My husband said that about the kids last night: “They’ll take us down, if we let them.”

We have always had a sort of “us v. them” attitude toward the kids and parenting, haha. Last night it involved the 14yo complaining about our choice of restaurant for dinner (or about wanting to go to a restaurant at all) and then the 10yo refusing to go to bed and trying to sleep with us/me. We stood our ground – we WILL eat in a restaurant that we like, we WILL have a normal conversation, and we WILL sleep together in our own bed. We will be victorious! And the kids will deal.

It’s not that we don’t put our kids first. We do, but the flip side of that is that we are very SELFISH, in some ways, about our own individual interests and about our marriage. We do not have babysitters and don’t go out on “dates” alone together, except maybe once a year. In all of our 14 years of parenting we’ve been away from them overnight, together, maybe 3 times, and then only one night at a time. This is not so much a philosophy – it’s just that we’re boring and cheap. So we make the kids do what we want to do. Or we don’t do it. We have a vision of our marriage that goes beyond these childrearing years and we are keeping our eyes on the prize.

My 10yo says my husband can’t be my BFF, by the way, but I disagree.

Still, the longer I am married, the less I think I have to say about “marriage,” per se. It’s a crap shoot. A lot depends on personality – or two personalities. On how we were raised (good or bad), on how we see ourselves, on what we want to get out of life and how we want to go about getting it.

But I do not think marriage is damaging to women. I think it is empowering to have a life partner who fully emotionally and intellectually supports you – it frees you up to be who you’re supposed to be. I think it is empowering to be in a positive sexual relationship. I do think parenthood is damaging to women in economic and social terms. And parenthood can be damaging to marriage. And even if the marriage fails, well, you are still a parent, so you can’t blame the kids. Not out loud.

A lot of marriages are imploding around us – good people who I care a lot about. It makes me sad to see them in pain and worrying about the effects on their children. Each case is different – anger, betrayal, addictions, bad choices by one partner, mutual declarations of unhappiness and boredom, married for wrong reasons in first place, stayed together too long for wrong reasons, or who knows? You can never know what’s going on behind closed doors.

But of course, each time I hear such news, I turn inward a little bit and ask, what’s going on here with us? What have we got here and how did it come about? What choices go into making it happen and how much of it is just pure luck? After all, I could be confident in my personal “views” on marriage all day long, but that doesn’t control what goes on in another person’s mind and heart. How can I speak for him? How can I trust?

All I do know is that in 22 years of marriage, I have never wanted to be away from David (well, maybe for a few hours). I have never thought about leaving him – or needing a break from him – or regretted marrying in the first place – or thought I married the wrong person. I’ve never needed “time to think” – I’ve never thought being married was the hard part – and I’ve hated every time I’ve ever been away from him, for a few days or a few weeks. And we’ve never gone more than 5 weeks without having sex (that was post-baby, by the way, when we couldn’t make it to the doctor-recommended 6 weeks).

I cried when he traveled to China the first time because I didn’t like having him on the other side of the globe. I cried when he went there the 2nd and 3rd times, too, although those times it was because he was leaving me with alone with the kids

Anyway, I’m also having some in-my-40s-now sex-crazed prime of life thing going on. haha. It’s not that extreme, since, as I just mentioned, we’ve never gone long without sex, so even the “down” times were never really down. Just that lately… Well, I’m not complaining and I hope it lasts. This past week he went to San Diego for 4 days, though, and ALL I could think about was him returning. And the great part? That’s all HE could think about either. We hardly spoke for 4 days – too difficult to have a real conversation with kids & family members & work, etc. But he got home around 6pm the other night and we both were DYING to put the kids to bed early… Downside of older kids = they don’t go to bed early

Hey, speaking of older kids & being alone. I know I just said we never go on dates or get babysitters, but this past summer I left the two kids alone together for the FIRST TIME! It was during the day. For about an hour. But I caught a whiff of that freedom. We are working up to leaving them at night now. Before you think we’re total wimps about it (they are 14 and 10, after all), we have been hesitant just because they fight a lot and also we live rurally, with no neighbors to see what’s going on… Kind of creepy out here at night. But we’re gonna do it one of these nights, I tell ya.

