What question am I tired of?: "Sabrina, when are you going to get married?" I often wonder if the people who ask me this expect me to pull a Sex in the City and marry myself. I am currently not in a relationship and despite other people's banter, I am just fine being single. My male counterparts have no such problem. People ask them about their careers and their life goals. They do not assume that catching themselves a woman is a top priority. And why should they? Why do women need to be married to have their goals met?
Even once a couple is engaged it is the woman, not the man, who is hounded about the wedding: dress, bridesmaids, color, flowers, blah blah blah. Just think about the t.v. shows that base themselves around the bridal industry- Bridezilla and Say Yes to the Dress in all of its incarnations, my favorite being the Bridesmaids edition. Something is missing though. Where are the groom shows? Somehow Say Yes to the Tux! doesn't have the same ring to it, does it?
All of these shows echo the same train of thought "This is the Bride's day!" or "THIS IS MY DAY!" depending on the level of crazy. Here's the thing, it's not just the brides day. There is also a groom involved. And isn't marriage supposed to be about love? Maybe that's why homosexuals aren't allowed to get married in most states! No one would know whose day it is! The wedding day can't be about two people! That's absurd!
So why is it "the bride's day"? Because there is A LOT more money to be made if the wedding industry markets it that way to the American people. Brides are expected to spend money on a dress, shoes, jewelry, veil/tiara, fittings, bouquet(s), garder(s), nails, hair and that's only some of the stuff for the wedding day, and that will literally run you thousands of dollars. Grooms, meanwhile, have the tux rental, boutonnieres, shoes and maybe a fresh haircut. So maybe a couple hundred at most. Doesn't take a degree to figure out that the money is in highlighting the bride. But this is not my main point.
I have heard from many women my age and younger "I want to get get married in ___ years." Or "I want to be married by the time I'm (whatever age)". This is troubling especially when the women who are saying this are single. For those of you who feel that you want to be married at a certain age or in X amount of years but not to a specific person, I hope you are happy settling because that's exactly what you'll be doing. You won't be waiting for "the one" but rather you'll be settling for the idea of what some other person could possibly be all because some imaginary deadline you have given yourself is about to run out. This is a grave injustice to both of you. For the most part, quick marriages lead to quicker divorces. Why? Because you don't know the person yet. And they don't really know themselves. Hell, the brain can't even really understand that you are mortal and capable of dying before the age of 25. Why would you get married when you're brain can't even grasp that you could die? Statics have shown that those who marry early, particularly, before their brain has fully matured have a much higher rate of divorce.
So by now you might be thinking I'm crazy or you may be in complete agreement with me. Either way, you're probably wondering what any of this has to do with the title The Marriage Pool. Well my female friends that I graduated with from high school all feel about the same as I do about marriage and specifically, getting married young. And it was through one of our conversations that the marriage pool was born.
The marriage pool, much like a death pool (death pools are illegal because people were literally killing each other over them), has a group of people pay to get into the bet, for us $25, and then as people get married they pay into the pool $50. The last remaining single person wins the money. We figured if nothing else the money will help to pay the winner back for money spent on everyone's weddings. Also if anyone gets divorced they still cannot win the pool. At the time this was agreed upon between us all everyone was in a relationship. None of us are in a rush to get married and three are still in long term relationships.
Once we came up with the pool, I began to think, what makes my group of high school friends so different from other women our age who are seemingly dashing down the isle? We have very different backgrounds from each other since we left high school. We all went to different colleges, different graduate schools, none of our fields of study or jobs are alike, and we all live in different states. The difference between us and the women who are consumed with the idea of marriage, I have come to believe are that we are all feminists who went to graduate school. Studies have shown that people who go to graduate school tend to wait longer to get married. And this is not to say that feminists are completely against marriage, most of us aren't. We do have some issues with the ceremonies and other things surrounding marriage, for example: gay people aren't allowed to get married in most states and with Christian vows the women having to say "Love, honor, and obey". Fuck that shit.
We all need to recognize the pressure put on specifically, young women, to get married. And everyone putting the pressure on us need to knock it off, it's not cute. My family has at least given up on harassing me about marriage because I have made it quite clear I will not be bullied into settling. I have a long list of things that I want for myself/thing I want to do and I don't want to have to take into consideration someone's feelings and the impact it'll have on their life into consideration. Sound selfish to you? Here's the thing: it's my life, no one else. And since I believe I only have one life, I have sectioned off the remainder of my 20s for myself, to do all the things I want to do; to make mistakes and learn from them while laughing about it; for staying out all night, coming home at dawn after making a giant penis in the snow, and for doing all the things you can't do when you have a family. I don't want to have any regrets in my life. And I don't see waiting 5 or 10 years to marry someone as being a regret. I would, however, see marrying the wrong person and getting a divorce because I married way too young as a regret. It's all about perspective. And this is mine.
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