I don't

I have everything against marriage. Marriage is the ultimate display of affection. Who does marriage actually benefit?

Yes, all little girls dream of the day they will get married . The long white dress and diamond ring on their finger. The flowers, the cake, the grooms bow tie. But marriage isn't just one day, one very expensive day to say the least, but it's for the rest of your life (or so they say, but divorce is all too common). I like to think that I am incapable of making such a big decision but time again has proven different. I made the leap across the country for school at one point I was ready to marry or so I thought. I was ready to dedicate myself to someone else. This was before I understood the institution of marriage and the politics , language and stigma that surround it.

Marriage is giving yourself to someone else. It's legally binding for the most part. You become defined by the other person. You aren a wife or a husband because of the other person. And for many women, you become the other person as you accept his surname. Marriage is like slavery. It has been historically associated with slavery as a woman became the sole property of the man. She was no longer a self identifying being rather an object to be acted upon.

How much has marriage changed? Women (and men) enter into marriage willfully? But how much truth does that hold?

Marriage carries with it so much stigma (so does marrying late or never marrying). Girls are pre disposed to marriage. It's a goal. It's all you need. The media glamorizes marriage (Platinum Weddings, say yes to the dress, just watch TLC) and that's what marriage has become. A day to take Facebook pictures. I'm not here to reclaim the definition of marriage or to return it to its traditional sense: man and woman united under god etc... But to rethink the way we think of marriage. Because religion, law, and gender binaries should have no say in it. Marriage, if one chooses it should be a partnership, an agreement, not a contract of my sort (sexual or legal contract). That redefines marriage as an agreement that isn't legally binding but emotionally based. I shouldn't have to marry someone to express my love for them. Marriage is the ultimate form of PDA. It's a social ritual of acceptance. But I would marry someone if they needed me to (to gain citizenship, etc) because marriage attributes certain rights to those married. It's hierarchical though. The married couple enjoys more social acceptance than the non married. The husband and wife titles are seen as reigning. At the top of the social order (heterosexuality and marriage). I'd rather enter into a "marriage" with someone who doesn't necessarily want to marry, and instead wants to share their life with me. Share being the keyword, not Give their life to me.

I have nothing against those who want to get married. Do it. I'm rarely someone to talk you out of anything. But to realize that the expectations from marriage may not be fully realized because they are socially constructed. I want someone to understand this and to understand that my love for them is greater than a piece of legal paper. I will stay in this relationship because I want to and because I love them not because I am obligated to. And maybe I will marry someone at some point in my life, to reap the benefits married people enjoy. Because I am the one to enter into a transaction solely for benefits (and later return it). Ive bought clothing just to wear it for a day and return it the next day. That was a bad example. I don't mean to say that I would enter a marriage just to try things out. I would and I wouldn't. How different does a relationship feel after marriage? I would have to say not so much, but what can I say really about something I have contemplated and accepted offers for. It's just the stigma that surrounds marriage that changes things. If I entered a marriage it would be for experimentation and to benefit from the aspects the government affords me. I understand as much as I can, the battle the lgbtq community faces as they strive for marriage equality. To enjoy the choice to enter into a marriage if they want to.

Now I've entered into a rant. I don't know really where it came from. I've seen my parents marriage last 30+ years but I don't see love, I see tolerance.

If you want to marry me because you love me, understand that I may not want to marry you because I do love you. (and who knows if we'll even have the choice and opportunity to ask each other).
I don't want a diamond ring. I don't want a fancy dress. I don't want to spend thousands of dollars (also because I am frugal as fuck). I really just want you. I want to share my life with you. Not give my life to you and lose my identity.

You will not define me. We will form our own definition of "marriage"

But I watch WE tv and I want it all. I want the dress, the shoes, the spectacle. I want you. I want the suburban home (I prefer the farm home, town home, home), the dogs, the kids, the minivan (maybe not a minivan, I still want my Vespa). I am against the "traditional" definition of marriage. I would enjoy getting married some day to someone who understands what marriage truly is. Someone who has decided that they would like to share the rest of their life with me and the ultimate form of showing it is by spending ridiculous amounts of money (or not, I would enjoy the backyard wedding or whatever wedding really, WE tv has also given me unrealistic expectations) on the wedding and the whole thing, ya know. But I do want it, it just isn't something that I am striving to attain with someone, I would like for it to just happen, for us to plan and plan and plan, and then for one day to say "ah well, fuck it, let's just do it". And there. We are married.

