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From: aeq@pucc-h (Jeff Sargent)
Newsgroups: net.singles
Subject: Re: In defense of marriage (thoughts from an ivory tower)
Message-ID: <735@pucc-h>
Date: Tue, 29-May-84 17:47:36 EDT
Article-I.D.: pucc-h.735
Posted: Tue May 29 17:47:36 1984
Date-Received: Fri, 1-Jun-84 08:23:48 EDT
References: <1027@wateng.UUCP>
Organization: Purdue University Computing Center
Lines: 25

I like Tom Chmara's article.  This reminded me to respond to a point
raised last week by Rsk the Wombat:  the idea of having marriage ceremonies
omit any indication of sticking together for life.  I think that such a union
is a travesty of marriage.  In it, each partner is implicitly saying to the
other, "I'll stick with you for a while, but if the relationship sours, I'll
bag it!"  Marriage for life says, "I'll stick with you for life; I'll do my
best to keep the relationship good; if it sours, I'll be vulnerable and honest
with you as we both work the thing out."  I believe only the second kind of
marriage is true marriage, wherein one can feel free to totally let oneself go
and give oneself totally to the partner -- because the partner has committed
not to reject one.  The non-lifetime marriage is hardly worth the trouble,
since the attitude is that it is a provisional, probationary arrangement --
it's as though the partners are on probation their entire life!  How can
either feel safe, at home, in such an arrangement?  When (if?) I marry, I
intend to enter a commitment for life, and I want my (presently hypothetical)
wife to make the same commitment to me.  Then I will feel that when I return
to the place where we live, I am coming home, not coming to a nonstop
examination; coming to a place where I can really relax and let my fears go,
rather than have to face new ones.  Isn't that one of the (multitude of)
things marriage is for?

-- 
-- Jeff Sargent
{allegra|decvax|harpo|ihnp4|seismo|ucbvax}!pur-ee!pucc-h:aeq
"...I've got to be where my spirit can run free..."