We were just talking about some friends (more friends) who are getting divorced – they have very young kids & are doing the split-week thing, etc. etc. I told David that raising kids is so hard, that I feel like my REWARD is knowing that I get to be alone with him again in a few years, when they are grown. If I didn’t have that, this whole raising-young-kids thing would be a real drag. To me, anyway.

I feel like writing a long post about marriage and sex and feminism and sex and writing and sex.  Would you read it??   Ha.   I feel like it, but I can’t find the time or energy. 

I’m finding it difficult to blog like I used to and want to.  I guess it’s because I’m writing more in real life – I mean, actually WRITING, like words on page, as opposed to when I was “writing” my other books which was mostly research and constructing an argument and piecing it all together and footnoting and editing and rewriting.  A lot of busy work which ultimately added up to a lot of pages.  

Lately, I write fiction every day.  Sometimes for an hour, sometimes all day long.   But it’s mostly writing and it’s draining – intellectually and emotionally.  At first, I was still getting distracted by research, especially since one of my projects is a historical novel.  It’s easy for me to slip into historian mode and do research and compile facts and read about other people’s lives, dead people, from history.  

It’s harder to read fiction and then to figure out how to write it.  It’s hard to make things up – or, rather, to make them up and write them down in a way that makes them SOUND real… and interesting to readers.  And it’s hard to make up people – characters – that are emotionally complex.   All my writing energies are used up by the end of the day.        

I’ve been doing a lot of reading and thinking about writing ABOUT marriage and sex and feminism, which has me thinking about what I know and feel about those topics.  A lot, I’d like to think.  Is it really all that complicated?  Yes.  

I was reading an interview with a romance book author who was asked whether feminism is compatible with romance novels and why many feminists (and intellectual-literary types) disparage the reading AND writing of romance novels.  I myself have not read many romance novels, I have to admit, but I am interested in “scribbling women” and feminism and erotica… 

Anyway, the interviewee, the author, made the argument that there is nothing MORE feminist than women writing about women’s desires and women’s emotional and sexual fulfillment (because the heroine is *always* fulfilled in romance novels - it’s a requirement of the genre), in books primarily read by women.   Good point.   It’s just that, in the romance novels, those things come easily (no pun intended) and appear not to be complicated at all… 

I wish I could send my family off in the morning without getting so upset at everyone. My husband is the worst, too.  He drives both kids to school – but I get up before everyone else, take my shower, make coffee, make breakfast & lunches for the kids…  and my husband gets up at *the last possible minute* and takes his shower and then always has all of these other things he needs to do – unload his car, back something up the computer, whatever.   He only takes care of himself and he never gives himself ENOUGH TIME… so everyone is rushed and he does nothing to help get the kids out the door.  Nothing.  It’s as if he has decided that driving them to school – which is, you know, on his way to work – is the sole contribution he should be called upon to do in the morning routine. 

Which is nice for him, in theory, but also holds no water since, when they were in public elementary and had to be there, like, an hour earlier than they do now, he couldn’t be inconvenienced to get to work so early and so I used to drive them…  AND STILL DO EVERYTHING TO GET THEM READY IN THE A.M.   He would stay in bed, and wake up as we were leaving…

I’m really starting to resent this.  I have had so many conversations, expressed so many times my frustration, and proposed so many alternative plans – how about he gets up a half hour earlier to get himself ready AND help with the kids?  How about we switch off days doing breakfasts & lunches?   But it never works and it always seems like I’m punishing the kids instead of him.  It also never works because I *NATURALLY* wake up earlier than everyone else – even on the weekends – and so I would have to just make a scene and statement by sitting there, not helping, watching them all scurry around.  When the thing is – I don’t mind helping get the kids out the door in the a.m. – I’d just like a co-parent or some back-up… not a 3rd selfish kid slowing us down. 

This is how these things happen…. slowly, but they happen.  When one person does not work for pay – or works at home – or does not work full-time….  the kids, the house, etc. become that person’s domain.  Which, fine, there is some division of labor involved.  But it is increasingly difficult for the working-outside-the-home person (especially if that person is male, let’s not kid ourselves) to see why they should work for pay, outside the home, AND ALSO do much work or split the work at home.  Because it’s PARENTING, you  might say, regardless of your job situation or personal interests or schedule.  It just needs to get done and it should be split.  Sounds simple enough. 

