Oct 09 2008
Love And Marriage
Love and Marriage
Love and Marriage
Go together like a horse and carriage…
I was on the phone to an old work colleague earlier and she asked when I would give her the opportunity to buy a new hat. I told her she’ll be waiting a while.
So, let’s hear your thoughts on marriage. In an age where the divorce rate is ever increasing and the average age when people tie the knot is going up and up. Since 2002 the divorce rate has gone up 70%. Is Ireland turning its back on marriage, now that ‘living in sin’ is now the preferred choice? In a state where those who can’t marry are campaigning for it and those who are married are trying to get out of it, where do you stand on it?
I personally have no problem with it, but don’t think it’s for me. I grew up seeing many of my friends’ parents separating and it became common place very quickly. More common however was the number of clearly failed marriages that stayed together out of apathy, fear of change or ‘for the kids’. I never saw marriage as a positive option, something to look forward to, and I still don’t. It always seemed to me to be part of a forced and institutionalised system and never about love, commitment or loyalty.
I understand what marriage is for. I do know that some people get married so they can publicly declare their devotion to another person, but it seems now to me more about the ‘big day’ than all the days that come after it. If marriage is so important to people then why don’t more people have smaller private ceremonies. Instead, we have ever aggrandised titanic weddings (I’m using the word to its fullest) – weddings that are bigger and bigger and increasingly doomed to hit the proverbial iceberg.
I don’t think I’m being particularly cynical here. I don’t understand the huge expense that goes into these events and I definitely don’t see how they can ever symbolise what the marriage is supposed to be – a long term commitment to someone you love. I know a few married people and while some of them seem very happy with married life, more do not and have actively sought divorces. And yet this does not put them off the institution.
I don’t know. I haven’t fully formed my thoughts on the subject yet, but I do know that I would rather spend all of that money on doing up the apartment, taking a long holiday, buying a new car, anything rather than forking out thousands upon thousands for one day of drunken dancing (fun as it may be).
I’d love to hear what others think on this. Am I a cynic? Am I wide of the mark? Enlighten me.
If I had your view on marriage Darren, I wouldn’t do it either! 🙂
My parents have been happily married for 31 years and himself’s had a nasty horrible divorce that went on for years and only ended recently.
Despite our completely different backgrounds we have the same view on marriage. Forget the wedding and the pomp and circumstance, MARRIAGE itself is a commitment to each other that is for life.
We went through a rough patch there a few months ago, but despite that, I knew that we had to get through it because this is it, unless one of us die. Without that formality there was always “an out,” if you will, but I see marriage as taking away that option.
Some people don’t. They see divorce as always being a viable option (which of course in many cases involving abuse, neglect etc. etc. it is) before ever tying the knot. But if you go in knowing that it’s a lifelong commitment, you don’t give yourself the option of divorce.
We both feel the same way and it means that no matter how hard it gets at times we HAVE to sort it out. I remember just a few days before the wedding we had a HUGE fight and in the back of my mind I knew I could still walk away. I haven’t had that thought since, because I can’t walk away. I’ve made a commitment to himself and to myself.
You have to work at a marriage as you do any relationship. It’s not all hunky dory. Ultimately to me, it’s the same as a serious relationship with that option of escape taken away. But that’s because of my attitude towards it, if you don’t see it like that, then yeah, why bother?
I know personally I could never have had children with someone who couldn’t make that commitment. If they couldn’t commit to me for life, how could they commit to their children for life? Something much more important… just my two cents.
I have a hard time comprehending how a house and even children often come before the wedding here… very odd! Although I wonder if it’s as much a financial thing as anything else. How is it that an unmarried couple who’ve been living together longer than we have are eligible for a single parent allowance? It’s quite substantial money… can see why people would want to remain unmarried!!
