I love you. Now what?

A few weeks ago, a friend told me a story. It went like this.

Bride and groom have made their rounds at the wedding dinner. The groom obviously had a little too much too drink. The emcee then invites the newlyweds to the stage for their thank you speech. Newlyweds make their way to the podium.

Groom then picks up the mic and says " MICHELLE, WHY DID YOU LEAVE ME?" "YOU'RE THE ONLY PERSON I LOVE, MICHELLE." "I LOVE YOU MICHELLE."
 

I'm not sure if you've guessed by now that the bride's name is obviously NOT Michelle.  Michelle being the groom's ex girlfriend who happened to be seated somewhere in the ballroom that night, cringing in shame and embarrassment. Well, I'm not sure how the marriage fared after that enlightening speech by the groom that night but I am pretty sure they didn't ride together happily into the sunset.

Yes, it is a true story. No fictional characters. All real, breathing, living human beings.

So, the question is why do some of us marry for all the wrong reasons? So many of us think we should marry because "I'm getting old" or "We've been together for so long, why not?" or "she'll be a good wife/husband.".

Are those the reasons why we should spend the rest of our lives with someone? I'm not professing to know the ingredients to a happy marriage but I can bet my last sen that those reasons up there won't give you happily ever after.

Is it too cliche to think, the reason one should marry is for LOVE?  The butterflies in your stomach, heart racing, eager, passionate, time consuming, birds chirping, perfect sky, kisses and hugs, type of love?

It's not cliche. One should ALWAYS marry for love. If it weren't for the fact that I loved my then boyfriend (who is obviously my husband now) I would not have defied my parents, lost some friends, accepted ridicule and made a life changing commitment to marry him.  But the truth is that, while we should marry for love, love by itself, is not enough. 

Love does not pay your bills, love does not feed your children (if you choose to have them) and love certainly does not mask emotional baggage or close the gap of intellect.

I swear each time I meet this friend of mine, I think why is he with her? She's flighty, she's not the most intelligent , she's got a terrible temper, and oftimes she uses words without even knowing what it means. And in a split second I also think why is she with him? He's lazy, he does not work, he likes to have intellectual discourse with his friends- politics, economy- something which she has no knowledge about and he makes her pay whenever they go out to eat. You'd think these differences are glaringly obvious. They are, according to them, very much in love. And hope to married.
Except that it has been two years since they have talked about marriage, but he has not proposed and she is still waiting for him to do so. And she complains about him all the time, she hates his mother, she hates his sister and her mother hates that he is much too complacent to get a job instead of riding on her coat tails. His mother on the other hand thinks she wants to marry him because he has family money. Match made in heaven? These problems are BOUND to crop up even more once these people take the plunge of marriage. Yet, every day, they tell themselves, we are in love.  Love will conquer all.

Bollocks.

If all of us took out heads out from the clouds, and wiped the glaze from our eyes, remove our rose tinted glasses, maybe we can see that life is not like a movie. In real life, we do not fall deeply and madly in love with somebody and then live happily ever after. In reality, we fall deeply and madly in love with somebody, we discover we are very different in character and upbringing, we work on those differences, we find a solution, we learn patience, we learn tolerance, we learn to love the person for who he is and for who he wants to be, and then maybe we can have a shot at happily ever after.

I may sound like a party pooper. But at least I still think you should always have the moment when you meet that one person and you fall madly and deeply in love.

That I believe everyone is entitled to have.

As for the rest, let's not get too carried away with fairy tales.