One cynical, jaded sumbitch
I have the feeling that dating for me is going to be a really tough thing as the years progress. I finally asked for and got an answer from Boston Girl as to what happened to us. It didn't feel right to her. She was thinking about the future and family and life and all of that, and things between us just didn't feel right. I guess that conversation where I casually mentioned not believing in marriage helped that particular feeling. So there's my answer anyway.
This will not get any easier. I dated someone for about 4 months last year and she ended things over this very thing as well. Seven years older than I, she was thinking of marriage not in a distant future but as something real that needed to start quite soon. Even I wasn't such a cynical bastard, obviously I wasn't the one for that. Hence, it was nice being with you, but good bye now. As I approach my thirties and all the women around me begin to comtemplate the same boring societal mores, I expect this problem will be cropping up quite a bit. This is not going to help my serial dating habit.
I don't believe in empty promises. I'm going to three weddings this year, and knowing about the 50% divorce rate here in the US, quite frankly I expect two of those will end up in divorce. I'll even bet which two. Why can't a relationship be enjoyed for what it's worth? Why do people need these assurances, even knowing that they are probably false? DeBeers and Anna Sui, ruining romance for Flint in 2006 and onwards. There's a poem I read in some lurid Marilyn Monroe bio when I was about 13 that I've never been able to put out of my head. It's something about, "This is the wisdom, to make prayers and wish nothing of the the gods, to kiss the lips and stroke the hair, to have, to hold and in time, let go." I've never been able to find the book again to get it right, but that pretty much sums up my approach to relationships. People would have much more fulfilling relationships and less bitter partings if they simply held this view. Live life, work at it, enjoy it and don't try so hard to control what can't be controlled. If you're going to fall in love, fall in love. If you're going to fall apart and don't want to, then work at staying together, and when it's no longer worth it, walk away, cause life is simply too short to be bloody unhappy. Wedding rings and all that nonsense? Fool's gold if you ask me. And yes I know it's jaded, yes I know it's cynical. It's also right and it's also my view and if there is anything I am, it's an individualist. I'll listen to other people's opinions but the only truth I know is that I came onto by myself. And that's my truth. Unfortunately, the unpopularity of that view is going to cost me a lot of potentially interesting relationships. I won't lead anyone on. Who I am and what I am are pretty much always on display and if in my lifetime I can find one or a few women willing to accept that, then I suppose I'll be as happy I've any right to wish for.
This will not get any easier. I dated someone for about 4 months last year and she ended things over this very thing as well. Seven years older than I, she was thinking of marriage not in a distant future but as something real that needed to start quite soon. Even I wasn't such a cynical bastard, obviously I wasn't the one for that. Hence, it was nice being with you, but good bye now. As I approach my thirties and all the women around me begin to comtemplate the same boring societal mores, I expect this problem will be cropping up quite a bit. This is not going to help my serial dating habit.
I don't believe in empty promises. I'm going to three weddings this year, and knowing about the 50% divorce rate here in the US, quite frankly I expect two of those will end up in divorce. I'll even bet which two. Why can't a relationship be enjoyed for what it's worth? Why do people need these assurances, even knowing that they are probably false? DeBeers and Anna Sui, ruining romance for Flint in 2006 and onwards. There's a poem I read in some lurid Marilyn Monroe bio when I was about 13 that I've never been able to put out of my head. It's something about, "This is the wisdom, to make prayers and wish nothing of the the gods, to kiss the lips and stroke the hair, to have, to hold and in time, let go." I've never been able to find the book again to get it right, but that pretty much sums up my approach to relationships. People would have much more fulfilling relationships and less bitter partings if they simply held this view. Live life, work at it, enjoy it and don't try so hard to control what can't be controlled. If you're going to fall in love, fall in love. If you're going to fall apart and don't want to, then work at staying together, and when it's no longer worth it, walk away, cause life is simply too short to be bloody unhappy. Wedding rings and all that nonsense? Fool's gold if you ask me. And yes I know it's jaded, yes I know it's cynical. It's also right and it's also my view and if there is anything I am, it's an individualist. I'll listen to other people's opinions but the only truth I know is that I came onto by myself. And that's my truth. Unfortunately, the unpopularity of that view is going to cost me a lot of potentially interesting relationships. I won't lead anyone on. Who I am and what I am are pretty much always on display and if in my lifetime I can find one or a few women willing to accept that, then I suppose I'll be as happy I've any right to wish for.
posted by Flint at 9:42 AM
7 Comments:
On the outside I am like you, I tell everyone I don't believe in marriage, sometimes I want open relationships... The most meaningful relationship I've had lasted for years but crashed and burned when we started planning for our future.
