Marriage: I Still Don't, But…

Oh, the can of worms I’ve opened with yesterday’s posting. Part of my thing on marriage was tongue-in-cheek, but the other part, probably far too ground in my own past.
First of all, it’s not too often that I don’t explain myself clearly, but I guess I didn’t want to get too into things in that posting. It’d been a long night of insomnia, too many thoughts racing in my mind, and those little words, “I don’t” popped into my mind, and I thought, “Hey, let’s have some fun with that.”
Unfortunately, that “fun” has left me lying in bed for the last couple hours, thinking about just how wrong my parent’s marriage was. How much they lacked, and ultimately, how long it was all so bad. I hate the marriage that my parents had. I hate the way its demise wrecked both their lives. My father’s still a shell of a man all these years later. I’ve seen what a bad marriage can do, and even this morning, I’m left awash in sadness at the thought of it.
I often remember being in grade 7, on a cold, dismal morning, and my father was supposed to drive me to the schoolbus, which would drive me all the way out to my private school in the valley. An argument had begun just after breakfast, and it never really resolved before the drive was supposed to begin. Those fated words, “Go outside, I’ll be there in a minute,” were spoken by Dad, and the good girl I was, I went out on the frost-covered porch and began the wait.
In those days, I was in my Catholic school tunic and long socks. I must have stood on that porch for nearly an hour. The bus? Missed that. Dad had to drive me all the way to school that day, and he himself was late for teaching. I remember the anger and uselessness that seemed to emanate from him on that drive. But mostly, I remember the shame and bewilderment that 12-year-old girl felt as she stood out there in the frozen morning, listening to the angry shouting and the hurtful words being hurled in that house. It’d been that bad for three years, and would stay that bad for another three, but honestly, it was never, ever good.
No, I never witnessed a healthy relationship. I remember being aware, as young as grade four, of just how pathetic my parents’ marriage was. They never touched each other, never joked, and never seemed romantic. That said, they were both people with troubled pasts and generations of distant family behaviour before they set foot in that marriage.
The legacy of hurt, I think, tends to be established long before the rings land on the finger. It’s not marriage that’s bad, and I’ve not meant to suggest that. But this notion of saying “love, honour, and cherish,” and that will somehow be enough to get the ball rolling, that, to me, is a joke. It’s laughable. Marriage will be – and should be – the hardest, most challenging thing for a person to commit to in their lives.
We hear lip-service to that effect all the time, but that point needs to be driven home. People need to understand all the challenges they’ll face in relationships. Most people enter the “institution” with ignorant, idealized perceptions of what it is, and the vows and ceremony do sweet fuck all to affect that.
Honestly, I’m a romantic, I want nothing more than to dedicate my life to a guy who deserves it, and I want to know I deserve all that goodness to be repaid in kind. I believe in karma, I believe in respect, I believe in sharing, in trust, and in faith.
What I don’t believe is that one general definition of what marriage is, is the right way for our society to operate anymore. I don’t believe the vows say enough. I think we need to expand our perceptions of how marriages can operate. These days, there are new commuter marriages and even “open marriages.” Me, I’m more traditional than that. Yeah, I’d like to maintain separate bedrooms, but that’s because I’m at heart a pragmatic woman… and I can be a real night-owl and I suffer insomnia. It’s pragmatism, not cynicism.
Maybe if I’d been raised in a house where love ruled, maybe I’d be a different woman today. I know I would be. But let’s face it, I’m not the exception. I’m an average girl who was raised in an average marriage that fell apart in an average length of time. I’m a statistic. I’m the mean and the median, and I’m here to tell you, it just ain’t working.
But then, what today is? Relationships of all kinds need better guidance. People everywhere don’t know how to communicate. Whether it’s with a business client, a boss, or a lover, we really need to get our shit together. We need more respect. We need more understanding. But we also need to set a broader, more encompassing groundwork in all those relationships. We don’t know what the words “honour and cherish” mean anymore. We can’t even commit to buying a fucking cell phone, for god’s sake, and you want to talk lifetime commitment?
No, marriage as it stands today is not something I would enter into. Its recent history is one that is predominantly uninspiring. Love is all you need, right? Right, sure. It’s too bad, but most marriages detonate like a time bomb. People enter into marriage based on the models they know – the vows they speak, the parents they’ve had, the little they see in the media – thus, so many end so poorly.
I’m not saying a pledge of undying love is cheesy or antiquated – I’m just saying that marriage needs more. It needs much, much more, and none of that is suggested by the ceremony of old.
And I couldn’t even begin to suggest how to fix it. All I know is, the marriage I see around me is not the marriage I’ll have. I probably will marry in some way, but it sure as shit won’t be the routine marriage the media wants us to believe is still laden with love and affection. THAT is the anomaly, and yes, its rare occurrence is worth defending and fighting for. The few of you who have that, speak loudly, because the rest of us do indeed need to see it’s possible. We need to see something more real, more lasting than the bullshit like Bad/Jen/Angelina that the media wants us to idolize.
Love will never, ever be dated. Commitment will never, ever be antiquated. But the societal rules and the ceremonial approaches can be, and are, out-of-touch with the world at large. Marriage is broke. When 60% of them die on the vines, it’s time to find out where the fuck we’re going wrong. This is no time for romantics. There’s nothing sadder than watching a marriage die, especially when you’re a kid in the mix with front-row seats.
No kid needs to stand in the frosted air outside their house and hear the reality of a failed marriage, its insults and coldness, being hurled back and forth inside. No kid needs to write in their journal wondering when in the hell the yelling and name-calling is finally going to end, wishing for a divorce. Society needs a reality check. Kids deserve something better than the average marriage and the pettiness most marriages dissolve into.
And I wish I could suggest what that might be, instead of pointing my finger at the obvious. But just don’t tell me that marriage is a slice of pie. I’ve seen otherwise, and I know there’s a hell of a lot of people who can empathize with my experiences. That, in itself, is every bit as tragic as all of what I’ve had to write on this topic, but seriously: Ain’t it time we get to fixin’ this mess?
(This is long, but I just don’t have the heart to edit it. My folk’s marriage devastated me as a kid, and I suppose I’m still a little too in touch with that reality. But fuck this, I’m gonna have me some breakfast and coffee and pretend it’s not on my mind anymore.)