But the truth is… when one person works for pay, outside the home, and comes home to do a whole bunch of other work-related stuff AND try to spend time with their kids and have personal downtime, it’s hard for the at-home non-working-for-pay person to say, “Can you please get those sheets out of the dryer & make up the beds?  I’m busy sitting here playing Sudoku on my Nook.”  kwim?  

Don’t get me wrong – I DO say that, quite often     But it starts to lose its force after awhile.  And it’s not just the matter of the sheets in the dryer, it’s who decided to wash them in the first place & made sure they got into the dryer so they’d be ready at night?  And who went out & bought new pillows & pillowcases when the old ones were getting shabby?  And who makes sure we have laundry detergent & fabric softener, so those last-minute loads of laundry can get done and everyone has clean sheets & jeans & socks & gym clothes?  All of that goes unseen… those are invisible things that just magically get done.

And so I am conscious enough to make sure they are NOT invisible – I point them out – I say, “I stripped the beds & washed the sheets & put them in they dryer, so can you know make the beds?”

And then I sound petty and, worse, LOOK petty because he’s making the bed while I sit & play on my Nook. 

And don’t say, well, the kids are old enough to wash & make their own beds & make their own meals… perhaps, but they still need supervision.  And I’m talking about our bed, too.  And none of that erases the fact that someone, still, has to OVERSEE all of that…

So what is the resolution?  Do the invisible work AND the visible work, even if the resentment slowly gnaws away at your soul?  Just accept the division of roles – that the work outside the home is just as valuable as the work inside the home? 

Perhaps, but my husband also claims to support my writing career.  Since I make no money at said career, perhaps it is ME who feels that work has no value and I can’t prioritize it.  But I think it’s easy for my husband, in the name of support, to say, ”Just write & don’t clean the house!”  “Do whatever you want.”  “Go work in the cafe if the house bothers you.”   “I believe in you & want you to write your book.” 

Without backing it up with real shared responsibility at home. 

Does that mean he will pick up any slack at home?  No.  I was sick all weekend with a sinus infection and my house FELL APART.  And I was left with a catastrophe of a house this a.m.  I got the kids to do a quick clean-up of their rooms this a.m., but the living & dining room & kitchen are out of control because he just ignored that all weekend…. while I was sick and sleeping much of the time. 

His support for my goals gets translated in my head more like this: “Do whatever you want.  Write your book!  I believe in your ability to write a book AND keep the household functioning without asking me to do anything around the house.  I truly do.”     

Ok, I need to get to work.  You vote:  1. write a book, or 2. clean the house?  

So there has been some grumbling and itching among the middle-aged, middle-marriage, mothers of older children types that I circulate among, haha.  I suppose we are the new Betty Friedan “is this it?” types.  Sad, huh?  That not much has changed… 

Or has it?  I suppose since we THINK about these things and READ all the feminist, marriage, motherhood books, we are already doing something different.  I suppose that our husbands were also raised in a different generation and are not *quite* the cavemen our fathers & grandfathers were.  And I suppose it is very different that we EXPECT to have intellectual & emotional relationships with our husbands – that we chose them as best friends and lovers (I’m guessing) rather than as mere providers & good gene pools, as our mothers & foremothers supposedly did. 

So we are enlightened in our bondage – we have that going for us!  Yay, us!  Friedan & her suburban co-hort walked around aimlessly, trying to define a “problem with no name” – but we – WE have a name for it:  problem, they name is children.  Hehe. 

First, let me tell you… I learned from my own mother that MEN are the problem.  That men may come & go, but you always have your children.  That a “feminist” is a woman who doesn’t need a man.  So I can honestly say that I always thought marriage would be the hard part and kids the easy part. 

I suppose this served me well, in one sense, because it meant I EXPECTED to work hard at marriage – to take it seriously.  I won’t go into the psychology of trying to create a new model of marriage out of this upbringing, only to say that… my marriage predated my children & I expect it to continue after they are grown.  My marriage is THE defining relationship of my life.  Yes, I love my children unconditionally, but they are their own people.  My husband is not his own people – he is part of a duo.  He’s not going to grow up and move out and get his own life… I HOPE – I mean, he COULD, but it’s precisely that possibility that makes it so that we have to work HARDER at marriage than we do at parenthood.   