Ultimately it’s a very personal thing, it may or may not be for you, but if it wasn’t something special then why are so many homosexuals fighting for it???
well, i’m getting married in less than a month! the boy is divorced already, and to be honest with you i never thought i’d get married and want children, but when i met him i wanted it all – with him!
we’re having a small, intimate ceremony and then lunch with family and close friends (not even 20 people) and that’s that. we are doing this because we will be together forever, and as Deborah said above, we are making this commitment so that we can’t just walk out when things get tough. we’re together forever and that’s it.
the fact that people get married and divorce today so easily or that people decide to be stuck into a bad relationship instead of choosing to be happy does not scare me or put me off marriage. people make “bad” choices everyday and i do something different. i am my own person. just because the boy’s first marriage ended should it make him put off being happy?
it’s really a matter of choice, i think, and i chose to be happy with him.
So I am just wasting my time here? Pfftht!
Marriage. Phfft! I know more that have failed than worked out (by work out I am putting a pan of say 16 years on it). People I went to school with have gotten married and are already separated – Which is absurd.
I think that marriage introduces a lot of pressures on a realtionship – or maybe that’s just my own fears of feeling trapped. I believe that if you want to be with someone it should be for the right reasons not becuase a piece of papers says so, or your parents want “a day out” or you want to have children.
If people are happy living in sin then why rock the boat? They say marriage is hard work? Why should it be? Where’s the sence in that. Yes all realtionships take a bit of TLC from time to time but the some of the married couples I know treat marriage as a licence to take each ther for granted.
Not really a believer in marriage.My parents have been married for about 28 years and have stuck by each other through thick and thin. But i’ve known far more separations and divorces than happy marriages.Each to their own but it’s a running joke in my family that the day i get married my mum will laugh as i’ve been repeating the mantra marriage is not for me for years 🙂
I think if both people in the relationship want to get married to each other because they want to make a commitment to each other rather then giving people a ‘day out’ then it’s a good thing.
I don’t like the idea of people getting married and having the attitude of it having to be bigger and better then the last wedding they were at as in, well Anne got married last year and it cost her €60k and had fairies dancing at it so I want to get married and it has to be at least €70k and I’m going to have lepruachans at it, I don’t like when people throw money at it and get themselves in thousands of pounds and years of debt just to have a party and aren’t thinking of the true meaning of marraige, of loving, taking care, standing by and being there for each other in the good times AND the bad times.
If I was to get married it’d be a small affair with only the people I really wanted at it and not aunts, uncles, cousins and neighbours who I don’t talk to from one end of the year to the other.
I think some people who get married do it for the big day out, the planning and buying, researching etc and haven’t really thought about the ‘afters’ of it, of being with that one person everyday for the rest of your life and not walking out when the going gets tough.
If I get married it will be for life and because I love the person, not for the big day out and the party.
@Deborah @Tatty As I said, it’s not for me, but you both summed up exactly what it should, i.e. a commitment for life, not an excuse for a big bash or just a stop gap between first, second, third divorces.
I might take issue with Deb’s comment “If they couldn’t commit to me for life, how could they commit to their children for life?”. I don’t believe parents need to be together forever to ensure a happy or well adjusted child. There are so many different family structures and a married man and woman are not the only requirement for a happy childhood. I don’t think this was how you meant it though, but I wanted to make the point.
@Lottie I agree – it shouldn’t be hard work, but that’s all I’ve ever seen in the marriages I’ve encountered. If something that your life pivots around is that hard, how could it be worth it?
@Greenie I think most of my family have finally given up on the idea that we might give them a ‘day out’. 🙂
@Mary Leprechans? Is Darragh coming? But yes, I don’t understand how two people could start their lives with such massive wedding debts over their heads. It’s frighteneing.
“Mawage. Mawage is wot bwings us togeder tooday. Mawage, that bwessed awangment, that dweam wifin a dweam…”
Its a personal choice I suppose – you can view it as an antiquated institution that has no relevance in the modern world, or as one of the highest forms of loving commitment – ’till death do you part’.
I think the idea of marriage is very compelling though probably over-romanticised. Personally, given the right circumstances, I would prefer it over a life as ‘just a couple’ – I like the idea of the deliberate and sincere promise and having the opportunity to involve those friends, family and loved ones in celebrating that decision.
But each to their own.
i think marriage is a good thing a fair bit of the time… but only when there’s no get-out clause.
i’ll give an example.
my parents don’t really like each other at all, never did.
they also don’t really have any friends.
so it seems like a comforting thing to know that they’ll always have one person with them… even if they despise each other, beats no one.
