Special Speech

To get married or not to wed? That is the inquiry. It never was the inquiry. It had been ‘When to marry?’ not ‘why to marry’. For ages women were required and expected themselves to seek out a spouse young, get married and set up home with tiddlers and a pet, and committhe rest of their lives to operating a good household. Perhaps because ladies have been loosed from what were once their traditional functions, that wedlock is no longer high on the agenda and most assuredly not the only road to go along. In Actually umpteen people- both men and women- decidedly detest the idea of marriage, and can’t envisage looking into a partner’s face and promising entirely to spend the remaider of their lives with them until someone dies. In many ways it’s a pity, because weddings can be such joyous occassions especially when they feature a pretty wedding dress and sky lanterns. But, calamitous marriages can be destructive, financially and emotionally ruinous, and the most lonely things of all. Though being in a ill-starred relationship is also massively isolating, somehow with the marriage mark, it’s even worse. Friends and family expect more of a couple when they are officially married and have also spent so much money on their wedding day. They are supposed to be happy or to at least try their damndest to be so. As a result of this detected external insistency, many men and women feel they have to put on a show and blot out their real emotions. The reason why there used to be a greater number marriages or why marriages endured a few generations ago is because couples had no choice but to keep pushing on with their relationship. This is advantageous in some ways, but in others, it is very wasteful. Yes there were a greater percentage of matrimonies, but there were also many more desperately pitiful ones.