Marriage - Why bother?

by Spectrum 62 Replies latest social relationships

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  upside/down

  Tetra said...

  marriage is a doctrine of denial.

  For the most part I couldn't agree more...and I've been married 19 years.

  u/d
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  mrsjones5

  as long as the sex is great and they can still make you laugh....marriage is priceless.

  
  

  
  My husband has asked my why has he lasted so long with me, why do I still want him. I told him the same as above. Hopefully it will never end...the laughter.

  Josie
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  bebu

  I thought something like tetra--that surely, surely, after 20 years people must be fooling themselves if they say they are "more in love than ever before". But we're nearing #19, and I think this comment is true for us.

  I don't mean we've been feeling exactly like gushing newlyweds for 20 years. I mean that, after nearly 20 years, my husband is like the other half of me. I'm very comfortable and secure with him. We still talk for hours, understand each other better, surprise each other, help each other thru rough spots, appreciate how safe we have become with each other, etc. The history of life together has molded us into one entity...

  And I think marriage is worth bothering about.

  Whether or not you live in a culture that requires a signed paper, such paper exists only to reflect for public record the vows of fidelity (and love, hopefully!). If people are good at keeping their promises, the paper is largely superfluous in that regard. But if one or both partners are having a hard time keeping their vows to each other, then that paper gives some legal protection to the other. That's all. (As well as serve for records for posterity, I suppose.)

  My JW neighbor's husband divorced her after 5 years. He abandoned her and left her destitute--and the elders didn't do anything to help her or put pressure on him to give her assistance. I'm glad she had that paper, because the law forced him to pay up a few thousand (peanuts to him, actually), because nothing else would have made him give her anything... He actually let their house go into foreclosure, and lost several thousand personally from that, instead of paying the mortgage until it sold--because she was living there and he utterly refused to support her in any way.

  The contract gives a reference by which all agree, and none can later pretend to have been misunderstood. It's there because some people are not always entirely honest. If we all were, then I think just an oral promise and a handshake would work fine.

  bebu