Posted on 09/06/2015 5:23:02 AM PDT by Kaslin
By the time you read this, I will be dead… Well, not dead-dead, but the life I’ve led to this point will be over.
Yesterday at 1 p.m., I got married. Unless, that is, someone objected or a young Dustin Hoffman showed up and swept my then-fiancé away. Yes, I watch too many movies. But yes, I always kind of wanted to be at a wedding where someone objected or ran out of the church. Just never hoped it’d be mine.
So, barring something worthy of Hollywood, the life I’ve known since birth is now over. If you’ve been married you know the transition I’m talking about. (And every married person I know has given me some variation of “Your freedom is about to end” in the past two weeks.) If you haven’t, heed my advice from a few weeks ago and elope.
If you’re a woman, the wedding is all up to you. If you’re a man, nothing is up to you. That’s both good and bad.
First off, women go through more hell than we men can imagine when it comes to a wedding. We’ve never thought of it; they have. They may not have obsessed about it like in some horrible movie, but they’ve got some long-standing ideas in their heads.
The best you can hope for as a man is she’s had a sister close in age or a best friend get married, so they can see all the hoops you have to jump through to reach the finish line and they want no part of it. Although that does happen, it’s as unlikely as an unscheduled eclipse.
Knowing it’s coming is one thing. Knowing what’s coming is something else.
Things you’ve never imagined could be an issue will be an issue. What do I mean? Well…
I almost spray painted my front lawn this week.
Not a sentence I ever thought I’d think, let alone write. But when you put fertilizer on your grass hoping to give it some pep, and it kills it instead, well, desperate times.
I killed my lawn the week before our families showed up, which is a problem. It wasn’t going to win any awards anyway, but it was green-ish. I picked up a sack of fertilizer to give it a kick, and because it was on clearance at Target. Kevorkianed it over night.
It wasn’t a defective product. I didn’t read the instructions because a.) I’m an idiot; b.) I’m a guy – but I repeat myself; and c.) It’s fertilizer! It’s supposed to help the lawn, not kill it. The picture on the bag was of green grass – lather, rinse, repeat. Simple.
Yeah, not so much.
I threw the bag away, so I’ll never know what I did wrong. Honestly, I didn’t care, I just needed green in front of the house.
I took to the Internet to find the fastest growing grass seed available, and how fast it could grow. Turns out it is four days.
I hopped in the car, zipped to Home Depot and bought a bunch of it. Raked (because I read the instructions this time), spread it, watered and crossed my fingers. Even threw some topsoil down because the bag said that increased my chances.
My fiancé went to Amazon and bought something called Enviro-Color. I had jokingly said I could always paint the dead grass green if nothing grew; little did I know such a product exists. She didn’t doubt my ability to grow a new lawn in a week; she simply was being pragmatic.
It won’t last the winter, which is normal for these seeds and the penance you pay for a quick lawn, but it’s a green lawn right now. Needless to say, I didn’t end up painting dirt, but if I needed it the option was there.
That, to my mind, is what marriage is. It’s not a dependency – an inability to function without the help of the other – but complementing one another. Left to my own devices, I would’ve tried the seed, then been out there with cans of Krylon the night before. She let me do what I wanted to do but was ready if that didn’t work. Not with judgment; with a plan B.
Perhaps you’ve never given so much thought to dead grass, but the night before your wedding, when you have a deadline looming (in more ways than one), weird things creep between the ears.
That my wife knows that, and puts up with it, puts a smile on my face. By the way, since I’m writing this Thursday night (my second-to-last night of singlehood), that’s the first time I’ve ever used “my wife.” Unusual, to say the least, but I like it.
I woke up this morning with a wife; my old life is over. It was fun, a lot of fun (and a bit of a miracle I have any liver or brain cells left), but it’s done. And I and my naturally green grass are perfectly happy about that.
Ending my life as a single man was the best thing I have ever done. No decision in my life has brought me more joy, given me more help, or provided me with more laughs than the decision to get married. And stay married.
People who think that your “free life” has ended is marrying the wrong woman. I have always been “allowed” to do what I want. And most of the time I want to be with her, the kids, and the family.
The transition, some 29 years ago, was easy and I went gleefully down that road.
Replacing bad grass is easy and cheap..........
All the best to you. Going on 35 years and wouldn’t change a thing. Marriage is such a solid rock if you both have the same interest in making sure it works. I’ve never felt so free! So safe! So comforted! So supported! So loved! It’s a good thing.
Looks like an interesting book, but do you think there are no other excellent books about finding a great Christian marriage partner?
