I just got back from a wedding reception for a couple of my friends. In this case, by a couple I really do mean 2. For the sake of the entry, we'll call them just Bride and Groom.
Bride and Groom met in the ward here in the YM/YW program. He is one year older than she is, and they both started to like each other when he turned 16. She was still 15, and so they waited about a year to start officially dating. They then dated for 2 years, and he went the way of 19-year-old worthy young men in the church, and headed on a mission. She finished high school and wrote him, and then headed off to BYU-I. She continued to write him, went through some tough stuff, kept writing, and he got home last month. She came home for Thanksgiving, about 16 hours after he was released from being a missionary, and he proposed to her 4 hours later. She left to go back to school about a week later, and then came back about 2 weeks before they got married, yesterday. In grand total they've spent about 3 weeks together in the past 110 weeks.
For me, this is WAY fast. Crazy fast! In Bride's words: "I waited a year to start dating him, two years for him to go, two years for him to get back, I don't want to wait anymore!" Granted, they both look happy, and things will likely go well for them, but looking at them gave me the sensation that they were playing dress-up. The dress and suit fit perfectly, and they did all the things that happy cake-cutting newlyweds are supposed to do, but still, it all seemed play.
Now, this could very well just be me. All my life I've looked forward to something happening in the future: going to school, moving, going to middle school, moving some more, high school, moving, graduation, college etc. And each time I get to a new place, I think, wow, when I get to the next step, then I'll really be grown up. Somehow though, at each new step, I don't feel really different. Either that, or (especially in the case of college) I go through the motions for enough time that I become accustomed to a place, and then I become familiar with it, and then I get to be good at it. The whole, practice makes perfect thing. But I don't ever end up feeling like I'm any more grown up. I think it might be because it happens too gradually. I "play grown-up" until it becomes reality to me, at which point it's usually time to move onto playing something else. At this point, I can't realistically see myself in a wedding dress, or at my own reception, or in the temple, at least not in the near future. Good thing I've still got a couple of years.
Subscribe to:
Post Comments (Atom)
5 comments:
It could be a variety of things, kiddo.
You could be always thinking of yourself as immature, while you really are maturing.
What you say could have some truth to it.
Maybe there's some sudden point where your perspective will change and you'll look back on February 12th, 2005 and think "THAT was the day everything in me changed."
It could be life and death, or it could not matter a whole hoot, or it could be a minor or medium thing.
It could be a lot of things, including tons of crap that isn't listed here.
No one can really see it coming until it blind-sides them. It's bizarre and surreal, and the first several weeks are like pretending to be adults or playing house. But you get used to it, like just about anything else, and it's nice.
That said, proposing to someone after seeing them for four hours is craziness. It took me four months just to date The Redhead.
Dear, dear, dear Novel. L'Afro here. This story is to me (allegorically, of course) a bowl of peaches and cream, with a slimy toad at the bottom. But that's just my cynicism speaking out.
IT JUST DOESN'T HAPPEN THAT WAY, FOLKS!!!
Approximately 3% of the LDS couples in the world have this story. Why so few? Because the girls who put their missionary's letters together in a cutesy scrapbook for their Young Women's project usually end up Dear John-ing the poor guy, or putting themselves in cold storage to play the lady fair until their knight came home, only to find out they've matured (or haven't matured) differently.
The chances of them meeting up after two years and still wanting a relationship, and wanting to get married, and still liking each other, are about as good as getting struck by a meteor.
I mean, come on, girls! This guy has been as good as a monk for two years, and you expect to pick up where you've left off?! Get real.
Sorry, Novel. You've touched a chord in me. Forgive my outburst.
Your rant is forgiven. :D
The other thing about the whole situation is that the poor guy looked lost every time that I saw him before he got married. He's also giving up a full ride engineering scholarship to the University of Utah so that he can go to BYU-I where she's studying voice. *sigh* I think they're both making their lives harder than necessary, but I'm sure they can work through it...Why would you want to add that kind of stress to marriage though? Seems it would be hard enough as it is.
My wedding day seemed unreal. I couldn't believe that I was actually at the temple, taking pictures in my wedding dress, and looking at Mr. Socks and thinking I was going to be married to him in a just a few hours (we took most of our pictures before the ceremony). I bawled my way through the ceremony out of fear and happiness. The whole day... unreal. But so wonderful. Living with your best friend... fantastic beyond words. And I thought that everything would change when we were married, and that I'd feel different... but everything was, more or less, the same. A few things change, like living together, but I'm pretty much the same person now as I was before I got married. Possibly a little bit weirder, but then again, I've always thought I got a little weirder as time went on. ;) Thankfully, Mr. Socks is just as weird as I am...
Post a Comment