11 thoughts on “Marriage: I Still Don't, But…

  1. Goose and Gander

    Definitely not a slice of pie. Actually, I haven’t found many slices of pie in this life. I’m the product of divorce, too, then the secondary product of my mother falling in with an absolute bastard after her divorce. Even after she finally found a good man to marry my life was dominated, for years, by a misguided idealization of my father and a burning hatred of the interregnum amor – all of which I had to come to terms with – I was lucky her second husband was a very decent man and they’ve been together for many many years, so I had a good model there. But I’m not sure I would have come to terms with it all actually, without my relationship with Goose. These interpersonal relations are so complex, just heartbreakingly so, long term relationships create friction and yet there are benefits mixed in with the tough spots. I have found Pepper Schwartz’s writings on peer marriage to be helpful – very pragmatic.

    This is a challenging subject – thanks for putting it out there.
    [gander]

  2. Professor Fate

    I don’t think marriage is any more broken today than when you were a kid or than it was in the 19th or 17th century.

    The problem is the uptight folks who live on the North American continent. Before no fault divorces appeared in the 60s and 70s many jurisdictions required “cause” for a divorce. In Georgia causes are: Adultery (includes heterosexual and homosexual relations), desertion (for at least a year), mental or physical cruel treatment, marriage between persons who are too closely related, mental incapacity at the time of marriage, impotency at the time of marriage, force or fraud in obtaining the marriage, pregnancy of the wife unknown to the husband at the time of the marriage, conviction and imprisonment for certain crimes, habitual intoxication or drug addiction, and mental illness.

    Before divorces were easy to obtain people stuck it out getting there physical and emotional needs met outside of the marital union. Partners were more tolerant of such behavior (because there wasn’t an easy out). Divorce rates are high now because you spend more time in front of a judge to plead not guilty to a traffic ticket than you do to get a divorce (or that was my experience). It is an unintended consequence of the social engineering experiment of a “no fault” divorce.

    I don’t believe the institution is broken, I think we as a society are broken.

  3. Anonymous

    .

    Steph,

    Here is an interesting, rather scholarly argument by Jeanne Ouellette. http://www.rakemag.com/stories/printable.aspx?itemID=13941&catID=146&SelectCatID=146

    She investigates, and concludes that the reason marriage as an intstitution is on the rocks is … of all things … love.

    Only after love became a reason to marry, rather than money and such, did marriage begin to decline in importance.

    I’d be interested in your thoughts on the article.

    😉

  4. virgin

    An article in the news recently that caught my eye. The headline was ‘Straight to the Altar’, and the accompanying photo was two men. I didn’t have time to read the whole thing, but the gist seemed to be about was two men taking advantage of the whole equal marriage thing. The men were best friends. They were older, straight and felt unlikely to marry again. They married each other. I’m not sure if they were just making a point, or if one needed the other’s health benefits or what, but it was interesting.

    And that’s the problem with legal marriage. It has nothing to do with relationship, sex or committment. It has everything to do with taxes and health benefits.

    I still believe in the sanctity of marriage, just not the legality of it.

  5. scribe called steff

    Gander — But I like pie. I want more pie. Strawberry, or maybe apple. Blackberry can be tasty.

