I did. I don’t remember exactly how young I was, but I knew early on I wanted to be married.
I’m sure tales such as Cinderella had some impact on that notion, but they didn’t necessarily create the notion. It was there beforehand.
Society also shaped some of my thoughts about marriage. Helped to define them, but definitely didn’t generate them. Good grief, I cringe thinking about what mixed-up concepts I’d have if I’d relied solely on my first impressions of marriage from society.
Bacon
See, there were a lot of mixed messages flying around about women’s roles in marriage and the world at large when my first impressions of such things took root in the 1970s. For one thing, more women were entering the work force and demanding equal rights. One song from a commercial that I remember back then pretty much defined the attitude at the time.
“I bring home the bacon. Da da da dum. I fry it up in the pan.”
So you earn it, you cook it, but you were still expected to care for the house and children. Yet, being a traditional stay-at-home wife and mother was looked down on. The focus was on empowering us little girls to do all the things and have all the opportunities our mothers never had.
What the Bacon Busted
So now you have an attitude of “we can do everything.” Which was noble but ludicrous. No one can do everything.
But our mothers were determined to show us they could, and by extension then we’d know we could.
Which was great. Like I said, their intentions were good. Except how they went about flexing their independence muscles broke something along the way.
What? Marriage.
Skyrocketing Divorce Rates
Check out these stats I found at Divorce Reform.
• In the 1880’s, fewer than five percent of marriages ended in divorce.
• In the 1940s, 14 percent of white women divorced. (There wasn’t a mention about other races.)
• From 1970 to 1975, divorce rates rose nearly 40 percent. (Granted, there were other factors besides feminism that accounted for this. For example, laws changed making it easier to get a divorce.)
And we all know what current divorce rates are.
Learning by Example
So instead of teaching us how to resolve issues and work through conflicts or disagreements, the lessons they inadvertently taught were, “If it’s not working for you, hit the road. Something else will come along.”
Or, to put it another way, “Divorce is okay.”
But divorce was not okay by me. I didn’t buy off on the concept that if it doesn’t work out you get out. I knew when I found the person I was willing to say “I do” to, we were in it together for the long haul. Period.
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