Writing Club Week 22

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[Irishgirl]

Writing Club Week 22 The rules are the same - ten minutes, no stopping, no editing, just write what comes to mind.

Sorry, I'm a lttle late with this, it is a Bank Holiday here...and I thought it was Sunday! 
As usual the first one to respond to this week's thread sets the topic.



Join in, write, have fun   

The previous Writing Club entries are here:

Week 21 http://www.themudflats.net/forum/index.php/topic,7141.0.html -- Things that rhyme with "spring"

Week 20 http://www.themudflats.net/forum/index.php/topic,7079.0.html -- Hope

Week 19 http://www.themudflats.net/forum/index.php/topic,7005.0.html -- The things kids do to drive you nuts...

Week 18 http://www.themudflats.net/forum/index.php/topic,6940.0.html -- Ann Strongheart
 
Week 17 http://www.themudflats.net/forum/index.php/topic,6757.0.html -- Rollercoasters

Week 16 http://www.themudflats.net/forum/index.php/topic,6637.0.html -- Volcanoes

Week 15 http://www.themudflats.net/forum/index.php/topic,6592.0.html -- Thought

Week 14: http://www.themudflats.net/forum/index.php/topic,6542.0.html -- Shyness

Week 13: http://www.themudflats.net/forum/index.php/topic,6472.0.html -- Ends

Week 12: http://www.themudflats.net/forum/index.php/topic,6409.0.html -- Unexpected Weather

Week 11: http://www.themudflats.net/forum/index.php/topic,6335.0.html -- Nature

Week 10: http://www.themudflats.net/forum/index.php/topic,6255.0.html  (BEST EVAR!!) -- Fill In The Blank

Week 9: http://www.themudflats.net/forum/index.php/topic,6052.0.html -- Sports

Week 8: http://www.themudflats.net/forum/index.php/topic,5867.0.html -- Trust

Week 7: http://www.themudflats.net/forum/index.php/topic,5724.0.html -- Martin Luther King

Week 6: http://www.themudflats.net/forum/index.php/topic,5325.0.html -- Open Doors

Week 5: http://www.themudflats.net/forum/index.php/topic,5195.0.html -- Mind's Eye

Week 4: http://www.themudflats.net/forum/index.php/topic,5108.0.html -- Slinky

Week 3: http://www.themudflats.net/forum/index.php/topic,5022.0.html -- Shoes

Week 2: http://www.themudflats.net/forum/index.php/topic,4809.0.html -- Where The Wild Things Aren't

Week 1: http://www.themudflats.net/forum/index.php/topic,4675.0.html -- Dust Bunny

[Deep Blue]

How about in honor of Mrs. Charcoal Sniper P. - Weddings/Marriage?

[Irishgirl]

Thanks Deep, Weddings/Marriage it is then --- this could be fun!! 

[Ripley in CT]

Used to be that when people asked me if I was married, I just said "no".  That was when I was young and nervous. 

You see, I'm one of the people that JTP won't let near his children, apparently.  Up until a few years ago, the word "marriage" was not an option for me, not that I ever saw myself married anyway.  After watching the train wreck that was my parents' marriage, I saw no use for it.

After a while, I began to answer people who asked if I was married with, "It's not legal in my state."  That usually was enough for them to back away slowly once they figured it out. 

Now, it's legal in my state, as well as many others.  And I am single!  Go figure.  I had been in a 10 year long relationship that I left in 2004, just before the real legal battles began for same-sex marriage benefit rights.  Had we been married, I would not have had to start my life over from scratch and left all my stuff behind with no desire or recourse to get it.  It was just stuff and I was safe.  A decent trade off, I guess.  However, marriage would have made it a law that I had rights to my stuff, half the stuff we gathered over 10 years, and probably some sort of compensation for my troubles.

I have many thoughts about marriage.  Both negative and positive.  I don't agree that religion should be involved in it, but I like seeing a wedding in a big ol' church.  I have not had the opportunity to see very many "good" marriages in my lifetime. Parents really can screw it up for their kids' future relationships.  But, when I see a really old couple, holding hands and shuffling down the boardwalk at the beach or something, it always makes me smile.