I had to rant all of my opposition to marriage to show that marriage can be beautiful when understood, when we have realized we have been deceived. And understanding the absurdity to truly understand if we want it. I want it. I want someone to share my life with. To possibly own a home with and some kids (not too many, houses, that is). I would like to get married. But I know that it may not happen. I mentioned my parents once before, married 30 years ya know, and it's toleration. My siblings have children but they are not married. So, it isn't something that I have come to expect, I'm jaded. But the media has made me want it and hate it so much. I may be too young to make sense of it all. My thoughts are shaky.

But c'mon man, I've got colors picked out, a dress in mind, and even possible names chosen for my kids for years now. Seven years to be approximate. My mother knows this. She's seen me sit on the couch all day watching WE tv (weekend mornings during high school) and asked me "are you planning to get married anytime soon? Because all I see you watch is wedding tv shows..."

And maybe I have tried to deny it. But weddings seem fun. Now, I think I have combined weddings and marriage. Maybe I want one and not the other. Maybe I want both. Hell, who knows what I want more than I do?

I'll think about this and make up my mind. Maybe I am opposed to weddings and not marriage?
You tell me, do I want the dress? Yes. Do I want to own my own home? Yes. Do I want to spend the rest of my life with someone? Yes. Should I expect all of this to happen? No.

But suddenly now

I hate having to distinguish what that feeling is. Do I want to masturbate or do I have to pee?
So I masturbate. And then realize that feeling was due to the fact that I just had to pee and not arousal. Ahh.

Peeing after holding it in for so long feels as good as masturbation.

Losing control, losing your soul

I made this blog weeks ago. I keep forgetting to write in it. Not forgetting, not having time. I blame the educational system. Endless nights, hefty workloads, midterms. I love my school. But I hate that my life revolves solely around school and the work associated with it. I chose to be here. So I have to deal with it. I often think to myself, how different would my life be if my parents prevented me from moving 3000 miles to attend school? How different would it have been if I had chosen to stay at home? If I had chosen to work instead of attending school? Yesterday, Meredith, Heather, and Gabriella were overheard speaking about being at the right place and at the right time. Bill Gates, Steve Jobs, that Mark Zuckerberg. How it doesn't just come down to luck but to the opportunities that you had and how those opportunities created that luck. Fortunately, my parents trusted me to make my own decisions, trusted me to decide what I thought was for my own good. But I dislike the fact that they believe school was my only option to get up, get out, move out, grow up, get going. School isn't the best and definitely not the only option for success. I hate that when I go home, I am praised for going to school by community members. I had luck I had opportunities. Attending school doesn't mean I am intelligent, that I will make money, or that I am even seeking a successful career. So many of my peers back home were not presented with the same luck and opportunities as I was. Their choices, their achievements, should not be invalidated because they are not going to school. Who said school was the only way to get out? Who said? What did they have in mind? And what does "get out" mean? So many institutions of higher education are heavily impacted by federal budget constraints. Many students are suffering from the educational gap. And decisions and choices are influenced and criticized by sexism, classism, and racism.

Am I better than any of them? No. Am I smarter than any of them? No. Do I feel uncomfortable using the term "them"? Yes. Because I am referring to people that I know. People that I grew up with. That I saw fall in and out of school, love, money. My success is not their success. Their success is not mine. We need to stop comparing our lives, to see who got the better grades, the better car, because it comes down to opportunities.
And I think I should stop ranting now. Because I have made no sense. This was supposed to merely be an introduction. I have been meaning to write, to write on this blog. I used to write so much. But along the way I lost interest. I wanted to be a writer. I read so much. I want to be that way again. Partly because I feel so inadequate when I speak about literature.