60k? Holy Christ!
One of the few wedding photos I have seen that made me go – now that would do me was posted by Annie Rhiannon a while ago of a wedding she attended in Iceland. The couple looked so happy and it was simple and lovely. Have a look here.
Darren
My response is way to long I will write a post tomorrow and link back to you.
My parents started going out when my Mom was 12 and my Dad was 13. They were playing some ball game in a circle and my Dad kept throwing it to my Mom. They have been married for 27.5 years and still cuddle on the couch. No one makes either of them laugh like the other can and they do things on their own as well as with all of us often. In saying that though, its not Walton Mountain where I live, they have humdingers like every couple and ours is certainly not a quiet household…with laughing AND shouting! 🙂
They are great rolemodels and I often say that if I am half as happy as them when I am married I will be doing well.
I am 26 now and single, have I already met the man I will end up with or is he still a mystery?
Who knows….. but one thing is for sure, I believe in marriage and making a commitment and making it work. And as the promoter of a wedding website, I sure hope that I get my ‘big day’ in whatever form that takes!! 😉
Good topic Darren.
My view was I would never get married – I am not religious (thank god ;)) and didnt see the point of some public commitment.
But when we had kids things did change. The legal system in Ireland is such that is my partner died and we were not married then the automatic guardianship of the kids goes to her parents as net of kin. Now they are lovely beautiful people and I couldnt ask for anyone better to raise them if we were both gone. And I couldn’t see them ever making an issue of things if their daughter died. BUT you never know. Weirder things have happened and so I had to think of the kids first.
So we decided that the best for them and their security and our own (there were also issues with my life insurance going to her if we were not married) we decided to get married.
Small registry office seremony, meal with the family and a bit of a dance and drink. Total I paid for the wedding? 13€ for the registry office.
Peter
PS The tax benefits didnt hurt either. I was better off by a significant amount after being married. I am not trying to be cynical here – money and less legal issues but the Irish state ALWAYS errs in favour of married people and they are inherently protected much better than those not married.
Good topic Darren.
My view was I would never get married – I am not religious (thank god ;)) and didnt see the point of some public commitment.
But when we had kids things did change. The legal system in Ireland is such that is my partner died and we were not married then the automatic guardianship of the kids goes to her parents as net of kin. Now they are lovely beautiful people and I couldnt ask for anyone better to raise them if we were both gone. And I couldn’t see them ever making an issue of things if their daughter died. BUT you never know. Weirder things have happened and so I had to think of the kids first.
So we decided that the best for them and their security and our own (there were also issues with my life insurance going to her if we were not married) we decided to get married.
Small registry office seremony, meal with the family and a bit of a dance and drink. Total I paid for the wedding? 13€ for the registry office.
Peter
PS The tax benefits didnt hurt either. I was better off by a significant amount after being married. I am not trying to be cynical here – money and less legal issues, but the Irish state ALWAYS errs in favour of married people and they are inherently protected much better than those not married.
Peter makes an excellent point, and i think i would favour marriage for the same reasons. it’s unfortunate that that’s how the legal system is, but my priority would be to safeguard my family’s rights rather than stage a one woman protest.
and the idea of someone committing to me in front of witnesses is not without its charms, i’ll admit.
I believe in it i have to say. I think todays idea of committment involves signing papers with your bank manager and not in front of god though.
People seem to get wrapped up in the wedding more so than the marriage part. Its all about the day and this kinda short sightedness can set some people off on the wrong foot. Not as many people are getting married these days anyway, its just the way society is going.
Me? How i’d do it? Close friends and family, sign the papers and take everyone out on the town. Honeymoon in Lahinch Co Clare in a Liscannor stone cottage and surf.
I dont know if i will be able to surf when im 74 though.
I’m trying to stop wobbling myself with the giggles at B’dum.
10, maybe even 5 years ago I agreed with everything you’ve said, to the letter.
Then overnight it hit me, we had been together for seven years or so, there wasn’t even the slightest doubt that we would part ways, we should get hitched.
