Love and Marriage

Marriage isn't like herpes or plastic surgery. You can get rid of it. It's reversible. You can change your mind.

But it still scares me.

A husband was never a luxury I considered for myself. From a very young age I thought I knew, for sure, that I would never get married. That feeling was, in large part, because I didn't believe someone would want to wake up next to my ugly mug every morning. But it was also because of an absence - I didn't dream of walking down an aisle in a white dress. I didn't dream of carefully coordinated bouquets. I didn't dream of weddings. I dreamt of having a permanent snuggle buddy who would kiss me on the mouth sometimes, but not of actual, honest-to-god marriage.

Thus, I feel very unprepared facing the very real possibility of my own wedding. My boyfriend and I have Talked About It. It might happen. But the forces pushing us to marry are very... unusual.

See, my boyfriend, Craig, is English. I met him while in Prague during a drunken bender on a boat party hosted by the son of Rick Steves (don't ask.) Craig was a cute and sexy European. I was on my first weekend of my study abroad program. You know how it goes. Tale as old as time.

Except it didn't end after one night. We kept in contact, messaging daily. I went to London with some friends and met up with him. I visited Bristol. I visited again. I met his parents and all of his friends. When I went back for my final semester at NYU, we said we'd keep in touch and see how things went. We both knew long distance relationships often ended.

It didn't.

We talked every day. He came to New York. I spent my first post-graduate summer in Bristol. I fell in love. He did too. Deeply. We fell farther than we knew was possible.

But you can't work in England as an American. Since so many immigrants come in through the EU, the government makes sure no one from non-EU countries gets in and takes a job. No one.

Solutions can be found, and have been, but they're not permanent. I've now spent almost 6 months in England, total, in an uncertain position, gaining experience and money but no job security, no real future. And I'm eager to pursue a career. That's one thing I have always known I wanted.

So the only permanent solution appears to be marriage. I'm not unsure about the man - I'm 100% sure he's the one I want to spend the rest of my life with if I'm going to spend it with anyone at all. But I'm young. Twenty-three years old. I don't think I'm too immature or my brain cells haven't matured yet, but I do think I'm going to change a great deal in the upcoming years. Will the woman I become still be the woman Craig loves? Will she still be the woman who loves Craig?

I know, I know - everyone changes no matter what their age, and it's impossible to know whether a marriage will work out. But it's still frightening, especially if you can't wait until you feel, as they say, "ready for marriage."

But I swear to God, I won't met this man go. I can't. He's my inspiration, my muse, my drive. I'll fight to have him in my life until the bitter end. If we need to get married for that to happen, so be it.