television last year.

LUISA

“When they suggested we should get married on the show, we were like
whoa, that’s too full on. Not a chance. Crazy. I mean we had talked about getting married but we weren’t in any rush.
We are go with the flow kind of people. We met while we were travelling and we are exactly the same – we never have any plans, we just see what happens. We had been together for a while, but we’d never lived together. I was still at uni and there was no way I had the head space to move in together. It was too good living at mum and dads with the food and the cleaning and everything.
People still ask us if it was a real wedding and it was. We’ve got a wedding certificate dated 1861, but also one dated November 11, 2004. And it certainly felt real to us. I liked that the wedding was simple. Our parents were there and the other people from the show and they brought a priest in to marry us. All the gifts were handmade and it was just a quick ceremony on a porch. It was more emotional than I expected it to be.
Luckily I wasn’t one of those women who fantasised a lot about my wedding. The only preconception I did have was that my friends and family would be there. I would have preferred to be married by a Catholic priest, but the church really stuffed us around and wouldn’t agree to it in time. I definitely did not choose my wedding dress – it was big and green and ugly.
I only had six weeks notice that I was going to get married. I didn’t see Pete for a month because he started on the show before me. When he rode that horse full gallop across the paddock to meet me, my heart really did skip a beat. But then I smelt him and told him ‘you smell like horse and sheep’.”

PETER

“Luisa is perfect, or as close to perfect as a real person can be, but I just never imagined she’d be my wife. No way would we be hitched by now if it wasn’t for Outback House. We just kind of went with the idea because we thought it would be a bit of a trip, something awesome.
I’ve always felt totally comfortable with Lu. I think young people need a shove to get married. Everyone wants to travel or do uni or whatever and then get married when they have nothing else better to do.
I think I drive Luisa nuts because I’m very quiet and boring compared to her. My dad told her she would understand me more once she’d seen me on the farm, and he was right. All my ancestors were sheep farmers and being outdoors all day is much more my thing. I reckon it’s the way real men are supposed to live.
Luisa is really my best friend. Marrying her was an amazing experience, but I’d say it hasn’t significantly changed our relationship. We are just like any of our friends - we still go out, we still party and we aren’t planning on having kids or anything just yet.”