[xx-18] Marriage Blurb

Of course do you and I've been to some fun weddings, but the more I read this, the more I'm proud of its concise yet encompassing nature. I also may have lied about being married because reddit is where I go to lie :). The question was "What does marriage mean to you?"

Marriage is sobriety. I've personally never been capable of prolonged "deep feeling" regarding anyone, so when I was married, it was more transactional and for her. It's impossible for me to deny the attraction I have for...well everyone I find attractive, and I don't make strict line in the sand comparisons about the fun or conversations I can have with who I was to my wife. The sober reminder, that while you care about this person, they are a person, one of many potential "the ones." Something *beyond* you and them belays ideas of *us.*

Marriage is putting someone first. That was sort of the guiding light that many people call "commitment." I allowed certain things I wanted to do or say be subsumed by her desires. Unfortunately, it's hardly a perfect system when your spouse decides to stop talking to you or the stress from sacrificing yourself works its way into your bones. It was nice while it lasted, but hardly something I consider reliable.

Marriage is convention. Regardless of what I discovered over time, be it in someone's struggles they shared online or in a book, or just what I figured out through dating, the all-purpose fixer-upper glory day remains when you get married. If you're lucky you get to revel in the honeymoon phase. You start to adopt a way of speaking that you've heard from your parents or on television. I inched out a lot of the quirk or spontaneity I considered myself, at one point, full of.

Marriage is an investment. Like all investments, it's subject to inbuilt risk. I made big romantic professions. I put money down. I opened up to moving mountains of my personality so the packed earth could house something we would build together. I found the market to be rigged. A fantasy stoked as often as someone opens their mouth to profess the love and beauty. When it fails, instead of blaming obvious culprits, a game of finger-pointing and hot potato ensue. Neither of us deserved it.

Marriage means an illusion. It's the illusion against divorce. It's the illusion that your life can mimic a Disney movie or your favorite romantic holiday. It's forcing yourself to focus on the special date or great sex scene while ignoring years of dirty clothes, passive aggressive comments, and morning breath. It's the song and dance of togetherness and renaming "forcing it" with "better together." Marriage means politics. This is your cage so come to the table or be nuked and sanctioned. But make sure your facebook only displays the best smiles from the convention.

Marriage means denial. Denial for its roots in property negotiations. Denial of systems that do it in an arranged way with equal or greater "success" when you consider social power dynamics. It's denial of human psychology and sexuality. It's denial that the "sanctity" is not bestowed by some timeless all-loving being in the sky.

Marriage is hope. The childlike hope instilled in you since you can remember that it's about you and your feelings and your story and nothing else. The hope that while you pursue the heights of selfish indulgent and extravagant thinking, you'll remain capable and worthy to opine on selflessness and "love." The hope that people will believe your photo montage and forget what they know about you from school. The hope that even one thing can remain stable against the tide of truth that is enduring change.

Marriage means nothing to me, and it's why I understand it as something that can mean absolutely anything to someone else.