Anyway, we – the people with “the problem” – have been reading a variety of books lately & comparing notes. 

I am currently reading Wifework: What Marriage Really Means for Women and apparently it could have been written by my mother because MEN, it turns out, are the problem, the thing that ruins marriage… and, by extension, women.   

So let me present the author’s definition of “Wifework” and give you my personal perspective on how this has played out in my long-term feminist marriage. 

1. Wifework involves women performing a hugely disproportionate share of unpaid household labor – EVEN WHEN KIDS ARE NOT PRESENT. 

My Answer:  No.

We were married for 8 years before we had kids and, during that time, we DID NOT HAVE arguments about housework or domestic issues.  I am not kidding.  We were best friends with benefits… roommates with a joint bank account.  I can totally NOT relate to the author’s surprise that so-called feminist people will fall into strict gender roles *even without children* in the marriage.  It doesn’t make sense to me.  No one expected anyone to cook or clean or do anything specific on a daily basis other than attend to our separate work ventures and have sex.  And we ate out a lot and if someone felt like cooking, they cooked.  Actually, we moved into a house the year before my son was born (so we’d already been married 7-8 years) and I remember thinking that we never even went into the kitchen except to make coffee or feed the cats or entertain guests.  It was a non-issue.  Except for the cat box… I expected him to clean the cat box.  He was the one who wanted cats, after all…    

Maybe it helped that he’s not a super messy caveman – or that I’m not a super picky housekeeper.  But, seriously, if you are in a childless marriage & you are arguing about cooking & housework…  YOU ARE DOOMED.  And a little lame.  Give it up.  That is my feminist advice to you. 

2. Wifework involves assuming total responsibility for HIS emotional caretaking & arranging his social life.

My Answer: No.

            I keep re-reading this one because I don’t even know what it means.  Not that I am emotionally dead, hehe.  Just that our marriage has not worked this way at all.  I am not involved in much of his social life and I have never felt burdened to take care of his personal life.  He has his own friends, makes his own plans, makes his own social & personal appointments, etc..  I don’t have anything to do with any of that. 

The author criticizes the assumption that women do all the work of maintaining the extended family social relationships, too, and I guess that’s true.  Or it was more true during our early marriage – now our extended family networks have dwindled and I just don’t care that much anymore.  Heh.

But his “emotional caretaking?”  That seems grossly unfair.  I have never protected or nurtured my husband’s feelings at the expense of my own – and, in fact, I have ALWAYS KNOWN that he constantly thinks of me and organizes HIS LIFE around my feelings and goals – from moving to a place where I could attend grad school, to being a good listener and good conversationalist, to calling me during the day to see how I’m feeling, to coming home every night to listen to me… I don’t know.  Unlike the author, I have never thought of it as a one-way street. 

3. Wifework involves managing his intimacy needs at the expense of hers.

My answer: No.

I don’t get this one, either.  This just does not have to be true. My husband is completely generous, thoughtful, and willing to put in the time.  He wants to know everything about what I want and like and work hard to do it.  Not only that, but the author flat-out states that sexual satisfaction will be hard to maintain after about 2 years of marriage (?!).  She also states that men must be willing to engage in extended oral sex.  Check. 

I am just really disappointed in reading a feminist book that just completely dismisses the idea of sexual equality in marriage as something few have achieved – who are these unhappy sexually silenced and bored women she writes about?  And why didn’t she talk to anyone who has managed to have an exciting long-term sexual relationship?   If anything, I feel like our sex life is organized around MY needs and I know that he considers it the most important part of our marriage.   He has worked HARD at this (don’t feel sorry for him – the rewards are worth it

4. Wifework involves monitoring his health & physical well-being, organizing medical treatment, providing healthy meals, and preparing meals to his appetite, taste, & schedule. 

My answer: No.

This is actually two issues and I think the second one, especially, is HUGE for women, but has not been an issue for me…   The first is taking responsibility for his health & well-being, which I have never done, except to be concerned about him as a wife, love, and friend.  But I’ve never made a doctor’s appt. for him or organized anything around his weight or fitness goals.  Totally foreign concept to me. 

