i'm only 22. and yet i keep having this recurring feeling... it's almost making me clausterphobic... like the walls of unmarriedness are closing in on me... like the life i used to know, the one full of young, carefree friends and fun, is being chipped away, wedding by wedding...
of course, i LOVE weddings. they're such happy occasions. people i love and good food and tons of dancing... fabulous combination. so yeah, each wedding in isolation makes me really happy. but then, at some point, comes pattern recognition. sometime after each individual wedding, when my thoughts begin to congele, it occurs to me that the weddings are continuing to accumulate. i think about the wedding i just went to, i think about all the weddings i've been to recently, i think about all the weddings coming up... and i can't help but feel something slip away...
i know i'm young. i feel like most of my friends are pretty young. and yet, i feel like *everyone* is getting married--and in their youth, no less (hence, straight outta diapers and into rings--see title of blog entry above). a few of my best friends/relatives in the past few years have gotten married at 21 or 22. the second wedding i'll be attending this month will be between two 22 year olds. wow. where are the irresponsible, college and post-college-aged years going, people?!
it's not just these people's ages either. it's sheer numbers. since i first went to college 5 years ago, i've been to *so* many weddings of my friends or family members... people that are roughly in my age group, often in the same stage of life as me. in the last 20 minutes, i've counted how many such weddings i went to, or that i was invited to but couldn't attend... so, in the past 5 years (not counting cousins i don't know or of friendly acquaintances to whose weddings i wasn't actually invited--because that would probably triple the number), the grand total comes to...
20, with 6 more to come in the next year (2 of them this month)
ummmm... wow. 26 weddings of my family members or personal friends, all roughly in my age group/life stage. i can't even imagine what the figure would be if i did stop and tally all the other people i know who got married, but who may not have specifically invited me... the number would be staggering. it's seriously ridiculous.
interestingly enough, my fabulous coworker javad just said, not 12 seconds ago, unprovoked by me or this blog post, "what is it with everybody in the world getting married?" good question, my friend. good freaking question. glad you're feelin' me on this one...
recently, my friend mojan blogged about how *everyone* is having babies (see july 5 here). so true, moj. perhaps the baby epidemic is an after-effect of a marriage epidemic that started 5 years ago and continues even now...
all i know is that everyone has gotten married recently or is getting married soon. and by everyone, i mean everyone but me. and of course, that's all wonderful. i support marriage, i plan on getting married someday. and if i get married sooner rather than later, i suppose that means i've been infected by this spreading marriage contagion. and that'll all be well and good, i guess, since we all have to grow up sometime, it's good to move on to the next phase of life, and i'm sure we'll have fun and stay friends and grow and change and all that... even after we're all married.
still, i have to lament the end of something. i'm not quite sure what the something is yet... i could assign the something a name, maybe a trite, generic phrase, like "an era" or "childhood" or "the simple life," so that we could then refer to the tsunami of marriages as "the end of an era" or "the end of childhood" or "the end of the simple life." but somehow, that all seems nondescript and essentializing.
i know it's more complicated than that... but because it came so soon, i didn't have enough time to think about it, decide what it is, and call it that. so for now, we'll just say that the it has come. and with it has come nostalgia, reminiscence, discomfort, joy, confused contemplation.
everyone and their cousin has joined the legions of married or soon-to-be-married people. everyone but me, that is (though incidentally, my cousins have joined as well). and it is what it is.
and it makes me realize that with each passing day, i can feel the dimensions of my kid box getting more and more contorted... very soon, i won't be able to push the edges out any further. very soon, i won't be able to stretch the sides into strange shapes and patterns so i can be comfortable inside. very soon, i just won't be able to fit inside anymore... i'll have to step outside the kid box. and once i've stepped out and attended 12 more weddings, i'll have to do my best to avoid getting sucked into the adult box...
and that is what it is.
Posted by naseem at July 27, 2005 04:10 PMLOL.... "marriage contagion"...
Lots of people hold out. I am 29 and not yet married. My best friends from high school just got or are about to be married. A college friend just got married last year... She was 28 and he was 31.
'90s US men, women marry at a greater age
http://www.stp.uh.edu/vol61/950915/6a.html
I AM NOT MARRIED!
Posted by: george at July 28, 2005 02:59 PMhm. i gotta think about this one a bit...
Posted by: delara at July 28, 2005 11:46 PMi never thought you'd propose to me like this, but alright, nas. i'll marry you.
:)
Posted by: edward at July 29, 2005 08:33 AMYou know . . . I wasn't sure how to respond to this post. When I got married I was youngish and by husband was in his mid-twenties. But at the time I got married I felt anything but young: I'd spent the majority of my psuedo-adult life taking care of people in one way or another. Marriage wasn't something I'd ever planned on doing at 21, but God makes other plans for us, and two-plus years into it I'm suprised at how much more carefree my life is now. When you've had a lot of interaction where people rely on you but are unable to give anything, being in a relationship where everything is reciprocal doesn't feel like some huge adult commitment, or like a responsibility. And when you're both supportive of each other you never feel like opportunities are lost, because you have your own personal cheerleader encouraging you to grow in whatever ways present themselves.
I'm not trying to imply that marriage isn't Very Important and Very Serious. I guess it just seems like you have notions that marriage is in some ways burdensome, and I wanted to say that, for me anyone, it's anything but.
Posted by: raychul at July 30, 2005 04:36 PM
Nas, it seems that people up here (upper/midwest) get married earlier than down in Texas. People up here seem more likely to have kids in their early 20's, and to feel that it is tragic if you're not settled down by 25. TH and I have both noticed that in our circles at work & school.
Raychul, don't forget you started school young, right? That makes a bit of difference.
You're growing up, its true, but what of it? It doesn't sound like you're obsessed with the issue, as I have known some people to, so you'll be fine =).
Posted by: Stephen A. Fuqua at August 10, 2005 08:43 PM