I’m a twenty-something Caucasian chick from the suburbs. And I’m a minority. In several ways. Presently I’m focusing on the fact that I’m a minority amongst my friends. And not because of my race, or age, or gender, or because of where I reside. But because I’m one half of a married couple who has somehow managed to STAY married. Think about that for a minute. This may be no big deal in today’s world if I were middle aged, perhaps. But as I’ve already stated, I’m not. And neither are my friends. My coupled friends are around mine and my husband’s ages, and they are ending their marriages left and right. “Till death, do us part” has overwhelmingly become, “Till I can’t take anymore of your bullshit, do we part”. And even though we’ve all been hearing for quite some time now that approximately half of all marriages end in divorce, didn’t you always think these couples were at least making it a little longer than a few years? This isn’t Hollywood here….. Ugh. It’s so saddening to see. Especially because small children are involved. And what I also find particularly bothersome is that it’s the woman in 99% of these marriages who were the ones done dirty, who have given up the most, and who yet still stand to lose the most. Do I seem bitter? Maybe a lil bit…
We women have a habit of leaving our jobs to raise the children and care for our husbands and homes. We’re known to put off going back to school, so that our breadwinner husbands can work longer hours or go back to continue his education because he’s the one who will reap the financial benefit for the family and more quickly. (Did ya hear? Women still make approximately 70 cents for every dollar a man earns. And here in my home state of Delaware that gap is even larger.) Wives and mothers also often find that their friendships suffer because they’re too busy with the laundry, and the cooking, and changing diapers, and helping with homework, and playing chauffeur to the kids. These wives give the biggest thing they could possibly give to their husbands and children: Themselves. And when things go sour, they’re left in the wreckage, struggling to deal emotionally, with the added financial burden weighing them down as well. This is the norm among the couples in my social circle, anyway. It reminds me of the great Feminist Gloria Steinem’s famous quote, “Most women are just one man away from welfare.” I’m a Feminist. Did I mention? Well, I am. At least, I consider myself one. To a point. (Everything in moderation, I like to say.) Having stated this, I’d like to also mention I in no way feel that in order to be “pro woman” one needs to be “anti man”. I’m just callin’ it like I see it here. The ugly truth is that all but a few of the men in these broken up unions were unfaithful and dishonest. Some repeatedly. And the uncanny part of it, is that even after their indiscretions were found out, they still behaved smug and difficult to work with when it came to attempting to repair the marriage. What gives!?
Recently, it’s been proposed in Mexico by a left wing political party to change the civil code in allowing temporary marriage licenses to be issued. Two years would be the minimum “Marriage Contract”, a contract that would be renewable if the couple remained happily married. These would incorporate provisions on how the married couple’s kids and property would be handled, as well, if they chose not to continue with the relationship. This makes some sense if you take a moment to ponder how every other contract we enter into has an end date. We can lease our vehicles, at which point the lease comes to an end and we can decide whether to buy or not. This is also the case when we lease our houses, and we have terms on our mortgages. What other contracts can you think of that you’ve signed, that binds you for life?
What about the old adage, “All good things must come to an end”? Hmm? Or ponder for a moment, if you will, the fact the you are a different You today than you were even just a few years ago. And undoubtedly, so is your spouse. The dreams you had for yourself, number of children you wished to have, life goals, and hobbies of interest, they may have very well changed also. If you’re anything like me, they’ve changed and seemingly keep on a’changin’. Say, hypothetically, that you and your partner had bonded over a shared love of country music, the same social group in college, and that you both fell for one another over a shared love of rock climbing. Fast forward to married life now with two kids, minimal free time, stretch marks and stretched bank accounts… Not only are you both stressed to the max. But! You now can’t bear to hear the country music being played on the radio today, ya only see those old college buds’ faces through a social networking site now, and you are so tired all of the time that you couldn’t physically force your twice-the-size-it-used-to-be ass up a small hill let alone the side of a mountain, if you’d wanted to. This scenario doesn’t seem so far fetched to me. What happens when all of the “perfect” reasons you’d been “perfect” for one another have dissipated? Aside from one spouse betraying the other- there’s a myriad of reasons that marriages don’t last. These things may seem small, but they add up over time. There are probably literally hundreds of factors that evolve us all on a continuing basis. How can you possibly grow together in everything?
The idea of marriage proves to be different than “actual” marriage, with examples of this truth all around us. In the media and in our own families and neighborhoods we see firsthand how quickly and how nasty the demise of a marriage can be. The wedding is fantasized and romanticized. Then shortly after we’re made aware of the dirty details of deception, abuse, addictions, and mistresses. More folks are beginning to see the unrealistic expectations of “till death do us part” for what they are: Unrealistic. And many are choosing cohabitation over marriage. In the United States, rates of cohabitation among heterosexual couples have more than doubled since the 1990’s, (finds a recent study by the Pew Research Center). June Carbone, a law professor at the University of Missouri-Kansas City, stated in a New York Times piece that today females with college degrees are actually more likely to marry than those with just high school diplomas, the opposite of several decades ago. (Think these “blue collared” ladies are trying to break the cycle of depending on a man?)
I could ramble on forever about this topic of marriage. Like, for instance, how marriage first came into play when societal changes began to evolve. Ironic how marriage starts out with the man, and typically, ends with the man. See, men didn’t give two hoots about monogamy and marriage until material possessions came into play. Once males began to acquire personal physical possessions, they began to care about who their offspring were. Before this time, women and men mothered and father multiple children by multiple sexual partners, not caring who the parents of each child were. It just wasn’t a matter of importance. And all shared a communal responsibility for supporting each other: “the tribe”. But as we evolved (there’s that word again) as human beings, and structured society took over, the need to know who should rightfully get the father’s earthly belongings became an issue. Bring the need for “order” into the picture, and you now have things like man created religions that favor marriage for their own purposes as well….
Believe it or not, I’m a happily married person. It may sound like I’m advocating for divorce, or against marriage. But I recognize full well the advantages to marriage- the monogamy, emotional support, the benefits to the children, having that special someone to be there through thick and thin till the end, to share a lifetime with, and I know that the list can go on and on. It’s just that I’m a realist. My husband and I are up today, but could just as easily find ourselves down in our friends’ places tomorrow. We’ve worked on our marriage, a lot. But then, so have many of our friends. There are just certain things that marriages can’t come back from…. Each union is unique and complicated beyond anyone’s wildest imaginations. This is undoubtedly true. I’m just so damn sick of these women being the glue that’s held their marriages together for however long it lasted, then getting the short end of the stick when their husbands allow for it to crash and burn. It may take two to ‘tango’, but it only takes one to break the trust forever and destroy a marriage- leaving the lives of their children and of their once beloved wives in shambles... Their exes now faced with the struggle and uncertainty of how to move forward with their new lives, in the rubble that remains.......
No comments:
Post a Comment