Checkmate (you win the debate).
Of course not.
Have you read the Neil Clarke Warren book?
Could he write before he got married?
If so, he may have a problem.
Probably something homophobic about this post. Men marrying women? Egads!
/sarc
No, but read the reviews. Looks like a good book in many ways.
But it seems to address only the natural/human elements of a relationship, and not the spiritual.
We are spiritual beings first, and the spiritual element is the most important - our relationship with God.
My book, and others, address both the natural and the spiritual side.
You and, more importantly, your daughters should read it. He is a Christian and it contains a lot of great advice for those who want to find the love of their life.
It is a great book for Christians, and non-Christians; and was written to appeal to both. Don’t discount it just because it does not come across as overtly “Christian”.
I’ll read it on your recommendation, but a number of serious books are ahead of it.
I know Warren is a Christian and I have always appreciated and valued his approach - and his building eHarmony with it was a genius homerun for sure.
I don’t claim to be in his league at all, but I have many years of pastoral/counselling and business psych training and experience utilizing some of the best personality analysis tools there are (Myers-Briggs based profiling systems) beginning in the early ‘80’s that I think Warren utilizes as well. I have found the tools, analysis and application of principles invaluable in all human relationships and I’m sure I’ll probably agree with everything Warren says.
As none of my girls are in a relationship right now, I don’t see any urgency for them to read it - but I will pass on the recommendation.
One more thing. God doesn’t play by man’s rules, and is not bound by man’s systems - even when they are fairly accurate descriptions of what He has done in the past. He cannot be put in a box. He is infinite and infinitely creative.
The most important things about marriage are 1.) being led into the marriage by God, it being His will; and 2.) the individuals personal walk and relationship with God - their Christian character or maturity; 3.) a true life-long commitment to lay down their lives for one another. Personality and temperament issues are very real, but the spiritual side overrules them. And they cannot be the foundation for making a marriage work and last.
And #2 and #3 overrule even a mistake in #1 - and can turn a relationship that is not a “natural” fit in the realm of personality and temperament into a wonderful marriage. Character and one’s personal relationship with the Lord are far more important than personality and temperament.
Don’t care if you take this personally, or not, but maybe you are the problem.
Could be that excellent marriagable men see something in your relationship with your daughters that raise red flags. I could easily be wrong, but you might want to run it by a few of your male friends who you know will be honest with you.
Like I said, I could be wrong.
Have your daughters tried eHarmony? Even if they don’t want to join, the free personality profile is excellent.
How funny!
I think you could not be much farther off than this.
My girls are each quite independent of me, and I’ve known little about their male friends at all. Until they are further along in the relationship. Only once did a guy do the breakup - and he and I are good friends to this day. Not long ago he was part of a group of my kids and friends following me on my Harley, he on his Ducati....
One daughter that was once serious, and we quite approved of her guy, she broke off the relationship quite to our surprise. When I asked why, she said her relationship with the guy was hindering her relationship with the Lord. BTW, neither we nor our kids are religious.
At the same time, I am very close with all 8 of our kids, and the single ones all still bring all their friends here for a lot of their activities - we are blessed with a large log home in the woods (that I and 2 sons built with own hands) in the country that makes a great gathering place. That our kids & their friends all prefer to gather here and I consider that quite a compliment. They are comfortable being themselves here and want to come here.
As I’ve been a biker all my life, most of my kids ride and have their own motorcycles. A lot of their biker friends (all makes of bikes) frequently ask me to lead them on rides.......my 66th birthday present was 2 sons & 5 of their friends asked me to lead them on a good ride in the country, which I did......looking in my mirrors seeing 7 young bucks 25 - 35 I wondered how many 66 year olds get to do that?
I have a full auto/bike/truck shop with a lift and my garage is a fav hangout for young adults of all ages on the weekends.
In fact, I know of no other man within 20 years of my age that has a better relationship with young people of all ages. I am mentoring about a dozen men from their 20’s and 30’s to 50’s......I think all my kids friends would find your suggestion quite laughable!
My opus? First of all I am a she. That's enough
He should have just bought and laid down some decent turf; fake or sod.
Your posting about marriage is very well said, but for any “attention deficit disorder” candidates in the audience, let me sum it up in a couple of sentences.
Marry your best friend. If he/she isn’t your best friend, how in the world do you expect to share a bathroom with this person for 40 years?
If sometime in that 40 years your spouse ceases to be your best friend, it’s your responsibility to find out why, and fix it. If you wait for the other person to fix your feelings, the next words you’ll hear are, “You are Served”.
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