Mind-Boggling Enlightenment

Seriously?

Search anywhere for inspiration if you have time.  I have a lot of time lately.  My spouse is in a rehab hospital, and I get amazing things done in short order without him here to criticize me, or without me delaying a project for fear he will criticize.  So I have many more hours in the day when I feel guilt free and can spend some of my time on leisure or self-gratifying pursuits.  Plus, I haven’t written or blogged in at least a month or so, so that also contributed to the  plethora of extra minutes in my endless days.

I was perusing Cracked.  (Cracked.com is a very valuable resource and the home of my highly touted and publicized Smurf remark, so I promote them constantly and visit them regularly.)  I honestly cannot even imagine what the subject of the actual article was, but it linked to a whole bunch of articles on whether or not a male could be monogamous.

There are two clearly defined schools of thought.  Scientists say we are biologically programmed to be monogamous (marker proteins on the surface of the ovum, etc.) in order to preserve the integrity of the gene pool.  I love to hear about this stuff, but considering the fact that the epigenetic train is roaring through civilization like a run away, I myself would not argue that that particular theory may need to be trashed.  I have a relative who works in the genetics lab at Duke.  Too bad I am not on speaking terms with him.

Anyway the other school of thought is that a male cannot be monogamous.  He is genetically programmed to spread his seed in order that the fittest of the fit may rise to the top and rule the world.  Actually, someone needs to back down on that concept a little cuz the world is going to hell in a hand basket, and the fittest of the fit, the cream of the crop, is playing video games or getting advice on how to proceed in life from bozos.  I will not go off on a political tangent here.  I promise.

So in one of the comments to one of the articles I was so busily consuming, a male, in retort to someone who would not even consider fidelity or monogamy, stated clearly that you should marry someone because you love them,and not for their vagina.

I was thunderstruck.  I am really old. I have been married really long.  Such a theorem never entered my mind.  If you read my fiction, you know my philosophy is strongly canted away from that idea.  I never considered it.  If I had waited until I met someone I was sure I was in love with (at the age of 19) I would not be married, even today.  I have always thought that love kind of grew.  Like I think I love my irritating husband.  But the way I feel was not present when I was nineteen.  I was in such a place that thinking didn’t really have much to do with it.  I feel that the guy that wrote that comment is a rare bird.  Maybe I am wrong. Maybe I am so inordinately shallow, as my fiction reviewers attest, that my personal value system is beyond the ken of most of the rest of humanity.  Lust ruled.  It blinded me.  It does that.  I guess it would be swell to be one of those people who thinks about living with someone for the rest of their life in that way.  But it ain’t me.  It ain’t me your looking for, babe.  Wasn’t then.  Isn’t now.

I wonder if that is a product of my upbringing or what other factors may have made me that kind of person.   I am surprised I have not been shot down in the streets or back alleys long ago.  Really I am.

Photo attribution:  www.ievolve.org

Holding On

Every marriage has its ups and downs. This cannot be news  to anyone, married, single, or otherwise. In fact, I doubt that anyone gets to the altar (so to speak) without first experiencing what is at the time considered to be life altering trauma. This is probably the major advantage the royal marriages of the past held over modern customs. Often they never even saw the spouse-to-be until hours or days after the party arrived from a far away land, and in some circumstances walked down the aisle with a person that gave them shivers of disgust. Yet this is how they were raised, how their customs evolved through necessity and perhaps convenience. And, in most cases, the obligation of begetting offspring was carried out in good order. We hear, usually in Historical Romance, but sometimes from supposed genuine historical chronicles, that there were marriages of great love and passion. But one of my favorite fiction authors who specializes in enjoyable retellings of the sundry machinations of various ancient monarchies, recently published a book about a not too well known real queen who was terribly in love with her prearranged partner. In fact, it was widely reported that he, in turn, adored her which led her to a lifetime (well in this case the marriage lasted about six years) of wondering about and being hurt by the fact that he refused to give up his string of mistresses. I am not choosing to read this one.  Cluelessness can only take a person so far.

For myself, I am of the opinion that today romantic ideals about marriage are not dead but in fact are held in such esteem that people go into marriage expecting doves to fly out of the bathroom every morning to herald another day of blissful union. This could be, I assert, the very reason that so many marriages do not last. Pure disillusionment. And perhaps more than that, disappointment.

Every couple has to hold on through the rough patches and, if and when they do so, they do it not knowing if it is going to be worth their while. There is, of course,  all this stuff about the integrity and commitment that put the real value on the married state. Too bad nobody bothers to talk about how much fun it is. Sometimes.

So hold on to what you’ve got and try to keep that song from running through your head now. You probably shouldn’t probe too deeply into why you are holding on. That will become apparent when you realize you have lost your grip and cannot hold on any longer. But I am pretty sure the best thing to hold onto is the cluelessness. If you are considering ending a disappointing marriage, realize that any other version of marriage that you may look forward to or seek or fall into is going to have just as many rough spots. They come in all sizes and shapes.