When Donal Traynor met Joseph Bowlby in Dublin in 1994, a year after Ireland decriminalized homosexuality, neither man ever imagined Ireland would one day hold a referendum on legalizing same-sex marriage, as it will this week.

"It feels really weird," Traynor, 53, said in the home he now shares with Bowlby and their two adopted sons in southeast Ireland. "But on the other hand, if it passes, what an affirmation that would be for the years and years of work we've done to change our bit of Ireland!"

Bowlby, 55, who is from the US state of Alabama, said: "I still can't believe that there's a referendum on gay marriage."