HAPPILY EVER AFTER

once upon a time....
that is how all fairy tales start and often end with and they lived happily ever after. we are told these stories as little girls and we sit and have pretend weddings, thinking every boy we meet is "mr. right", doodle their name with ours in our school notebooks. we dream of the "perfect wedding" and the wonderful life that we heard in fairy tales, seen in movies and told to us by mommy and daddy.let's be honest here, it does not happen in the real world.
in the real world some people are nice, some stab you in the back and some only know the word "me".
these days dating and marriage are so complicated. in our parents day you got the ring, the marriage license, the house, married and moved in and had a life together. today you need 2 or more months salary for an engagement ring alone, a prenup so what yours is yours and his is his, the wedding planner, the aids test, and the next 30 years salary for the down payment on house you need big enough so the bill for the decorator is worth it.
when did getting married get so complicated?
we want it to be perfect like we were told as little girls, but nobody ever warned us that one day you could think you were having the perfect life and one day your spouse looks at you and says i want out. the perfect world is gone.
i have been married for 4 years and as much as i do love ace and he loves me, our life is far from perfect. some days it's down right weird. we fight over all the normal things, money, job, who is doing the dishes, and of course the fight that comes every sunday during football season. then there are the days we fight about nothing but bring up everything that has nothing to do with what we started screaming at each other to begin with.
i can honestly say i married the female version of my self. we both are passionate, want our own ways, we think alike (scary sometimes) and we have a very mixed marriage.
he is catholic, i am jewish, he likes so leave everything all over the house, i am the neat freak, he likes to shout and i do not want any noise, he is the republican, i the democrat,
he is a white sox fan, me, the cubs. you can see where the fight can happen.
this is something fairy tales forget about. sure we compromise, but it takes alot and you have to be willing to work it everyday.
there is no happy ever after. marriage is a consent work in progress. when you take those vows you take them for life. i come from a family, mostly my dad's side, that has a long line of divorces. because of this i try to keep the marriage working because i do not want to follow in my family's foot steps. will i have the perfect marriage, no, but i can at least strive for a good one. it's a more realistic choice in life.