The second issue… meal preparation.  You won’t believe me, but I will just tell you this as the secret to my long-term marriage =  I don’t cook for my husband.  I sometimes cook for my family, because kids are helpless little creatures.  And I sometimes enjoy cooking and baking (mostly baking).  But if you are a married woman and you see COOKING FOR YOUR HUSBAND as a JOB description, you are doomed.  I’ll just say it.  Stop it now.   She uses the example of women who are relieved when their husband is out of town because it means they don’t have to cook, or they can eat take-out or cereal for dinner…  Stop it.  Eat take-out or cereal for dinner WITH YOUR HUSBAND.    

Now, since I’ve had kids, I’ve complained a lot more about having to shop and plan meals – which is the hard part, right?  Not the actual cooking.  But I don’t always make “meals.”   And when I do, I cook what I like to eat, even if the ungrateful kids are not going to eat it. 

Here is a sample week for us:

SAT – bbq together

SUN – go out for sushi or Chinese food

MON – Mom makes a casserole or big pasta dish or something

TUES – leftovers

WED – Mom & kids ate late lunch at Whole Foods deli, Dad comes home & eats canned soup

THURS – Mom & Dad eat salads and bread, kids eat frozen stuff or boxed pasta

      FRI – out to a restaurant or Dad picks up some Panda Express on the way

home…

Get the idea?  Last night this is what happened: I had a late lunch and so all ate for dinner was an English muffin with peanut butter on it.  My teen son had a leftover carne asada burrito from his lunch.  My 9yo daughter *made herself* some scrambled eggs & toast.  And Dad ate some canned oysters & Triscuits & a salad.  So the 9yo is the only one who actually *cooked* something. 

I’m not making a feminist statement or refusing to cook.  I have a life and we figure out what to eat – there’s usually some type of food in the house & no one starves.  And when there’s no food, I send my husband to the store on his way home.  We don’t always “wait for daddy to get home” and we don’t sit down together every night like a public service announcement.  My husband watches his fat, I don’t eat cheese, the kids want to eat kid stuff, we enjoy going out, sometimes we eat lunch at 3:00pm.  Whatever.  If you think you have to put a 4-course hot meal on the table every night because your husband works & you stay home – STOP IT. 

5. Wifework is assuming full responsibility for child-care drudgework (including laundry, cleaning, homework supervision, shopping) so that HE can enjoy “quality time” with his kids (games, sports, watching TV).

My answer: YES.  This is actually my main complaint & the only point on which I was hoping to find some answers.  Unfortunately, there is no answer. 

But, considering that I don’t feel that the other 4 points are issues in my marriage, or sources for resentment, I can focus all of my attention on improving equality in this one area.  I’ll let you know if I come up with any solutions, or if the book does.  I haven’t read that far, but I gather from skimming & from the synopsis that her solution is something along the lines of designating entire tasks to the husband (such as laundry or grocery shopping) rather than trying to negotiate on a day-to-day basis.  I’ll keep you posted. 

Overall, I’m saddened by this book as a “feminist” view of marriage.  I don’t buy the “wifework” thing – the author tries to say that “wifework” is something separate and beyond the work of parenting.  Perhaps.  But THIS, the problem she describes in the book, is not my problem.  And if Wifework (points 1-4 above) IS your problem, well then… you’ve got a problem, for sure. 

My husband took the kids to hang out down at the docks on our new/used sailboat.   I say “our,” but I am not that into the boat.  I mean, I’m not *against* boats or the ocean or any of the fun stuff, I’m just not into hanging out on the boat, working on it, etc.  Anyway, he’s down there with the kids on a Friday night, a great harbor, good friends, kids in life jackets picking mussels off the docks and feeding them to birds… or so this is the report I just got via a cell phone

I feel a little bit guilty not to be too excited or involved with my husband’s new hobby, but then I thought, why?  Screw that – he can have his thing, and he’s including the kids, and I get some quiet time.  Just that… there was a time when a boat would have been “our” thing – we could have hung out down there, talked, etc. etc. and so on… if this boat’s a rockin’, haha. 

But now I’d rather trade the kids off for some alone time (alone) than hang out on the family boat.  Oh well. 

