Interesting blog, Meg. Good luck with your book!

And that’s the other half. I didn’t believe in marriage because everyone I knew who got married, later got divorced. My parents were divorced when I was two, and I didn’t really care growing up (Families come in all shapes and sizes, right Mister Rogers?). But I remember my best friends’ reactions when their parents got divorced. Sad. It still makes me cry when I think about young me, having to explain to my young friends that it wasn’t their fault. If getting married was a step towards having kids, and kaving kids meant breaking their hearts when (not if) you got divorced, I wanted no part of it.

And most of the things people are talking about feeling with their partners? I felt most of those before I got engaged. Getting engaged was more about extending our ability to care for each other. My nightmare is that I will have a heart attack or a bike wreck and he will be outside in the waiting room while my (DNR obsessed) mom makes the decision. His is that he will pass away (or be abducted by aliens) and I will be left alone and on the streets because the house is in his name only. Those mundane reasons become important in the light of taking care of each other and loving each other with everything we have.

But being engaged means that people take us seriously, when we say we have holiday plans, or even date night. They quit implying that every tiny disagreement between us could be “the end.” My mom quit asking if I needed a place to stay for a while. It even extends to our decision to not have cars, which is now a thing that we are doing together, as a couple, as a facet of our “very serious” relationship. If I’m being honest, I never expected that getting married would make me easier to take seriously.

And as a sidenote, when people pull the whole pessimistic “marriage is hard,” “parenting will destroy your sense of self,” and “you’ll grow out of touch with your spouse/never have sex again”… It makes me question every time either on of my parents told me it wasn’t my fault. Those kids who finally believed that, who now have to hear about how having children will ruin your marriage… What message do we send them?

It is possible [probable?] that the blogosphere has a much higher percentage of women with these ambivalent feelings, and hence, writing about them. After all, for people who always knew they wanted marriage, there isn’t that conflict to work out and write about!

Also, there are differences between “I never thought I’d get married”,
“I went through times where I thought I’d Never get married”, and “I was never one to dream of getting married”.

I never *dreamed* of marriage, or wrote my name with boys’ names. There were times I considered marriage, certainly, and times when I thought, NO WAY.

Now, I haven’t started a wedding blog, but I did join the OffBeatBride Tribe. I’m still not interested in flower arrangements [too expensive for us, and he doesn't like cut flowers!], but it does seem that when the event in question is for you and your Special Person, the level of interest changes!

Just some thoughts I had in response to the above. ;p

I’m hoping maybe you’ve seen these by now, but, here:
http://apracticalwedding.com/2010/07/a-way-to-weigh-what-you-weigh-when-you-wed/ (SO awesome)

http://www.alosangeleslove.com/2010/08/what-to-look-for-in-photographer.html (there’s a follow-up post, too, and she confirms your suspicions–the photogs are pretty much only blogging the “pretty” people.

Best Wishes to you. You are loved, you are worthy. I hope you see this! (& anyone else with similar feelings!!!)

at first my ambivalence (and active procrastination) about calling up everyone i know and telling them about being engaged seemed like maybe a red flag. what does it mean!

yet i find i feel strangely *protective* of this fledgling marriage, and this event to celebrate it. there's a question of how much to share and how much to keep private, how much is between me and my fiance and how much goes to committee, and i'm still not quite ready to let everyone have a crack at it. not quite yet. it doesn't mean i'm any less committed or delighted. :)

meg, thank you for posting and for giving so many a forum to grapple with big questions.

Then one summer evening he came home with a ring and proposed. I was in shock. Now I'm all caught up in the wedding planning and wonder if it's worth the money and asking myself what happened to the "we don't need a piece of paper" idea.

Is it a bit silly to do this after 12 years? I don't think anyone cares anymore (except for my mom). I just feel well…ambivalent or like I'm trying to fill a role that's only belongs to twenty somethings in new relationships.

We aren't ambivalent about being married to each other, but we were ambivalent about marriage in general – we didn't "need" it to be together or to be happy. We had many conversations about this late at night.

There are some great legal and "romantic" perks either way, I think. The idea of calling each other "husband" and "wife" excites us, and I feel good about "moving forward" with our lives – not that we needed to be married to do so, but it does feel good. :)