So we did. Bought a couple of rings and an airplane ticket and tied the knot by ourselves, only for ourselves, in New Orleans.
If the basis is there in a relationship, trust, love, respect and the rest off the cliché list, then committing like that only strengthens and secures.
As for the ‘Irish Wedding’ Industry….it makes me a little ill, and speaks volumes about how our superficiality has mutated.
30K to feed Aunts and Uncles you don’t know or like just to save face.
If I had 30k to flit down the loo I would much rather spend it on taking a few months off work and go travelling around the world.
Heh, about an hour ago, himself says to me’ I can’t wait until we’re married, so I can treat you like shit’ in response to what was going on on the telly(Guy walking out on his wife after her moaning he was late home).
I love him, he loves me, I look forward to us getting married some day 🙂
Inevitably people fall out from time to time. I kind of view marriage as the necessary coercion not to chuck it in if it all gets rather difficult, and the point at which it typically gets difficult is when kids arrive on the scene. The concept of marriage is essentially there for the darkest hour when, if you hadn’t made that promise, you’d be tempted to take the easy option and sling your hook. Instead, ideally, you grow up and look at what the problem is like an adult and sort it out.
I fully understand that there are many justifications for divorce (mental illness, abuse, being a lazy waste of space useless fuck like my former bro in law), but I reckon that if some of those who got divorced spent a bit less time either wallowing in self pity or focussing on their narrow point of view it might have been possibly to disrupt the bad patterns in the relationship and get things onto a new track.
I also really think the boomers are a product of the “century of the self” and as such many are a bit wishy washy when it comes to having the nads to just fucking get on with it when the going gets tough.
Darren, your perception of it all is very accurate I think. I’d personally much rather stock up on a truck load of technology than go through the whole thing. Don’t tell Emma though. I’ve afeeling she may not appreciate that.
Personally, I can appreciate why people may use it as a public declaration of devotion however my opinion is, that desire to make your commitment so public just reflects a certain insecurity that you are afraid that your partner is going to get taken by someone else or the love /respect that you share with that person isn’t enough to keep the two of you together.
A friend of mine actually said a few days ago that for the first two or three years of a relationship, you have passionit love. After that, you have normal reserved love but after more time, you get respect and friendship. I think he was particularly sinical but it has certainly made me think. Do people actually believe that and if so, maybe marriage is the glue that people need to reintensify that life long commitment.
I do think that for couples who go down the road of having a family, marriage is a very useful way of formally recognising the defined social order of things and yes, to bring it back to my last point, it is an extra glue to keep things together if feelings get a bit week at the foundations after a while.
I suppose, a lot of things change. People change, society will change, feelings change. It’s all a constant learning curve. It may help to have one constant through it all.
Their just the uneducated and unexperienced ramblings of someone who hasn’t made his mind up. However, I am now going to make sure I have a will in case my better half ever reads this.
Never met anyone that I would have married.
I guess it’s just a state of mind ….. a couple is a couple … married or not.
It just makes it ‘official’ …. it tells the world … ‘we are one’.
Marriage for me personally ….. hard to say …. at 40 I reckon I’m getting too long in the tooth for all that.
If I were to marry it would be a simple, private affair ….. cos the two most important people would be there! 🙂
Darren is it getting married or being married that you have the most problem with?
Getting married is nothing more than a promise to each other. I agree with Lottie – I’d go travelling rather than the expense. While the tax breaks are beneficial and all that legal stuff, it’s not a necessary complication to add, if it’s not for you.
Being married is about commitment, dedication and love for the one person. From seeing you both in all sorts of situations and at all sorts of times, you and Lottie are probably more “married” than a lot of the couples I know. Like many of the other fine commenters here, my parents are a great example to me of people who have made it work. You and Lottie are another one.
I wouldn’t say no to the chance to dance at your wedding, but would be as happy to dance at Ben’s cottage in Clare to the sound of the uileann pipes before we take to the beach at dawn. I’d be just as happy for you both as I am now.
Yis bastids.
I’ll do it for the tax breaks, I’ll do it for our kids, and I’ll do it for less than five grand. I don’t want a fancy wedding, I want a marriage.
