Wedding Stories

ElizabethB said:
Reasons for marriage are as varied as people.
I was 20 for my first marriage. My high school boyfriend. I was clueless. I had no idea what marriage meant. I do not know what I thought. My Husband (George) and I have been together for 30+ years (a long story).
Our decision to marry was based on practicality. Louisiana is a community property state. An unmarried couple can will their estate to their partner. The partner will have to pay $$$ in taxes. A married couple owns 1/2 of all property and financial recourses and 1/2 of the spouse's resources. Convoluted and need an attorney kind of laws. The impetus was to protect me.
In my mind our marriage was a formalization of our existing relationship. I love George, George loves me.
I was not prepared for the intense love and passion in George's eyes when he said his vows. I was not prepared for the huge shift of emotion inside of me. I felt the love and passion of the young woman who met him so many years ago. Our vows resonated with both of us.
I do not know how to describe the shift in our relationship.
I am a very happy Wife with a very happy Husband.
I love calling him Husband.
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:love:
 
TastyReuben said:
I got married 13 hours (by car) away from my family, in my wife's hometown.

I mentioned before (I think) that weddings are not a big deal in my family. Most of the time, we just go to the JP. The most recent wedding among my siblings, no one was even told until a couple of months later ("Oh, yeah, we got married a while back..."), and that's happened more than once.

MrsT's family are much more...normal...where weddings are concerned. Nothing over-the-top, but a couple of hundred guests, a church, a hall for the reception, the standard stuff.

Because of the distance, only my folks and my brother Lee (as my best man) attended from my side.

The plan, for months, was that Lee and my folks would drive up together. It just made sense. Lee was single at the time, 33yo. My dad was 50yo. Dad ended up having foot surgery, and couldn't drive anyway, so that worked out...

...except that three days before they were scheduled to leave, my brother backed out and said he was driving himself.

Why? Because he'd just taken up with an 18yo hottie who said if they went up on their own, she'd, um, make it worth his while with a whole lot of...personal attention, if you get my meaning.

Sorry, Dad! Sorry, Tasty!

So the Monday before my wedding, my mom called to say they weren't coming.

Frankly, I wasn't surprised, because again, weddings have very little priority in my family. I was kind of surprised they'd agreed to come in the first place.

I told MrsT, though, and she had a problem with it: "My family will really take this badly if your mom and dad can't even bother to show up for our wedding. It'll be pretty offensive to them, and me. You better talk to Lee and get it straightened out!"

Lee wouldn't budge, because he's always been ruled by his rooster. Always.

Mom eventually agreed to drive (she hates driving), and Dad did do a little driving, so it was all back on.

That was the first thing he did to screw up our wedding.

The day they were due to arrive was a Thursday. Tuxes for the groomsmen had all been measured for except for Lee, and the tux shop agreed to a last-minute fitting for him Thursday afternoon, no later than 3PM. The shop closed at 5PM. We were to be married Saturday morning.

My folks arrived to the hotel just after noon. Lee said he'd be there around the same time.

1PM...no Lee. 2PM...no Lee...3PM...no Lee.

We kept checking with the front desk, and they finally told us he'd checked in, sometime between 3:30PM-4PM. They wouldn't give out his room number, but they called the room for us a few times, no answer.

I explained what was going on, and the receptionist finally slipped me the room number. Up I went, ready to kick his rear end for all the drama he was causing.

Room door was half open, so I knocked and went in, asking what the 🤬 was he thinking, dragging all this out and not letting us know the moment he arrived, when I made it past the bathroom area and into the bedroom part and there they were, upside down and inside out with each other, going at it like rabid hyenas.

Well.

I really started yelling then, and had him backed up against the window, bare butt and all, and of course, Mom and Dad had followed me up and Mom had all but fainted at the sight and ran from the room crying.

I told him he had five minutes to get dressed and get his azz down to the car to go for his fitting, because it was less than an hour before they closed and it would be too late.

He started to argue that he didn't need a fitting, he was sure everything would fit, but by then our dad showed up and told him he to shut up and get dressed and do as he was told, and he did.