(sorry, I could go on, but then it would be MY blog!)

[Cassie Jeep Pike Palin]

You are so right.

Do not EVER give up.

I am hetero, married for 39 years, with four children, and I deny you NOTHING...nothing.

[0whole1]

Dweam within a Dweam

I was married before -- before I was married, actually.  We lived together for five years, and it was just easier to say "wife" than go into all the gory details.  With HR or inside my own head.

...

She's gone now.

[Charcoal Sniper P.]

We met our neighbors yesterday.  I was trying to nap after the excitement of the weekend, they were BBQing.  Froth decided joining them was easier than fighting it so he went out into the yard.  I eventually came out too.  He introduced me as his wife.  So strange.  Obviously I knew that would be the outcome of our wedding over the weekend, but none the less very very peculiar to hear.

This morning someone said "Hello Mrs.-----------," and I was confused but only for a moment.

Things are settling down here after an 18 month engagement and wedding planning.  I woke up today to have nothing pressing to do, no one I had to call, no vendors I needed to check in with, a weird quiet. 

I had made for the wedding all the place cards, wrapped all the favors, made the boxes for other favors, wired crystals and pearls for my flower arrangements, decorated a card cage, designed and printed welcome packets for the people in hotels, designed and printed programs and a million other things I have been busy busy busy for months and then in a few short hours it was over.

The day was strange like I was in a play about myself but not really there.  In a tragic turn of events my coffee maker died that morning, and I think with out the caffeine and with all the excitement I couldn't focus.  I was prepared for this (not the death of my coffee maker but the hectic nature of a wedding day, I have worked many weddings in several different job positions).  I had emailed specific needs and requests to the venue. I wasn't bridezilla, I just know that when I work at a wedding there is info I need that no one thought to provide me, so I provided that information in advance.

I'm not sure yet (after really only a day and a half) if married life is any different except I don't recognize my own name, other people aren't sure what to call me and people want pictures that I don't have yet.

Froth seams to be very very very very very happy and a tad bit emotional.

I love my husband.
I love our life.
I am not sure what to do now.

Several people said "you should be a wedding planner" but I think I need a break.

[Irishgirl]

Great writing....I'm hooked!

[Deep Blue]

To me, marriage is one of those broad concepts like religion, or culture, that’s just too complicated and personal for platitudes to apply.

I think I’m really fortunate that I’m happy in my marriage – I like my spouse more than anyone else I know. I love nearly every minute I spend with him. But still there are challenges, and a multitude of sacrifices.

I have a friend who married a guy she caused a scandal with in college. He eventually left his long-time girlfriend for her; that was after she had been the “other woman” at a small school where she had to endure a lot of whispers and furtive glances. They’ve now been married more than ten years and have two beautiful children. She wonders if all those college gossipers are waiting around for vindication. If a divorce comes after 20 years, will they be right? That she should have expected it to end in disaster – cheating, jealousy, lies - considering how it started?

I guess we just make our way the best we can. I figure whatever my insecurities are, I still have a spouse who loves me and chooses me, and we can figure things out together. Though marriage arguably  has its drawbacks, for me it’s worked out pretty well so far.

So I guess that makes me an advocate for marriage, for anyone who truly wants to make that commitment to another person – whatever the race, religion or gender of that person may be. Good luck to you, and don’t forget to work hard.

[Ripley in CT]

Charc P:

Your entry here is most excellent.  I appreciate your honest self-report.  The name thing would freak me out, too. 

It sounds  a little like Christmas morning:  all the wrapping, tree placement and decorating, suspense... then everyone throws open the gifts and it's over.  Or like Thanksgiving dinner being over in 20 minutes after hours of preparation.

At least you don't have the clean-up to worry about!  Congratulations on the beginning of a life with someone else by your side.

