Marriage...

Any other Princess Bride fans out there? "Mawwaige ... mawwaige is wha' bwings uff togevah, today."  Love that movie.  Love to mimic that marriage ceremony.  Probably be good if no-one ever asked me to get my internet credentials to solemnize their marriage - between my love of bad imitations and my track record with weddings (Sean and I were married by a judge in a pumpkin suit), I'd probably be a risky bet.

Two different people made me think about marriage this week.  Lots of times I take it for granted - being married - and one of my friends commented this week that she had long thought if she just got divorced, then her live would be stress free, and then she realized all the new stresses that would come from being divorced in her current stage of life.  And I thought to myself how easy it is, when you are annoyed with your job or your work or your house or whatever, to just think of that green grass on the other side of the offending fence.  It's deceptive sometimes. 

And then I woke up this morning to several Facebook posts from another friend, announcing her impending move out of the house and divorce, and already scouting for a replacement wife for her husband so he can be happy since she can't seem to make him happy.  Shocking way to start my day.  Those friends are from long ago and I've only seen them once in the past 10+ years, but I was there when the relationship began and was one of two witnesses to their wedding, and it made me sad to think that this is the end after 18 or so years.  Later today was informed that perhaps the end is not as near as it appeared last night.  Perhaps after a night to sleep on it, that green grass didn't appear quite so green, eh?

I was married once before, to my first boyfriend.  We got married when we were 23, after dating for 2 years.  On the day of our wedding, he was just an ass to me that I actually considered calling it off.  I realized then that this was not a marriage that would last and I remember very coldly thinking that I would marry him, have my children, and then dump him - and in that way, I would get my kids and get to keep his family.  I was not "in love" on my wedding day.  We should have broken up.  My parents weren't crazy about him, so they would not have presented any arguments against calling off the wedding, but I didn't tell anyone what was going on in my head.  Thank goodness no children were conceived in that marriage!  I was so bloody naive to think that divorce would have been any kind of solution, post-children.  Marriage ended after 2.5 years when we separated, filled out DIY divorce papers one night over supper at Perkins, and the divorce was final just a month shy of our third anniversary.  One of the best things I ever did - ending that fiasco of a marriage.

When Sean and I met, it was a whirlwind.  I didn't expect to even like him, when our mutual friend fixed us up, and the fact that we even had a 2nd date is a testament to Sean's efforts.  But about a month in, I knew it was a good thing.  The biological clock business started in my head (I was 36). And three months after our blind date, we picked a wedding date in the fall, while out walking the dog.  He hadn't even proposed yet!  I told him, long before he proposed, that I wasn't getting divorced again, and if we got married, it was forever for me.  That still holds true, as we wrap up our first decade of marriage, but I am the first to admit that marriage is hard and certainly not the romantic b.s. that pop culture would have us believe. 

I think divorce has it's place, just as I think there are lots of marriages that never should have happened, but it still makes me sad when good solid people struggle in the trenches of their relationship.  There is no stock answer either - what works for one person, doesn't always work for another.  The reality is that there is green grass, and nasty thorny weeds, and everything in between, on both sides of the fence.