Mariage Marathon
May 12th 2007 07:24
The wedding day was the beginning of the race as the couple started their life-marathon together. At the beginning, the couple tried to catch their breaths at the same time, to run at the same pace, and if one of them ran faster, the other one would run faster to catch up so they could be together again. If one of them started to run out of line, the other one tried to steer his/her partner back to the right track.
Many generations ago, most women stayed home to take care of her family. Nowadays, family and career were both important for women. Some career oriented women have chosen to give up their jobs to stay home, and take care of the children. The husbands then became the sole financial providers, and the wives became dependent on their husbands for emotional and financial support. By the time the children grew up, these abandoned wives/mothers started feeling lost with the empty nests. They have lost their focal points in life – they are out of place. At the same time, the husbands have been too busy with their roles and they forgot that they have left their partners who got lost so far away behind.
As time went on, sometimes, many wives were so out of touch with the society. The working lives that they were once had were out of reach. Some of them would even feel worthless. They have missed the challenge and the fulfillment from the job. To pick up where they left off was a difficult thing to do for some women both mentally and physically. Getting back to the society was a big challenge. For instance, getting in shape was one thing; catching up with the advanced technology was another thing. Yet, they would feel it was time for them to move on, away from the “desperate house wife” life style. They believed that this was their chances to renew themselves. They also need their spouses to be supportive. From the husbands’ points of view, this situation might not have been a problem. The husbands so got used to coming home with hot home-cooking meals, fresh new laundry, the clean and organized house; and he did not want to change the existing life style.
In the movie, The War of the Roses, the wife became angry with her rich, lawyer husband when he did not support her idea of having her career back. The movie showed the couple fighting like children and used their beautiful house as a battlefield. The war continued until “death does them apart.” They both died at the end and she still refused to forgive him. Even though, the movie exaggerated the situation a little bit; but the message was clear – the wife’s job of raising her children was done and she wanted to pursue her career once again. Somehow, the husband did not seem to recognize the “housewife” job was voluntary. When she did not have the support from her husband, the resolution was dissolution of the marriage.
Regardless of how old we are, as we have gone through life, we are still growing everyday with new experiences. As we grow older, a lot of things in our life have changed: our thoughts, feelings, preferences, the way we perceive life, and even down to simple thing as hobbies. The desire and hope for the future might have been different for most couples. Somehow, along the marriage-marathon line, the couple has lost touch with each other. One partner would have been too far to the right or to the left, many steps behind, or even totally stopped running. To reset or adjust the pace and position for both would be difficult and almost impossible for some.
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