Posted on 08/30/2005 10:14:07 PM PDT by tbird5
I've seen two movies lately, one very funny ( Wedding Crashers ) and one infuriatingly stupid ( Must Love Dogs ), but both baffling in their lockstep to happily-ever-afterland. Why does romantic love, the kind that doesn't occur in life except fleetingly and disappointingly, still play to the crowds? I give the impecunious boat-builder and the petit bourgeois schoolteacher five years at the outside -- he's not going to keep her in end-tables. And Daddy's Little Girl will have ditched the immature arriviste long before that.
Why, in an era when men and women can barely achieve détente, in a First World where everyone suffers from attachment disorder, are we still ponying up for marriage? On the HBO series Six Feet Under a show I adore because all the characters behave abominably at all times, yet never manage to have more than a millisecond of fun men and women can't stay married or remain faithful from one week to the next. We're not quite that bad, we HBO viewers, but we're getting there.
I'm no historian, but it doesn't take a Paul Johnson (author of A History of the American People ) to tell us why it's so hard to stay married. We live too long. Marriage is a naturally polarizing process that causes one person to detest, over time, what the other person loves. Only after a couple divorces do they move back toward the center, where their interest in one another began. (I knew a man who left his wife because of the endless chintz and throw pillows. I went to visit him once in his new Bauhaus apartment, but he couldn't really talk he was too distracted by trying to choose the right tassels for his new Salamandre curtains.)
(Excerpt) Read more at hartfordadvocate.com ...
The author did have a point: people are living longer and the result is more strain on a marriage that in the modern era needs to last 40+ plus years in order to reach death do us part. Whereas in the 1700's 20+ years was the norm.
Since familiarity breeds contempt, it is logical to conclude that lifelong marriage is becoming a greater challenge.
Attachment disorder ? sounds like she's loving someone so hard shes killing them treating someone you love like something you OWN will kill a relationship faster than not recognizing your doing it or acknowledging it either
What's the problem with drunken bitter chicks having their say? Bitter drunken dudes have been clogging up the printing presses for centuries.
"You know, I'm kinda glad her high-born kinsmen bore her away from me, my Annabel Lee.
After reading this article, all I can say is 'Nevermore!'"
Ed
The author exaggerates by using the word "everyone". But the bastardization of huge numbers of America children does seem likely to produce an attachment disorder.
To all documentation geeks: Don't ask me for scientific proof of this assertion. Instead go choke yourself.
Ha ha ha ha ha
Okay so I'm abnormal. I was faithfully married for 29 years. She died in March of '04. We loved each other and got along almost all the time. In those nearly three decades I can remember two, possibly three actual disagreements. We had different views on religion but otherwise agreed with each other about most things. She got cancer and spent 6 years trying to survive. I did what a husband is supposed to do. I am doing it still by raising our children. This is real life and I don't deserve a medal or even any praise, this is what grown-up people do.
Nitwits who think that real life includes Knights in shining armor and Fair damsels waiting to be rescued are in for disappointment.
Marriage is a naturally polarizing process that causes one person to detest, over time, what the other person loves.
My 2nd marriage was 14 years of wedded bliss. Then Sheryl died of cancer
I firmly believe that there are more important things to consider when choosing a spouse than looks and sexual pleasure. We make a good looking couple isnt a reason to make a (supposedly) life long commitment. Neither is money, sex, boredom, fear of never marrying, wanting to be all grown up or social pressure to not be the only one in your crowd still single.
Love and compatibility should always be the first considerations.
People with strong sex drives tend to admire and marry people who basically disapprove of sex. People with low sex drives are intrigued by people with high sex drives. Sexual opposites attract and then go on to torment each other 'til murder or divorce, whichever comes first, do them part. >>>>>>>>
Can't figure how she can generalize others by her own bad experience. I personally couldn't stand to be married to someone who was a polar opposite, especially on sexual terms. She is just projecting.
Another sex-crazed polygamist minor, huh? We've all been there.
Sorry for your loss. You sound like you didn't take your time together for granted.
The biggest problem is that many people just want to weigh anchor and leave when the going gets tough. It becomes too much work. My parents went through some very tough times (my dad was an alcoholic nearly his entire life) but they stuck it out because...that is what most of their generation usually did.
The last 15 years of his life, he kicked alcohol, and they had a wonderful marriage. They were indeed best friends.
That taught me, as an adult, that persistence and work make a bedrock foundation for a marriage. If you really liked and loved each other to begin with, it will always be there.
Yep. Live and learn - the hard way.
All you need to know about the author is that the court gave custody of her son to the father...
"Second marriages are the triumph of hope over experience." - Samuel Johnson
I am glad also. These people that don't work at it..have no idea what they are missing. Once you go through the fire and realize all marriages have seasons, you reach a place that is truly wonderful. People who are shedding spouses like used underwear will never understand why they are so miserable even if they have money.
I think it's normal for people of both sexes to go through a period of bitterness and anger after a divorce. The point is to get over it, after awhile.
That said, she's right about one thing: the pool of available potential spouses is smaller for divorced women of a certain age than it is for their male counterparts, because many divorced men either don't want to remarry (and who can blame them?) or they want a younger woman. So the rate of remarriage for women in their fifties is something like 1%. She would face a life of loneliness even if she had an angelic temperament.
Anyway, cut her some slack. She's lost her kid. If my husband had dumped me for a neighbor woman and then I lost my kids, I'd be bitter too.
My wife and I came very, very close to the brink. The end result is that we changed our lives, left our six figure jobs and focused on each other and our kids.
Now, almost three years later, we are more in love, better communicators, and we are going to make it.
After this time, I am more spiritual, committed, and I know we can handle anything as long as we work at it together.
Jesus Christ is the head of our family. Tommie and I are each other's best friend. Love is a choice - and both of us choose to love each other, and place the other person's needs first no matter what.
There are treasure laid up in heaven, but there are also treasures here on earth. My greatest treasure is my husband, followed by our four children and seven grandchildren.
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