I think there is some confusion between a wedding and a marriage.
The wedding is the big ceremony day. You can (and some do) spend an absolute fortune on a wedding day, others pay the bare minimum on a civil (or church) service, get the legal forms signed and might go as far as having a quite meal with their witnesses and parents.
A marriage is the life-long commitment and legal benefits and obligations.
If you’ve been in loving relationship for the last 20 years, you probably don’t have to worry about the commitment bit; you already have it.
The legal bits are the reason there is a gay marriage debate; e.g. together for 20+ years, and after death, the other half has no legal right to their shared home and may have no rights to access to any children. If you’re together for 20 years, the marriage will be strong.
If you’re scared; don’t get married until each of you have nursed the other through a bad cold. You get to see their/your true non-thinking self. If you can both live with that… no worries. Remember the in sickness and in health and the for better or worse.
If you are thinking of spending the rest of your life with someone. Mention it. If it scares both of you, talk about it. Find out what you both think.
And if its just the wedding part that worries you. Elope… no wedding costs (its your day), but the start of a marriage.
@Sheepie Maybe that’s just it – that ‘promise’ just seems so insincere to me. Death do us part? I just don’t buy it.
@B’dum Now that’s an interesting point of view. Staying together out of lonliness is so sad though.
@GM Thank you for the spin-off. It’s a topic that seems to have struck a chord.
@Ciara Aw! That’s such a lovely attitude. I’ll marry you. 🙂
@Peter I really need to sit down and have a chat with you over a few pints. I keep catching fleeting glimpses of your past and there’s so much I’d love to ask you. As for this comment, (and @Rosie) it’s a sad state of affairs when the legal aspects of marriage come before any of the more romantic connotations. So much so that all of the romance (for me at least) has been taken away from the whole thing.
@Ben 🙂 The smaller affair does seem to make more sense and the intimacy of it is far better than some huge event.
@Xbox You got married in New Orleans? Awesome. I’ve changed my mind – I’m going home to propose right now. 😀
@Voodoo Aw! 🙂 So sweet.
@ThriftC Actually there something in that. Perhaps I do have some of that attitude. To me divorce does seem just as simple as getting married. The permanency of marriage is gone now.
@Darragh Does Emma read this blog? 😉 You seem to be having the same thoughts and ideas as me on this. I understand that if you start a family then being married kind of legitimises it, but that’s an old school idea that is rapidly changing. I’m still trying to make up my mind on where I stand.
@Paddy Don’t say that. Lottie’s mum found love at got married again at 50. There’s hope for you yet, you auld sod. 🙂
@Doyle Both, I think.
@Catherine Maybe your realistic approach to it it spot on. Who knows!
To be honest, we have talked about it and we seem to be in the same mind on the subject. It may change in the future. I don’t know. It’s more that I don’t necessarily see the advantage (other than legal or financial) in getting married. We have bought a home together, we have a cat, we’ve lasted eight years as a couple. I don’t see how marriage could add to that. As Darragh said:
i married the love of my life and my soul mate at the age of 21 (just weeks off my 22nd b.day). It was the best time of the my life and the next couple of years that followed were fantastic. We have two beautiful children (my first when i was 25), but i have to admit that sometimes i think maybe we were a bit young to know the commitment we were making to one another.
Almost 10 years on, here we are at a stage where i really need to find the reason that i choose him – (i know that might sound strange), but over the past couple of years, we have changed a lot, being through alot – achived alot – and here we are two totally different people then we were when we first meet almost 14 years ago.
i find myself sometimes wondering if i still Love him, and even though i know i do, i sometimes find it hard to find and show. i think we are going through a part of our marriage where we have to discover each other again and then fall in love all over again, i dont’ want anyone else to take that spot in my life.
We are as always very committed to one another, and i think this helps, but i think if we weren’t married, and didn’t have the children it would be easy to walk away, to not put in the effort, and take a different direction.
Marriage takes work – no extra work that any other relationship, and it will work if both people want it to work, you just have to learn to take the good with the bad – and as with anything else you’ll get your fair share of both.
I’ve skipped over here from Grannymar.
People have pointed out the difference between marriage and wedding. Good!
