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The most beautiful wedding ceremony and celebration that I’ve ever attended took place in Boston right around this time of year. They were a young, Jewish couple. He was an up and coming attorney and she was a bright-eyed, optimistic social worker. They had been living together on the West Coast for a little over a year and had plans to Change the World <— the actual song that was played at the rehearsal dinner, written by the groom's brother.
I'd never attended a Jewish ceremony before, but I was immediately in awe of what I witnessed. Before saying their vows under the chuppah, where the bride did the traditional sensuous circling of the groom, the audience gathered around them to witness the signing of the Ketubah (marriage contract). That thing was SERIOUS business. It wasn't just a contract. It was a beautiful piece of artwork and it was to be hung on display in their home. My boyfriend at the time was one of the groomsmen – and signed as a witness.
I was humbled by the perfect balance of “love and legalese”; for lack of a better term and filed it away as something that I wanted to incorporate into my own marriage ceremony one day. I sincerely liked the couple and wished them a lifetime of happiness. They seemed like any other young couple – happy, nervous, excited…ready to take on the world….except their marriage lasted less than 6 months.
In retrospect, there were unresolved issues and the groom had doubts about whether or not he even loved his bride (ladies put your feathers down…I know mine bristled when I first heard that lol). It is, what it is. All I know is that on THAT day – all anyone saw was happiness and tears in both the eyes of the bride and groom.
There was an interesting debate taking place on Facebook today about our generations reasons for marrying these days. I mentioned that I knew of several people (even some of you readers/lurkers) that have pushed love to the middle (or bottom) of your must-haves in a marriage. While others of us still make that their #1 non-negotiable. Still others ask, well what the hell is love really? Is it a seed or a blossom, because someone can marry the seed and cultivate the blossom through marriage. The definition of love has certainly changed for me in just the last few years, as I’m sure it may have for many of you.
And then there are those that ask what's love got to do with it anyway? Looking back on that day, I wonder if “love” could have saved that marriage. Or if putting the love issue aside and focusing on the contract could have given them a goal to work towards together and led them towards (or back to) “love”.
Do love and marriage necessarily have to go together “like a horse and carriage”, as Frank Sinatra croons in the Married With Children opening? Can you really not have one without the other?
What say you?*
*Y’all know me well enough to know that I’m a sucka for love and that the man I marry will hang the sun, moon AND stars in my eyes, so…yeah… I’ve refrained from giving my opinion in this entry…almost… 
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I think it depends on the people. If someone can live with one or the other, it’s not my place to tell them they’re wrong. And sometimes you can fall in love after the fact. I’m reminded of that Beyonce song:
“I don’t know why you love me and that’s why I love you.”
The song sounds like he loves her so much despite her flaws and all and THAT’s why she has fallen for him.
I can’t tell people the “right” reasons to get married – only the “right” ones for me. What I do see (and this is what stemmed the FB debate yesterday) is a lot of women marrying dudes that they don’t love and discovering later on that they are unhappy.
I did a post a couple of years ago about going to the b-day party of the husband of one of my friends. There were 3 generations of women there and they all sat around and picked apart every husband’s flaws. They made all of the men in the other room sound like bumbling, incompetent idiots – and these women weren’t all “more precious than rubies” themselves.
They sounded bitter, unhappy and jaded. One even scoffed and said, “Love? Psht! Him?” Ugh! It bothered the hell out of me because I was wondering to myself, if you truly dislike him that much – why did you marry him? I also wondered what the men truly thought about them. I would never sit around in a group of women and go in on my man like that – but they told me that one day I’d understand.
I still don’t. And I don’t think that I ever will.
One even scoffed and said, “Love? Psht! Him?”
That is pissing ME off just reading it! Men do not dog their wives like that. They complain or whatever, but I have never heard any dude talk about his wife like that quote above. And I hope I never do… I don’t think I could stand it.
It wasn’t just her either. It was the whole brood of them. I was the only single person and my mom (who is divorced and wouldn’t even dare speak like that). It was the ugliest thing that I’d ever seen and it threw me off because among them, you’re talking about 100′s of years of marriage in that room.
The experience helped me to understand my friend’s thought process in choosing her husband though – because I always wondered why she married a man that she barely tolerated.
And thank you for re-affirming that men don’t dog their wives that way. I was hoping that what I saw that day was completely out of the ordinary!
Love is the seed AND the blossom AND the fruits falls comes from the blossom. So people marry others at various stages of love: some folks want to eat a couple pound sof the fruit before marrying, while other just need the seed to marry. It’s a personal decision.
But no matter what stage of love folks get in at, love has to go with marriage hand in hand: that’s what you’re promising to God… to love and cherish. That said, marriage can also be a business arrangment, but I’d offer no need for a ceremony in that case, just sign the papers at the courthouse.
….marriage can also be a business arrangment, but I’d offer no need for a ceremony in that case, just sign the papers at the courthouse.
Exactly! I have no problem w/ business arrangements in marriages. But if that’s the case, leave the wedding ceremony out of it because it’s not authentic.
For ex., if I were to marry my male best friend, I honestly believe that we would share a lifetime of happiness together and never get divorced. We have loved each other (flaws and all) since we were 14 in the purest sense of the word.
But if we decided to marry, I couldn’t put on a dress, stand before God and all of our loved ones and say those types of vows because that type of love isn’t there.
But many people will go into an arrangement with less love, or none at all with all of the pomp and circumstance of this great love that they’ve found.
I think two people who don’t love each other will have it easy. They can’t hurt you or let you down. They just follow the business deal. If one loves but the other doesn’t it’s chaos. Two who love will have more challenges because love requires giving but I think the reward is greater.
But I would not want to have children in a loveless marriage. I think people need to bloom from mutual love or at least some strong passion.
Exactly. I never thought about it being easier for two people who don’t love each other because it takes away the emotional vulnerability piece. One of the comments from yesterday separated TRUST from LOVE – which I had always believed went hand in hand, but looking at it from a business perspective I guess that you can trust your partner without loving your partner. On the other hand, you can’t really love your partner without trusting him/her so it’s a lot more work.
Yes, you’re right. I think that the reward is SOOOO much greater and worth waiting for.
You and I agree about conceiving children from a place of love, but now as I’m thinking on it – it makes me want to go back and look at some of the bible’s most powerful figures to see if biblical teachings encourages us conceive based on great love or familial obligation.
I’ll admit up front that I decided what my answer was going to be before I read any of the comments. Some of them were very insightful to me. Like this one:
“Love is the seed AND the blossom AND the fruits falls comes from the blossom. So people marry others at various stages of love: some folks want to eat a couple pound sof the fruit before marrying, while other just need the seed to marry. It’s a personal decision.”
That was interesting to me.
As for love and marriage coming together…I think there has to be true love for the marriage to work. If you don’t love each other, you’ll struggle to survive through the hard times of marriage. That’s what I believe and I’m sticking to it!
If you don’t love each other, you’ll struggle to survive through the hard times of marriage. That’s what I believe and I’m sticking to it!
That’s the part that I believe too. I mean, business/contract/obligation aside, I feel like if I’m in a marriage I want to be able to draw upon the emotional well that he and I share through our most difficult times. I guess the key is to have a partner who also shares that belief!
Love and marriage HAVE to go together.
That is all.