The Kiss on the Cover

Photo by Peter Hapak for 'Time'

Last week, the Time magazine split covers that featured a male couple kissing and a female couple kissing with the headline "Gay Marriage Already Won." made waves. But some may be curious who the people photographed were.

On Time's site, they explained that Sarah Kate Ellis-Henderson was 41 and a marketing executive and Kristen Ellis-Henderson was 42 and a songwriter who live on Long Island, N.Y., in a town called Sea Cliff. They also are the mothers of two 4-year-olds, after both conceiving at the same time (read about it in their book, Times Two).

But some may not immediately realize that Kristen Henderson is also one of the founding members of all-female country rock band Antigone Rising.

On her Hangin With Hendo blog, Kristen Henderson explained some of her internal thoughts about being asked to be photographed for the cover:

"Are you guys comfortable kissing in front of the camera?"

"Sure, I mean, we are married." That's what I said out loud to the photographer who posed this question to me Monday morning on the 23rd floor of the Time Life Building. But my internal conversation went something like this. "They will never choose us anyway. They'll go with a guy couple. Or with Portia and Ellen. Not with me and Sarah. On the cover of Time Magazine. That would just be... INSANE!"

So we kissed. I mean. We are married.

It turns out the band had been recording in fellow band member Nini Camps home recording studio, also located in Sea Cliff, just a few blocks away from the Ellis-Henderson home, when Henderson had to figure out what to wear to the shoot in Manhattan. So she ended up wearing Camps's pants.

"They said I had to wear something khaki or light gray or neutral colored," Henderson explains. "I am in a rock band, I don't have anything like that. But Nini was wearing some tan cords, and she's small, so I didn't think they'd fit, but I tried."

"I feel represented," Camps says, explainging that her wife walked into the studio while they were still changing clothes and she was still in her underwear. "But my pants looked really good on her."

As Henderson went on to explain on her blog: "I'm kissing my wife on the cover because the mother of a gay kid might see it and finally come around to letting her son or daughter back in the house. I'm kissing my wife on the cover because it's time for every American to have their civil rights. And, let's be honest, I'm kissing my wife on the cover because Portia and Ellen probably weren't available..."

Learn more about Antigone Rising, and the upcoming EP and tour here.