I wish the English/British state would encourage marriage by a sensible tax regime…but I loathe the idea of a religious basis for this estate…if that is what the couple want then they should decide but the contract (for that is what it is) is a civil affair and should be bound by civil law.
In sickness and in health is the phrase that I take most notice of…my wife was ill with a “Personality disorder”. Several of her friends (I use the term loosely here) said I should get out and find someone else. Sickening, this is the mother of my children.
Those who choose not to formalise their relationship must take their own course but note should be taken of their wishes in case one or other dies and when children are involved the remainnig partner should have “custody”.
Ther is so much one can say but when push comes to shove …each to his or her own and if you decide to get married do not let the families interfere with the way you want it.
By the way…37 years as a teacher has taught me that marriage is not always a guarantee of successful child rearing..it helps tho’. That is if you are allowed or encouraged to bring up your own children….15 hours a day childcare to be available to parents of children over 2 in the U.K……
Oh my, what a topic. Me thinks, there’s marriage and there’s the ‘institution of marriage.’ I feel so many times, when this topic comes up, it seems the two are jumping around each other like beans.
Marriage in its purest meaning is a convergence, a merging, a union, an alchemy of elements coming together to ‘make’ something new. One doesn’t need the state’s consent to create that ‘state’. On the other hand, the institution of marriage is about taxes, and rights and protection, laws, and yes, about religious/societal order. The institution of marriage as it exists in reality approves of some folks and not others – it rewards some and not others – it also punishes those who don’t want it a’tall, ie, tax breaks etc. (Darren, you not gonna get your tax breaks, lol)
I heard a couple of people say ‘you need a no-way out commitment’. Dear me, does that actually exist? Well, I’m from the US, lol. But, I have to say, if a man told me, ‘I want to get married so there will be a ‘no way out’ when it gets tough’ , lordy, I’d run right then, lol. Truth and honesty of commitment can’t be regulated or legislated, nor judged by another. It’s there or it ain’t. That’s why we all can point in most any direction at what appears to be a marriage of the unhappy. They’re there. There also are many marriages full of joy and elasticity to move and change and grow. There are also ‘same ’ in unions without the legal stamp of the state.
My parents have been married for, hm, 66 years. They are beautiful, affectionate, still dancing, still kiss when they get tickled at each other, still cry a bit here and there when they quarrel. They are still so very in love. Seems to me, whatever ‘form’ your commitment takes, love is the thing one wants to keep alive and blossoming. Love is the key that keeps all fires burning. Love is it! Love greases the axles when the ‘tough’ comes then the hard work is no work a’tall. Flowers, talking, and picnics help too, lol. Will I ever ‘get married’? You bet I will. I am a divorcee. (thank god for divorce, bless his heart, he’s still looking for hisself after all these years under every rocknroll roadhouse that will hear his six strings twang, lol, ie, in short, one who wants a door out will find it no matter what a piece of paper says, he did, then he did again and again, then finally, I did 🙂 I jumped at marriage, the institution, too young, before my good sense set in,lol. I learned. I’ve had very good relationships since, but it seems to me, the topic of marriage takes on its on life when ‘the one’ stands before you. I look forward to that day. Will the state be a part of that, well, we’ll see, he and I’ll talk about that. 🙂 Oh and, I won’t spend 60,000, for sure, but, oh how I do love a party !! Not for show, for the pure joy of it !
Oh, hello Darren, I forgot my manners with my first comment, or, rather, I’m just learning them. Brand new to the blog world, near virgin commenter. (a bit shy, and, so full of blogbliss (that does pass, dudn’t it, takes so much time to hold my head in a paper bag to curtail the hyperventilation after each time I hit the publish button). 🙂 You can thank/blame Darr for teaching me to have nerve and to know the buttons. 🙂 I found you and Lottie and Amy thru his blog. Very lovely, insightful community. I enjoy reading all y’all’s posts.
I think I was culturally dyslexic on the tax breaks when I was kidding you. It’s US gives the breaks to the married, I know that, and Ireland the singles. Did I read that right on Ireland?
but I was being serious here mr xbox!
but i’m saying it beats nothing by a very large amount.