My husband and I are very different people with different interests and hobbies.  Obviously, we have intellectual compatibility – and that can be defined broadly to include our views on religion, politics, etc.  I’m not saying we agree on everything even in those areas, but we talk and are compatible and engage and challenge one another.  But not too much on the latter… you don’t want to be constantly *challenged* in marriage… just enough to keep it interesting.

But he’s an engineer, I’m a historian.  He knows how everything in the world works.  I depend on him for knowing how everything works.  I also frustrate him with my lack of *curiosity* about how things work!  Anyway, I read and write, he does little of either, at least in the sustained way that I do, as a career and as a hobby.  He has not even read any of my published works, at least not completely.  He says he doesn’t need to read them because by the time they are published, he has heard all of the details and arguments in conversation with me over many preceding months and years.  There is much truth to that.  And just when I think, oh well, he’s just not that intersted in this or that subject… I will overhear him telling someone an interesting anecdote I wrote about or arguing for the importance of an argument I made.  That makes me happy. 

Do you and your partner have compatible and/or the same interests and hobbies? 

We share the same cup of coffee every morning.  I mean, the same mug, back and forth.  We’re too young for this, aren’t we?  haha.  If we somehow end up with two separate mugs, I worry about the state of our relationship. 

We take showers together 2-3 times per week.  Saves time and water  

What little things do you and your partner do to stay connected in your hectic day-to-day life? 

Again, reading lots of books reviews (and sometimes even books) and articles and blogs about marriage and thinking… why even try to write about marriage? Its meanings and forms – beyond the “wedding,” which remains quite traditional and predictable in our society, it seems – are myriad.  Marriage almost defies definition.  What works for one couple might seem appalling or counter-intuitive or just plain boring to another.  I have friends who married because they got pregnant.  I have friends who married because they wanted to get pregnant.  Both of these situations seem geniunely old-fashioned, don’t they?  I have friends who are in gay marriages (legally recognized or not), open marriages, sexless marriages, unhappy marriages, and long-distance marriages.  And I have friends who refuse to get married, but live together and raise kids, and dozens of friends (and family members) who have been divorced. 

Which, I suppose, is the very point and/or problem of modern marriage, as defined and/or lamented in so many of these recent book reviews, books, and articles I’ve been reading – i.e., that postmodern marriage has no single definition (no longer, in our day, even as simple as one man, one woman).  What was once a fairly straightforward, if confining, economic and procreative agreement is now not only a “right” to be pursued, but a path for personal fulfillment, even spiritual growth.  

And just try to define “personal fulfillment” in a way that could be codified in the Constitution. 

Not only have sex and procreation been separated – but even marriage and children no longer automatically go together.  I suspect this is why the anti-gay marriage arguments that focus on “the raising of children” hold so little cultural currency except among ultra-conservatives.  Children are beside the point.  Children can be and are conceived and reared and loved in all kinds of families and arrangements.  Marriage is something else entirely, it seems.

And so this is less a memoir of my marriage, I suppose, and just a regular memoir of my personal fulfillment and spiritual growth.  In the company of another person with whom I have sought that fulfillment.  In other words, a love story.

Where was I?  Oh yes… so who were these two souls who collided that fateful night in 1986 at the under-21 dance club?  Haha.   Having only just met him at that point, I can only say of David that he was already 21 years old, was still living at home, and was half-heartedly attending his junior year of university as a Communications/Visual Arts major.  He had held some part-time and one-time jobs and was, as previously recorded, remodeling his parents’ house.  His father was a university English professor at the school he was attending – his mother was a part-time community college instructor teaching English as a Second Language to Mexican, Vietnamese, Filipino, Taiwanese, Chinese, and Middle Eastern students, among others.  His father was a non-practicing agnostic Jew and his mother was a non-practicing Protestant type who was soon to convert to Catholicism because she liked the art and ritual of it (there may have been more, but she never talked about it).  They had been married 24 years already at that point.   

As for myself… I was four months out of high school and just turned 18.  My father (actually stepfather) worked in a lumberyard and my mother had a daycare in our home.  My father was a vague Christian type who refused to go to church and my mother was a born-again fundamentalist evangelical type who dragged her kids to church three times per week.  They had been married 13 years at that point. 