    Relationships are a bitch, period. They can be SO great, but usually, they fail. Almost always, really. Every now and then someone lucks out and finds the love of their lives –AND works hard enough to keep them.

    I think the silly notion most folks have is that 50% of relationships fail, but that’s just marriages. I’d be interested in the real numbers for failed RELATIONSHIPS, which would have to be in the high 90s. Anyhow. That’s just depressing. And say, Valentine’s IS coming up, isn’t it? Ha. Biggest break-up day of the year. How ironic.

    Professor — Yo, I ain’t gonna argue with you about society being broken. This is one fucked-up world we’re living in, and all our priorities are wrong. Maybe marriage isn’t broken, but our perception and handling of it is, absolutely. But it’s a big subject and there’s room for more than one viewpoint, obviously. 🙂

    Anon — THAT will require intellect, something that’s not on my side on this long Sunday’s eve. I’ve worked seven days in a row now and start a new job thing tomorrow that has me utterly distracted, so maybe tomorrow night I’ll take a boo at that. Thanks for the linkage. Errrr… okay, you’re gonna be waiting on a response to that. That’s fucking long! Nice font, though, so that bodes well for me reading it.

    Off the top of my head, though, I would say that love/money isn’t the point — the point is that this is a shallow, vacuous society we’re living in these days, and too few people A) know what they want before the do the asking for it and B) know how to keep it when they do the getting. Communication’s a lost art, and empathy is an illusion. There are ALWAYS people who defy these statements, who keep my hope in humanity alive, and then I get out in the world and see more vapid people who don’t have a clue how to respect people around them. Professor’s right, this society’s broken. There are so many values just absolutely absent in this continent’s daily life that it’s really starting to expose weaknesses in all areas, gaping weaknesses. Impending doom-kind of weaknesses, really.

    Virgin — I can’t really argue much of that, actually. The gay marriage thing is a huge issue in my world. Sanctity of marriage, it really depends on who’s doing the marrying. I think it’s bullshit when you have friends marrying like that, though, because it makes a mockery of all the fighting and struggling done by the homosexual community for the last number of decades.

    Legally, though, there are issues re: benefits/civil access, etc., that make skeptics like me feel we have to toss aside our values in order to have a voice if our lover ever needs us when they can’t vouch for them. Guys like the above, though, they’re giving ammunition for conservatives to say, “See? This flaunts EVERYTHING,” and have those rights stripped again. It’s bullshit.

    Bah, I don’t know.

    See, the irony for me is that the notion of marriage is a profound one. Commitment itself is profound to me. I don’t need religion, a god, a ceremony, or any of that to know what’s in my heart, to know what my thoughts for the future are, nor to know what it’s going to take in order for me to be a success at it. But the rebel’s in me pissed that I’m being told that without the church, without the paper, my love is essentially meaningless. That’s simply bullshit. I’m tired of all the laws saying when love is or isn’t enough. Law doesn’t know sweet fuck all about that.

  6. wunelle

    I’m not sure that I have the measure of this discussion, really. But here’re my 2cents:

    If we look thru the other end of the telescope, we are reminded that we are programmed to pair-bond for the purposes of making children. Our instincts are to crave sex and to love what comes as a result of it (though not, interestingly, to connect these two things). The “seven year itch” has been explained (posited) as our having been programmed to keep our need for the new & exciting at bay for approx. the length of time the man is needed to assist with childrearing.

    This doesn’t help to fix marriage, but it reminds us that what we call marrige is just a thin topcoat put over the dense flesh & bone over which we have no control (and less understanding). I think “marriage” deserves only provisional reverence.

    One of the things that drives me crazy about the conservative opposition to gay marriage is the claim that they are just “protecting” the institution of marriage. That may well be, but there’s nothing that less needs protection than male-female pair bonding. Their artificial construction of marriage may need help, but that’s a totally different thing to me.

    I think only we can individually determine the nature of our commitment to another person. Surely the flush of discovery and sex that characterizes a new relationship (and which all numbers of romance novels and love stories celebrate) must be recognized as what it is: a mechanism to bond us to another person. It’s great and glorious, but it’s not the whole thing. A common criticism of marriage (tho not one that you’ve made, Steff) is that it stops one from being able to play the field. Well and good. But playing the field also involves costs, by preventing the deeper things–the different things that movies are only rarely made about–that one finds in the 25th year of marriage. I love my wife above all things, but I could give a hoot whether we were married in anyone’s eyes but our own. Our love is different now in its seventh year, but it’s still love. And we work at it every day.

    I just think we must forge our own way.

