WordType Designs™
Driven To Distractions©
The Sound of One Hand Clapping©

A rchive Date
[ 25-05-2000 ]
Category
[ International Relations ]
sub-Categoy
[ Mass Media ]
      [http://lifewise.canoe.ca/SexRomance/Lovewise/2007/05/30/4220329.html

      Dating versus marriage
      By Lisa Daily

      I know a lot of single women (and a few single men) who are just itching to get married. They dream of matching towels, freshly scrubbed children, sharing the Sunday crossword puzzle in bed and a life of shared jokes from a You-and-Me-Against-the-World bubble.

      The towels usually come with the rest of the bridal gifts. The kids, if you have them, don't stay fresh-scrubbed for more than five or six minutes. And in fact, if you have two or more, one of them will have gotten into something disgusting and staining by the time you manage to get the other one dressed.

      Marriage, along with its own particular brand of bliss, generally drags a few other things along with it: If you're married and your spouse is making you crazy, you have no place to go but the grocery store. And then you have to come back

      Dating means the tingle of first kisses and carefully thought-out gestures meant to win your affection

      Marriage means a standing birthday order at the local flower shop and mystery toenail clippings left under the couch. It also means never feeling that first-kiss tingle again

      Dating usually means best behavior, sexual and otherwise. Marriage means your spouse laughs when he farts in bed, he leaves his dirty underwear on the bathroom counter (why?) and already knows whether or not "it was good for you" Dating means wild, passionate, elevator/cliff/hot tub sex. Marriage means every Saturday and alternating Tuesdays

      Lisa Earle McLeod, (www.forgetperfect.com) a 21-year marriage veteran who writes about everything from marital disillusionment and flat-line libidos to drive-through spirituality in her hilarious new book, Finding Grace When You Can't Even Find Clean Underwear says, "The reality of marriage is once the hormone-induced endorphine buzz wears off, you're left with your same old boring life. Only now, there's another person who wants space on the couch. McLeod adds, "Better barware and matching towels cannot help you sustain happiness for more than a day."

      There's a reason that chick flicks and romance novels always end at the beginning of the relationship. And while there's a certain appeal to having someone know you so well they've seen all your disgusting habits, from waxing your upper lip, to throwing up around the clock with a nasty bout of the stomach flu, the downside is you have to witness all of their disgusting habits as well... often on a daily basis.

      "Dating is about possibilities of who you could be. Marriage forces you to face the reality of who you really are." McLeod says, "Whenever I talk about the truths of marriage, the married women in the audience all nod their heads and smile but the singles tend to think I'm some jaded middle-aged woman who didn't do it right. There's a little secret part of me wishes I could track them down in 10 years to ask them how their storybook is going.

      "Don't get me wrong, I love being married," McLeod says, "Well, most of time. But it's just like a career or parenting: Parts of it are not so pretty and a lot of hard work. In hindsight, I wish I'd cultivated a bigger girlfriend network before I got married and during the early years of my marriage before I had children."

      So why are so many of us so anxious to toss away sole control of the remote and sleeping in the middle of the bed? Is it loneliness, the desire to belong somewhere, a yearning for formal flatware?

      "Dating is more fun than marriage because dating is about going out places together -- the act of going on a date. Marriage is the act of legally binding up your assets and your lives. Even the word dating is more fun."

      Traci, a dater who is single again after her marriage went south, said the best thing about dating again is that "Dating is like a buffet. And after years and years of the same old Egg-beaters and Metamucil for breakfast, I was suddenly offered stacks of pancakes, Eggs Benedict and bacon. Lots of bacon."

      The downside, Traci says, is that "With dating, you always wonder what the other person is thinking." McLeod adds, "With marriage, you already know exactly what they're thinking. It's both a blessing and a curse."

      This story was posted on Thu, May 31, 2007
      Copyright © 2007, Canoe Inc. All rights reserved.

      World Fact Book (CIA)]


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