We were both first-borns and I was always one of those people who just wanted to get on with my life already.  Not only was I lamenting that I did not have A Serious Boyfriend yet – all that time wasted with mere high school boys – but I was working full-time and had decided to work for a year to save money to go to college.  

A word about college:  no one in my family had been to college.  No one in my family expected or encouraged ME to go to college – indeed, I think my parents’ words were something along the lines of, why would you quit a perfectly good job (in bookkeeping) and go to college?   My parents also had not a penny saved to send any kids to college.  I had not considered applying to any local colleges yet, and, honestly, had not paid much attention to my high school grades.  But one beacon of possibility was held out to me – apply to our church-affiliated university in Texas and hope for scholarships and church aid.  Despite my lackluster (soon to be outright rebellious) attitude toward church and religion, in general, I had many leaders and mentors and college-aged friends in my church encouraging me to give this a chance and go away to school, and I agreed it was my only chance, if not my first choice.  

This offer – this possibility – would impact our first year together in more ways than one.  First of all, I had decided to put off college for a year and work to save money – so, what if I hadn’t?  What if I had gone that fall right out of high school?  I would have been long gone to the flat Texas prairie, never knowing my destiny that awaited me back in southern California at the dance club.  We wouldn’t have met.  This story never happened. 

Secondly, being the responsible life-planning sort of person/kid I was, I knew this might be my only chance to go to a real university and that I needed to give myself that chance to move up and out of my working-poor background.  Being the proto-feminist that I was (apparently), I was determined, most of all, NOT to change my plan just because I had met a boy.  Or, in this case, a man.  Either way, I couldn’t risk resenting him or regretting it, and although Texas didn’t work out in the end, I have to commend my 18-year-old self for following through.  Anyway, I told David all of this when I met him and I proceeded with the plan to apply and go to Texas the following year.  And what a year it was…

I’m collecting random links and interesting things to read about marriage now.   Marriage seems to be a regular topic of conversation, memoirs, novels, etc. lately.  Or is it one of those situations, where once you are interested in or aware of something, you just become hyper-sensitive and begin to see and hear about it everywhere?

Anyway, I am also – separate from the topic of marriage, per se – engaged in writing a novel, so it may just be that I am hyper-aware of book reviews lately. 

This novel sounds interesting – http://www.nytimes.com/2010/08/22/books/review/Thompson-t.html?pagewanted=1&nl=books&emc=booksupdateema3

I may or may not read it.  But I was intrigued by this idea of the characters being asked by a counselor to write out moments when the marriage “changed direction” – at least I think that’s what they’re talking about.  So I’m going to think about that… moments when our marriage changed direction.  Presumably for better or worse.  Just as a thought exercise, not to think about problems, but just about change and growth.  I like this quote:  “Neither memories nor marriages are static.”

a friend of mine linked to this site which chronicles the first year of marriage through poetry – http://josierichards.blogspot.com/

The poems are simple, personal, and sometimes poignant.  An interesting thought experiment. 

I wonder what I REALLY thought during that first year of marriage?  or second, or third…  That’s why I’m trying to write out these memories here, but the tiny moments will never be recaptured.  If I had poems or tweets or even journals from those early years, what would I learn?  Would I find that we are comfortably basically the same people?  Would I be shocked at our naivete?  Or amazed at the quick profundity of our relationship?  Or neither?  Sans that record, I still find it amusing that I remember not just the “big” important events, but all sorts of random silly things and conversations and feelings and insights.  So there is hope :)

  I recently read Elizabeth Gilbert’s’ book, “Committed.”  (you know, author of Eat Pray Love…)   I did not find this to be a particularly illuminating or universal book about the state of modern marriage.  I found it to be a specifically personal account of someone “forced” into marriage (due to immigration issues) and trying to reconcile it in her own post-divorce, restless, feminist mind.  From a scholarly point of view, it is not.  Scholarly, that is.  I agree with her that marriage is a dilemma for the modern self – especially the modern female self – and that we westerners place a lot of pressure on ourselves and our spouses, expecting ONE person to be everything to us -lover, soulmate, financial partner, best friend, advisor, confidante, drinking buddy, etc. etc.  But that ”insight,” and her comparisons with marriage in other cultures, is mostly old news….  

Talk to me in 20 years, Elizabeth Gilbert…