  7. Anonymous

    I’ve been married for 13 years, and we are as good as never before. We’re trying to have another baby, our sexlife has really spiced up because of that. I see why you don’t trust in marriages; my wife didn’t either (her parents are divorced as well), but mine have a really happy marriage, and I’ve learned A LOT from them. They told me that there are three very important keywords when it comes to making a marriage last:

    Connection – sex, love and body contact are the most important ones. It brings you as a couple closer, and you can be lovers, not just two people who live in the same house and have some kids and have some jobs. If you don’t manage to keep the love and the lust, everything is lost. Sex and cuddeling keeps the passion alive.

    Respct – respect and trust is essential to make it. I just read an interesting article about a prostitute who’s giving women advices on how to keep their husbands. She says that the woman has to understand that she’s number 2. That her needs aren’t as important. That you shouldn’t bitch. Just say that your husband is right and not fight over small things. I say bullshit! I say that bitch around as much as you want if you have a good reason. It’s like constructive criticism. But if you say something out of the line or speak to me in a disrespectful manner or try to master me (didn’t find a better synonym, hope you understand – I’m foreign), I’ll say stop. And that goes both ways. I also need to be able to trust her – I have my secret notes and diary, she has her’s. And we know where it’s kept, but we don’t read.

    Communication – if you have something to say, say it. If you have a problem with me, tell me, so I know what is bothering you. Don’t just turn away and refuse to have sex and be mad, because if I don’t know what’s wrong, I can’t do anything about it. Men always wants to DO SOMETHING, while women always talk. That goes for us too. So she handles most of the talking, at least starts it if she feels we have a problem. Either if she’s mad at me or I’m mad at her. And then I always comes up with a good solution to fix things. Either it is because she wants me to take more responisbillity and care of the children or if we have a sexproblem. We are usually sexually intimate 3 times a week. But say, if se turns me down one, I think “ok, fine”, but twice I get a little irritated, and if it happens three times in a row, we talk about it. And then we can fix it. So, as Steff has said many times; communication, communication, communication!

    I have a lot more to say on this subject, but I guess I’ll leve it like this for now. Just don’t lose faith in marriage. soem of us make it, and you can too if you just know how.

    (No, I’m not christian, nor is my wife. I think marrige is good because it’s more difficult to break out of. I don’t think marriage is more holy than a long-term relationship. I’m jus a hopeless romantical guy who loved the idea of showing everone I know my love for this beautiful, wonderful woman.)

  8. Southern

    Steph…appreciate your honestry and thoughts on this. I think my mom n dad were fairly happy with one another..they were married 50+ years. I, myself, was in a 25 year marriage that I should have ended long before it did end. I kept staying because I felt my mom n dad would be disapointed in me and that if they could make their marriage work, I should have been able to also. Unfortunately I didn’t give enough weight to my wife’s alcohol problem and the emotional issues she had with her dad. I should have paid attention to them, more.

    My daughter says now she enjoys seeing me happier. That makes me feel better about ending the marriage. Learn from the past but look to the future.

    Regards..

  9. scribe called steff

    I’ll get back to everyone else’s comments when I have the time, but first and foremost, Brainchild…

    Um, thanks for the thoughts, but while my past hurts sometimes still hurt, they’ve made me the woman I am — a pretty fuckin’ cool chick with some pretty skookum-good insights on the world at large.

    In my world, “God” isn’t love. Love is an emotion we put forth out of genuine interest and desire for others. Love is what we make it, and my love is made as well as it can be. I’m a great person, really ethical, really moral, but when it comes down to it — I ain’t a damned bit religious, and I won’t apologize for it. Spiritual yes, but radically not religious. Not even sure I believe in god.

    So, there ya go. Apparently hell has a seat waiting for me, according to some people I’ve spoken with in the past. Que sera sera. 🙂

  10. Anonymous

    I don’t see why you can’t define marriage however you want it. Why be so concerned with how other people view it, the media views it and vows?

    Furthermore, why set yourself up in narrow constraints of what you will and won’t do?

    I’m educated, quirky, smart, chubby and keep odd hours. I married my best friend who I love with all my heart and built a six bedroom house – big enough for us both to have offices to ourselves, while still sharing a bedroom.

    10 years later we are still really content. It has not been that hard to be happy together and live our lives – busy at times but not hard. We have better sex now than before. We travel and explore the world. We both created dream jobs and do well – not just money but really enjoying our work.

    I came from a broken home too. I had a father who was a real asshole but therapy helped me learn to understand that was just his issues. My issues were my problem and I needed to fix them, so I did. I worked on healing myself but I’m still the same person basically.

    We’ve adopted three kids now and we have this great family unit thing going on. I love my husband even more when he became a father. I love the man he is even more now as I watch him heal our daughter’s wounds from past abuse or show our sons how a man lives his life.

    I guess my point is don’t paint yourself in a corner.

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