[Jaime from Wasilla]

Mawwiage. Dat bwessed awangement...(I went there, too, owhole! )

I don't know why I always get choked up and emotional, but I am the guy who is a sobbing wreck, using a half a box of kleenex and making wet, honking noises all the way through the ceremony. I think it is just my repressed rage at a society that has not allowed people like me to be married, though that has been mellowed by recent events in Iowa, Vermont and Maine.  Or maybe I am a sentimental old softy. I cry at hallmark commercials, too.

In my 20's I proposed to a lesbian who had the good sense to turn me down three times.

In my 30's I proposed to my lover of three years, who left me.

I have seen a handful of beautiful, long term marriages, and countless shorter lived disasters.

My own parents tried to "stick it out" for the sake of the kids, but as the oldest, I think we all would have been better off if they had divorced much earlier. They were married 27 years, but the last seven years were divorce proceedings. The seven years before that were pretty ugly, too.

I suspect much of the difficulty with marriage is the disconnect between what it is supposed to be and what it is. If we had more honesty about what marriage actually is, instead of such an obsession with the fantasy of what it could be, we could be more successful at it, and more generous about who gets to.

I'd like a husband, and to be married. I would like the community affirmation and support of our relationship. I want to grow old next to someone, with them knowing the quiet sounds I make while sleeping, and me knowing the secrets of their solitude.  I am not sure that marriage is needed or helpful with that.

I think the conflict between the secular contractual reality and the religious spiritual union is the indulgence of small hearts and smaller minds.

[Irishgirl]

I suspect much of the difficulty with marriage is the disconnect between what it is supposed to be and what it is. If we had more honesty about what marriage actually is, instead of such an obsession with the fantasy of what it could be, we could be more successful at it, and more generous about who gets to.

I couldn't agree more. Marriage or a relationship between people of any sexual orientation should not be based on this fantasy of happy ever after. It requires bloody hard work to maintain most relationships. Only the very lucky few have an idyllic union. The rest of us have to slog at it. Don't tell hubby I said that. 

He can drive me mad, but he is my best friend! 

[The Blogger]

When I am very little, I meet lovely thin blonde lady.

She swim in oceans, wearing bikinis, always looking beautiful.

She dining with princes, partying with rock stars.

And one day, I walking into town to buy creme and day-old bread when she coming out of market.  She slip and I reaching out, grabbing her hand, helping her to her feet.

She smiling at me and asking my name.  I telling her Alain.  Her smiling was dazzlement -- with all the promises of ten thousand days of happiness and another thousand of bliss.

Before I know it, I speaking aloud what in my young heart.  "Please to be marrying me, pretty lady."

She smiling again... kind smile, not condescending.

Then long-haired boyfriend coming out of market and ask if she okay.  I still holding her elbow, but reluctantly letting her go.  "Who this?" asking long-haired boyfriend.  She explain I helping her and proposing marriage too.

Long-haired boyfriend laughing.  "Maybe you should get married.  All your friends from college are married now  They have houses and lawns."

She ruffling my hair.  "That's the way I always heard it should be," she says.  He offering me money.  I turning red and turning it down.

I am seeing her a few more times that summer, then she leave when nights growing colder.  Next summer I see long-haired boyfriend, but pretty blonde lady no come back.  I working up courages to ask him and finally am asking.  He remembering me, then shrugging and says "Who knows with women."  Again, he trying to give me money, but I refuse.  Jump on bike and pedal away as fast as I can go.  Cheeks red with anger I am not to understanding and tears falling down my face as if he punching me.

Next time I seeing pretty blonde lady is in record store (http://www.stlyrics.com/lyrics/littleblackbook/thatsthewayivealwayshearditshouldbe.htm).  Cheeks going red again as I listening.  Thoughts of her hand ruffling my hair.

Thinking:  Could we really have raised a family of our own, her and me?

And wondering: Am I so vain if I thinking song is about me?

[Charcoal Sniper P.]

thanks Ripley.

I am also glad i didnt have to do the clean up.  And it is a little like that christmas morning or thanksgiving dinner thing.

[Irishgirl]

The Blogger,

You have knocked it out of the park!! Wonderful. 

[Irishgirl]

Great writing again this week. Just want to let you know that Writing Club Week 23 had started and can be found here.