Married Isn’t a Feeling

I was just clicking through Yahoo, and I saw an article about Jennifer Aniston and how her wedding is still on.  I clicked the link not having even known that she was engaged because to be quite honest, I didn’t want to go grade papers which was my other option.

Anyway, there was information about how she and some guy had decided to push back their wedding just a little because they wanted it to be at the perfect time — when neither is rushing to and from jobs.  And then she added, “And you know, we already feel married.”

Up until relatively recently, I think I would have shook my head in a knowing way at that statement.  Yes, most people do “feel” married before they are married.  I remember that while TJ and I weren’t living together before we were married (regardless of what our priest thought!) that we had combined schedules and money and all that other good stuff about a year before the wedding.  I think it’s just that when two people know their lives will converge, the practicality of it often occurs before it is actually official.

And so yes, up until recently, I would have completely understood.

But now, while I fully understand, I must say that I do not agree.  After all, marriage is not a feeling.

It seems fundamentally dangerous to me to say that you feel married because what does that feel like?  Does it feel like you are in love?  Yes.  Does it feel like you are committed to a lifetime?  Yes.  Is it so much more than either of those two things?  Yes!

To say you want to get married at a future date is a wonderful commitment.  It proves that you are serious about the other person and that you want him or her in your life.  But to say that you want to wait until the perfect time to make it official?  It seems to have things backwards.

The problem I think with postponing a wedding until the perfect time is that it makes the wedding more important than the marriage.  That philosophy says that you want the perfect wedding even if it means putting off the very important marriage.  It says that in many ways, the wedding means more to you than the marriage.

And it also says that to be married to someone is no more important than to feel a certain way.  I feel deeply about many people in my life.  But I only married one.  Because I only vowed my whole self to one person.

People often say that becoming married is a continuum, and I agree with that.  It is a slow merging of two people towards one life.  But just because it is a process does not mean that the actual event is any less important.  It’s the moment of truth.  The moment when you give it all to someone else.  The moment when you give yourself mentally, emotionally, spiritually, physically, and legally into a relationship and vow that you will make it last forever.  And the part that I think Hollywood fails to recognize is that this vow must sustain itself even if the parties start to feel differently.

But if marriage is just a feeling, then why wouldn’t the union end if feelings wax and wane?  Why wouldn’t it end if the parties go through times of tumult or conflict?  Why would they fight through difficulties?  After all if the feeling ends, then according to that philosophy, the marriage would have to end as well.

I’m not one to criticize Hollywood culture.  Are there evils?  Yes.  Are there wonderful aspects?  Yes.  But on the marriage front, I don’t think anyone would say that Hollywood has it right.  Even Hollywood.  And as much as we might not want it to be so, what they do is important because it informs our culture which in turn tries its very hardest to inform our children.  Statements like Aniston’s about waiting for the perfect time and feeling married are so prevalent in our culture that we really don’t even notice them, and our children surely don’t.

So for better or worse (sorry for the pun,) Hollywood will continue to be itself and show us its very best and very worst.  I just know that for me and my family, I want to model respect for the institution of marriage and pray that it is enough to overcome the negative messages my children will be bombarded with every day.

And now I really do need to go and grade papers.