On Fucking Up Your Life As Well As Mine

I gotta' get this off my chest or I'm going to flip the fuck out.

So I'm getting married in 57 days. As I've said before, I'm really excited about it. Upon hearing this, one of the higher-ups in my deparment promptly started expounding upon his theory that marriage is largely a mistake. He further suggested that I get a prenup in order to safegaurd both my own and my bride-to-be's future security in the event of a divorce.

Now, while I know the guy thought he was looking out for my best interest, that couldn't be further from the case. What he was really doing was taking an opportunity to sound sage while simultaneously complaining about his own life. You see, all this great marriage advice is coming from a guy who got divorced in the last 2 years. Oh, I'm sure he learned a lot from the experience, but that doesn't make him an expert on marriage. In this case, it makes him bitter. I will now address the points he made since I could not do it to his face:

• "Remember, 50% of people that get married get divorced." The statistic is poorly calculated and misrepresentational. It is the annual marriage rate per 1,000 people compared with the annual divorce rate. What they should be do is calculate how many people who have ever married subsequently divorced. Which makes the percentage 41. There is speculation that it will never hit 50%. Thanks to http://www.divorcereform.org/nyt05.html for the explanation.
• "You've been together 8 years? You're making a mistake by marrying this girl. You haven't been able to explore other options to see if she's really the one that's right for you." The fuck do you know about my love life before my fiance? Every last one of the women I dated before her were out of their fucking gourds. All of them.
• "Love is not the only reason to get married. There are a lot of other things you have to take into consideration. You're creating a partnership. You have to look at how you work as a team, etc." This is the one statement he made that I agreed with when separated from the rest of the garbage spewing forth from the hole in the front of his head. We've been living together with combined finances/resources for the better part of 4 years. I know exactly how we work and interact together. Which is one of the many reasons we're going to get married.
• "She isn't pregnant already, is she?" No. But thanks for giving me some credit. That'd be a great way to get sucked into a marriage, wouldn't it?
• "How old are you? 28? That's not so bad." Ok, cool. I'm glad you're ok with that.
• Now I would like to address the underlying, though unstated theme of your diatribe: You're assuming I have not given marriage any real thought or consideration, that I am somehow romanticizing the experience. You don't think I know what I'm getting into. You say hi to me once a day. That is the extent to which you know me. You don't know how I make decisions, you don't know my background, you don't a goddam thing about my life as it is today. You don't know that I am a product of divorce and thus, perhaps take marriage a bit more seriously than many folks. Or that I have essentially been married for the last 4 years anyway. You have no idea what I am capable of and you don't know my woman or how strong and beautiful she is, and you sure as hell don't know how deep my love for her is. All you know is that your marriage wasn't all it was cracked up to be. All you have is your mistakes. You have 15 years of mistakes and you have twisted them into an argument against marriage, rather than a good explanation for why yours didn't work.

One of my bosses replied, "Josh, I hope you're part of the 50% that stays together forever." Thanks.

Ok, there, I feel much better now.

Oh, and if you're out there Dr. J., this doesn't at all pertain to you. I can handle all the, "Are you sure you still want to get married?" jokes you can dish out.