We are in Poland staying at my son's father-in-law's place. Now four of my children are here with their partners. (Our severely handicapped foster daughter stayed at home in NZ) We had a reunion last night sitting out on the deck tasting Polish beer, vodka and mead after a pork sausage barbecue. My children are delightful and are enjoying catching up with our Polish hosts. We are here for a local family wedding ceremony tomorrow where my son and wife (they were married in NZ last year) will share in a Polish Catholic ceremony with his Polish wife. We have been labeling vodka bottles, blowing up balloons and polishing the car in preparation, and as is normal, people are getting a little stressed. It is quite neat the two families, with incredible cultural and language differences, working together for this special day. It really is a very positive experience having all the kids make the effort and expense to travel here to be together to support their brother.
But before every wedding I go to or am involved in, I find myself in a reflective, often melancholy mood, asking myself "What will be their future?" A wedding opens up possibilities for happiness, partnership and friendship, but also opens up the potential for incredible hurt.
I have been married for 41 years and have concluded that each marriage is very different and that the whole process requires an incredible willingness to adapt, to give and to work with each other. There are no quick and easy "how to's" for marriage, no easy answers for what life can throw at you and nobody can be totally confident that they wont stuff it up.
I do think that it is a lot harder to stay married than it used to be. There are lots of reasons for this and I raise them as considerations.
- In earlier generations there were clearly defined roles for the husband and wife. These days these roles are freed up. This is a good thing, we would not want to wind back the clock, but it did mean that in earlier times there was a clear path to follow. The marriage partnership was supported by clearly defined "job descriptions", you knew where you were and what was expected of you. In today's much more free society each couple has to plan their route by themselves. It's like the difference between driving in the Australian desert on a sealed highway or driving across country. On the sealed highway there is a map showing where you are going, road signs that warn you of dangers and signs that give you directions. Driving across country you have to choose where to go and find the way. You have to discover the soft sand and workout how you will work through it, though you are completely free of fences and limitations. Today's married couples have greater freedoms, but a much more difficult job of working out, negotiating and navigating each partnership. There simply are more opportunities for heart breaking mistakes, though greater freedoms for different sorts of creative partnership.
- Secondly we live in a highly sexualised society. There are regular suggestions that life should be this ongoing romantic, experience of a hot, sensual and electrifying relationship. Media from women's magazines, chic flicks to porn all raise our expectations of the male-female relationship. It has to have, according to "popular media", the mysterious "spark" at all times. Well it is simply quite difficult to live up to those expectations with the need for two incomes, busy child raising schedules and all of the other expectations of life. (I have been relatively lucky in my 41 year old partnership) But no long term relationship will always be the ideal "Women's day" magazine joy ride day in day out, year by year. ... we know this, but again and again these high expectations are thrust upon us and it is easy to feel inadequate, especially during "flat" times. (It is interesting in Women's magazines... they will have close up interviews with "loving superstar couples" who will rave on that they have found their "soul mate", that this person "completes them" and that there is "so much love in the relationship". Give the magazine a few years [the next time you are in the Doctor's waiting rooms] and they will be doing an interview with one member of this "ideal" couple who will discussing how they have "moved on" in their life, and are on this exciting new adventure, free from the shackles of their former relationship, or discovering their new "real soul mate".)
- Thirdly we live in an individualistic age. At one time you found yourself according to how you fitted into the goals and directions of the family, the tribe, the nation. Now we are much more on an individual journey trying to find our own sense of fulfillment. Whether we are right or wrong in this sort of value it is just a part of the values of our society.
- Fourthly we live in a time when it is much easier to stray. These days we have untold opportunities to form relationships (we may never have intended) with members of the opposite sex. Workplaces are no longer male dominated. We spend more time at work, at the gym or at other places often than we do at home. Many of today's jobs involve periods away from home. There are countless, essentially private ways to communicate in this IT age. One man I know who was doing a study on infidelity (starting from his own experience) said that there are three leading factors... (1) things are a bit flat at home. (2) there is freedom from discovery and (3) the use of alcohol relaxes inhibitions. He pointed out that in today's society these things are much more prevalent than they used to be. Many marriages from earlier generations may have been faithful simply because there were not the possibilities that are available today. It simply was much more difficult to fall into an intimate friendship with someone else. It means that today's couples have much more of a temptation to resist than older couples may have had. (Though years apart during the war must have been tough?)
- Finally a marriage has to last a lot longer. We simply live longer and are more active for longer than we used to be, so instead of 40 years, a marriage has maybe 60 years. Some people have asked the question, "Is it reasonable to expect a relationship to last that long?" I am not suggesting that is legitimate, but just raising it as an issue. There have been long term, seemingly happy celebrity relationships that upon retirement, or changes in circumstances, the couple have decided to break up and amicably go their separate ways. All their friends are lefty wondering "Why?"
I have no answers, no assurances and no superior knowledge. It's a journey each person who says "I do" must negotiate "with due care". If you are a praying person, please drop in a sentence for my kids... I so wish that they will enjoy good partnerships in life and that they wont be hurt..... also there are a whole heap of other couples I would like you to pray for... because in my job I know of many who are hurting in what should be supportive, health giving and healing partnerships. ... bless them all.
Photo: Four from my extended family blowing up balloons which, according to Polish tradition, will be tied to the fence of the house.
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