The tux place wasn't happy with him at all, but they did a quick fitting and got everything ready in time for Saturday, but for the rest of the day, all he complained about was "being sticky" during his fitting - well, whose fault was that?

That's the second thing he did to royally screw up our wedding. More to follow later.
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Exactly like I thought lee would act. Exactly.

Russ
 
TastyReuben said:
What I'm fervently against is people just assuming that marriage is the only kind of relationship that's meaningful or worthwhile or "legitimate," and the assumption that getting married is just "what you do," without giving any thought to what they really want.
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Well said. You can be with someone and commit to them without a bit of paper to prove it. In many ways that's more important in my view. You can celebrate your union with friends and family without having a legal document. Just as you can celebrate a birth without a baptism. I've been with my current partner for 35 years. We have kids. Why would I need to marry him? I mean - what for? He knows I'm loyal.

caseydog said:
As for FL's question, for me it was about love for another person, first, and making a commitment to that person. Sharing life's burdens was another benefit. That can be anything from financial to physical/mental/emotional burdens. You are not in it alone.
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I have done and am doing all those things and he knows it. Neither he nor I need (or needed) to go through a legal ceremony to prove that. Would it make a jot of difference if we were married? No. Marriage isn't to do with commitment, or permanence, or children, or love or religion. The only distinction between marriage and not being married is that marriage is a form of relationship recognised and regulated by the state.

From a financial point of view, in the UK there are really no particular benefits from being married unless you have a lot of assets. I don't! Even then, the only benefit financially is that when you die, you can leave assets to a spouse without 'inheritance tax'. Since that only kicks in if your assets are rather more than we certainly have, there is no benefit for me or him.

My opposition to marriage is socio-political. Its to do with the history of the institution of marriage and its use in the subjugation of women (and girls*). Whilst in the Western world we may think this isn't the case any more, it certainly remains the case in other parts of the world. In the Western world the idea of marriage as a romantic concept is a relatively new concept.

End of lecture.

* Where it happens

Further reading: Against Marriage
 
Morning Glory said:
Well said. You can be with someone and commit to them without a bit of paper to prove it. In many ways that's more important in my view. You can celebrate your union with friends and family without having a legal document. Just as you can celebrate a birth without a baptism. I've been with my current partner for 35 years. We have kids. Why would I need to marry him? I mean - what for? He knows I'm loyal.



I have done and am doing all those things and he knows it. Neither he nor I need (or needed) to go through a legal ceremony to prove that. Would it make a jot of difference if we were married? No. Marriage isn't to do with commitment, or permanence, or children, or love or religion. The only distinction between marriage and not being married is that marriage is a form of relationship recognised and regulated by the state.

From a financial point of view, in the UK there are really no particular benefits from being married unless you have a lot of assets. I don't! Even then, the only benefit financially is that when you die, you can leave assets to a spouse without 'inheritance tax'. Since that only kicks in if your assets are rather more than we certainly have, there is no benefit for me or him.

My opposition to marriage is socio-political. Its to do with the history of the institution of marriage and its use in the subjugation of women (and girls*). Whilst in the Western world we may think this isn't the case any more, it certainly remains the case in other parts of the world. In the Western world the idea of marriage as a romantic concept is a relatively new concept.

End of lecture.

* Where it happens

Further reading: Against Marriage
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Well, no doubt that historically, marriage has some major baggage. And yes, in some parts of the world and some cultures, it is still a tool of subjugation.

But, as with anything in life, it is not necessarily the institution of marriage, but how you use it that matters. Both parties entered into marriage willingly, in my case. She had a choice whether to take my name, or keep hers (she chose to take mine). We made decisions together, and when we couldn't agree, sometimes I would let her have her way, and sometimes she would let me have my way. We had a joint bank account, and a few shared credit cards, and we were both able to spend the money freely -- within reason.

In the three major mono-theistic religions, women are described more as property, than partners. A girl is the property of the father, and then becomes the property of her husband, which she probably did not choose. Yeah, I have big problems with that. But, that's not how it is for millions of married couples today.

CD
 
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