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Jewish World Review May 3, 2005 / 24 Nisan, 5765 On marriage, best friends & tattoos By Marianne M. Jennings
http://www.JewishWorldReview.com |
I have not been the same since Jennifer Aniston filed for divorce from Brad Pitt. When they married in 2000, I gave the marriage 5 years. I was wrong. The marriage lasted only 4 years and 5 months. Three things portended doom: (1) Mrs. Pitt got "misty" during the couple's Malibu nuptials as she pledged, "to always make his favorite banana milk shake." Love, honor, and obey have gone by the wayside since fruit smoothies. (2) Mrs. Pitt offer this bon mot following her nuptials, "It's very cool when you have your best friend at your side." and (3) He's a movie star and she's an overpaid TV star who can't move beyond blue-collar/good-morning-star-shine characters in movies.
I predict marriage failures accurately, and I do not just appraise the obvious such as the demise of Angelina Jolie and Billy Bob Thornton, who were doomed once they headed for the tattoo parlor for mutual etchings. That's trouble with a capital "T" in blue ink script.
Tom Cruise and Nicole Kidman: she was too tall. Same for Chuck and Di. She was 5'10" and he was only slightly taller than Camilla Parker-Bowles, his now beloved bride who makes the Queen seem as if she is chewing nails.
My pending failures predictions? If John Mason does not run away from his daft runaway bride, Jennifer Wilbank, he is signing up for divorce. Two marathon runners do not a marriage make. Julia Roberts and her camera man husband are also goners. The cracks began showing when her working-stiff husband went surfing as Julia and twins recovered in an LA hospital. After a year holed up in Taos, New Mexico with two babies (their announced plan), Mr. and Mrs. Roberts-Moder will be no more. Jennifer Lopez and Marc Anthony. Ben Affleck and whomever.
Marriages, what with Charles, Camilla, Brad, Jennifer, and brides sprinting to Albuquerque via Greyhound, have been under the microscope of late. Even the final presidential debate found Bob Schieffer posing this question to Messrs. Bush and Kerry, "All three of us are surrounded by very strong women. We're all married to strong women. Each of us have [sic] two daughters that make us very proud. I'd like to ask each of you, what is the most important thing you've learned from these strong women?" Mr. Bush answered that he loved all three of the women in his life very much and added about Laura, "it was love at first sight." Sen. Kerry, however, retold the "Integrity, integrity, integrity" story about his mother. He added that he admired the way Mr. Bush interacted with Laura.
The ketchup bottles must have been flying at the Kerry compound that night. Mr. Kerry spoke of his mother and Mrs. Laura Bush with pride and praise, but only briefly mentioned, in gaggle form, Teresa Heinz-Rodham-Kerry and the hamster-toting daughters. Even the comedians seized upon the Kerry-banana-republic partnership. Saturday Night Live described public displays of affection between Sen. Kerry and Teresa as two lobsters doing kung fu.
There is a dearth of charming and enduring marriages. Spending a lifetime with the love of our life remains the soul's yearning, but culture does little to help in that goal. James Q. Wilson, professor of public policy at Pepperdine, has unequivocal evidence that cohabitation before marriage dooms a marriage. Still "shacking up," as my grandmother used to say, offers sophisticates an alternative to the permanence of vows. The runaway bride and her betrothed had been living together for 1.5 years before deciding to make it legal by sending out invites to hit up 600 guests for gifts. They couldn't even make it through the rehearsal dinner.
Our culture accepts divorce as a mere parking meter violation. People drift in and out of marriage despite studies documenting that those who get married and stay married are happier and healthier. The meters for their spaces may run longer than their marriages. Even Ozzy Osbourne, a monogamous long-termer whose brain has been largely sacrificed to unidentified hallucinogens, knows this. His thought, "You don't give up at the first bend. . ."
Reshaping marriage into an indistinct relationship was a bad plan. The Aniston-Pitt mantra, "My spouse is my best friend," is trouble. With all that marriage demands, best friends would part ways before the tin anniversary. No best friend will tolerate snoring. No best friend will raise children. No best friend could void golf on Saturday morning. A spouse will do all three. Demanding a best friend in marriage relegates marriage to the ordinary, denying its unique origins and purpose. Best friends set too high expectations on emotional support and too low tolerance for demands. Marriage allows you to say, with great love, "Make your own dang smoothie!"
The soul mate myth has us tossing about tarot card theories of romance. Soul mates are not found; they are grown. You don't see soul until you have shared the joys of Little League, the challenges of a wayward child, or the pooling of quarters to meet monthly bills. Astrological forces do not hatch soul mates. The best advice I've found on true love and lasting marriage came, oddly, from Tom Arnold's book, How I Lost 5 Pounds in Six Years. Mr. Arnold, now on his third marriage (second tattoo), wrote, "It's easy to enjoy each other while on a vacation in Maui. The key is to find someone you can have fun with during the six-hour flight over there."
A People magazine reader fretted over Aniston and Pitt, "If Jen and Brad couldn't make it with all their millions, how can I possibly hope for a happy marriage?" My dear girl, get up each day and do the mundane, share life's ups and downs, scrimp, save, laugh, and cry, but stay together through it all, even the bends, and don't skip town or involve the FBI. Also, forget the joint tattoos.
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JWR contributor Marianne M. Jennings is a professor of legal and ethical studies at Arizona State
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© 2005, Marianne M. Jennings |
Arnold Ahlert | |||||||||||
