Why Re-marry?

Nina Collins
HuffPost

The other day a younger friend, a woman in her twenties, called to share news of her engagement. She's been dating a great-seeming guy for about a year, and she sounded exuberant, glowing, over the moon. "Congratulations, Eleanor! I'm so happy for you." Yadda, yadda, yadda, and we wrapped up the call.

The truth is, as a divorced woman in her forties, it's hard for me to get excited about anyone's impending nuptials. Very hard to pretend the divorce and adultery statistics don't exist, to push into the background my own painful memories of marital discord, the tedium and pain of having the same fights over and over again, the feeling of being unloved and trapped. What I mostly feel for Eleanor and others like her is a jaded sense of "Good luck dear. I've been there. Enjoy the good parts and take care of yourself when it's bad. And try to have some sort of long-term back-up plan."

So hideously cynical! I'm sorry! Blame it on the years. I mean, I can see why people still get married: when you're in your 20s or 30s you have all of that ahead of you. It's what's expected, what seems inevitable, right, necessary. You want to make a home with someone, develop traditions, have children together. You're wildly in love and know, or at least hope, that your marriage will be different, and maybe, God-willing, it will be. And I'm not immune to the fantasy or the almost delusional Darwinian pull: I too am looking forward to grandchildren and even being the mother-of-the-bride one day.

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