I'm looking at you, Marriage

I have made my feelings about children well-known to those in my life who may be affected...

Me
I've decided not to have kids. Ever.

For real. This is not a phase.

Mom
(Thinks for a moment)
Probably for the best.

Me
(Smiles)

However, when it comes to marriage, I am still on the fence. I absolutely love the idea of marriage. I really do. But I believe marriage is a lot like friendship with exes: it's a good idea...in theory.

Balking recently at the split between two friends of mine after over a decade of marriage, my co-worker said that a marriage counselor once told her and her hubby that the hardest years for a married couple were years 3, 7, and 11. In my experience, this absolutely rings true. (Well, my experience as an observer and confidant, never having been married, of course.)

In contemplating this assertion, I couldn't help but wonder what happens after year 11? Let's say that a hypothetical couple makes it past the tumultuous first decade of marriage. Do they just sort of meld into a partnership that will no longer be questioned or threatened? Is there a point at which a married couple says, "Eh, we've been at it this long. Might as well ride it out."? I know that generalizations are a bad idea, and I'm not trying to nail down a formula or anything. I also know that a good relationship will always require effort. I'm really just thinking through many of the questions that bounce around in my twisted lil head quite a bit, especially as I approach the proverbial witching hour for young women: year three-oh. (I don't personally give a hoot what happens at what age; there are just hot topics that arise at certain age landmarks, as you likely know.)

There are those couples, of course, who seem to defy all odds and still have a passion and symbiosis long after the blessed nuptials. But I am starting to think those couples are like the relationship urban legend; maybe (a la He's Just Not That Into You), those couples are the exception, not the rule. Or you think certain couples are of this breed, not knowing that there is no longer romance, enjoyment, or sharing of the marital bed going on.

Consider this: what were your goals and desires when you were eighteen? Twenty two? Twenty five? Thirty five? (I know that the twenties are personified by an acceptable fickleness, but I think you get my drift.) I just have the hardest time believing not only that we can suitably pick our mate for the self we will be a dozen years from now (much less multiple dozens of years), but that the person whom we've picked, as we know them in that moment, will still be the same essential self that they are dozens of years from now. If there is any sort of change to be experienced or trauma to be had (be it to one person or to the couple), how can that not also touch and change the respective selves that form that unit/relationship? It's like chaos theory, reigned in and vowing to stay within a mutually agreed upon course...forever.

How is this possible?

(Subtitle to this post: "In Which Natalie Reveals to all Why She is Not Dating nor On the Path to Marriage. Try Not to Stare at the Spinster in Her Natural Habitat")