But then, I am a girl, living in this fucked up world where ultimately everything changes and no one really cares. And you know that is a hundred times worse living in a city. So I do secretly want to get married,I know about the divorce rates and will naver take a decision like marriage lightly, but ultimately I want someone to promise to always be there.
Think it's the same with most people.
It's a lovely dream really, and lord knows I'm a dreamer so I ought to know better than to piss on anyone's dreams. Some things are a part of you though. I probably spouted some form of this idea when I was about 12. Everyone laughed then and said I'd be the first to get married. Nothing's changed. I don't have the desire. Kids are fine, love is fine, relationships are fine. Marriage is boring, and predictable and totally unappealing to me. I don't even have anything against staying with the same person for all of eternity. If it does happen, thank whatever gods you believe in. But that false promise that so many make and break everyday completely repulses me. Maybe there's something broken in me.
As for Mujer del rio, you and I don't know each other well enough for you to be giving me orders. Get some manners or bugger off.
Why do you think marriage is boring though?
One of my exes got married about six months ago, she's stunning, he's stunning... They throw parties around the world, model when they're bored, make indie movies and manage indie bands. They make shit loads of money and will be fine without each other, but they are together cos they love each other. They did not need to get married, but they did cos they needed to create some sort of law to make sure they stay the same.
I am extremely jealous of both of them, they are not the 'typical married' couple, thier lives are far from boring...
But they are married.
I don't want a white picket fence in the subburbs, I'll kill myself if that happens.
You can get married without settling into a 'routine', I think people who all of a sudden get in a serious relationship or marriage and now stay in all the time to do coupley stuff, will ultimately get bored of each other, and lose some of thier personality.
Getting married doesn't have to be the end of you, end of your personality. It should be the begining of something bigger.
Shit I'm a dreamer.
See, you don't even need a response, you answered your own questions. Ha. I think the conventionality that informs even the desire for marriage is what bores me. That's followed by the falseness of the promise in my estimation. But probably most important in all this is simply the fact that I've never desired marriage. The same certainty most people attach to it and it's eventuality in their lives has always applied to me, but in the certainty that it was not an institution I was interested in being a part of. And I don't want anyone writing trite fear of commitment screeds here, I've committed to things and people before, and I expect I'll do it again and again before I die, just not in the way some ancient societal law decrees I must.
You know I don't particularly like marriage, I would rather have a social contract of sorts without the formality. I stopped being vocal about it because men didn't like it.
Why get married? Well, if our whole lives were only about ourselves many of us never would. And, it's hard to see anything wrong with that. We're best motivated when we choose our own stars to follow, and we get there faster when we're travelling alone.
My observation is that what changes the status quo - one individualist at a time - is becoming a parent. I really don't know any parents of young children who don't prioritize their children's needs ahead of their own.
Mind you it's not that becoming parents has made them saintly, just try taking the last chocolate-chip scone at Starbucks when they're in line with their kid behind you! That sour face (you know: like Chloe in every single scene on "24") is not glowing with the presence of the Holy Spirit. Rather, that there must be something transformative about the position of responsibility over something so clueless and useless as a human infant.
Children need security, it's that simple. They need routine: the same people, the same rhythms, the same spaces and places, etc. And, they're demanding - not necessarily in a spoilt brat way, but in the way of a creature that has many needs which it literally cannot meet for itself. Being responsible for raising a child with the security and routine it needs is a demanding role, and it turns out the best way for an adult to do that is in partnership with another adult. When you're thinking about children, you want have all that in mind. While it's all a huge undertaking and things will never go perfectly, nobody starts out wanting to do less than their best at it.
So to get back to your point... as long as it's only yourself you're responsible for - why get married indeed?
Hmm, I guess because time forces us to leave our twenties eventually, alas.
OK, this is really old. I didn't even read all the comments, so I'm not sure if my opinion is relavant.
I am female. I do not "believe" in marriage. I am in a long-term, monogamous relationship.
I basically don't believe in marriage not because I actively dislike it but because I don't think it IS anything in and of itself.
I want to be with my partner "forever". I may not be. We may be together for 2 more days, years, 20 more years! Vows or lack thereof will make no difference, and I would never want either of us to stay out of duty.
I believe in love (if not upon analysis!), I believe in giving, in communication and having the guts to SAY when you want something they can't give you or vice versa. I do not believe in god.
So, maybe I will get married. But it will be a nice gesture and life will go on. Most likely I won't.
I find the stereotype of women "needing" marriage painful - though each to their own. And linking marriage to selflessness is as offensive to me as linking Christianity to morals.
I just wanted to write this to show that I understand where you're coming from, I agree, and not all women spend their lives dreaming of marriage.
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