Your Happy Ending: Have you written it yet?

Marriage doesn’t solve all life’s challenges.

Well, crap.

I know this fact seems obvious – especially to all you long-time marrieds.  And, you are probably shaking your head right now, wondering just how deep does delusion run through this LBB? (Pretty deep, actually.)

The truth is, for those of us new to this game called “being married,” the fact that the prince and princess don’t actually ride off into the sunset upon signing the contract may have only been obvious in the abstract. I know several LBBs—myself included – for whom it did not stop us from hoping marriage would have been a little bit like the fantasy.  

Because you see, as a long-time single person, you are able to – and quite frankly, had lots of time to — fantasize and entertain all kinds of ideals around love and commitment.  I am not an expert in marriage, but I dare say I have earned my PhD in “imagination run amok.” In fact, I wrote the curriculum.

And, may I suggest some reading as part of this program? I just finished reading a love story series – known as the Twilight series – by author Stephenie Meyer.  I know, I know, it was written for teens. But, my sister and cousin said I had to read them.  So, I obeyed.

Ten days later, I had plowed through all four books. Nonstop. I finally understood why the series sat on the New York Times bestseller list for 143 weeks in total. They sold more than 42 million copies worldwide in 37 countries.  And, apparently it’s turned into quite the franchise, including a Hollywood movie. Who knew?

In the first book, Bella Swan, an ordinary teenager, moves to the rainiest town in America, Forks, Washington, where she meets and falls in (mutual) love with a vampire, Edward Cullen.  Throughout their time together (four books worth), Bella and Edward face enormous challenges (his unquestionable thirst for her blood aside).  I won’t spoil the ending for you, if you haven’t read them. But, suffice to say for about 10 seconds I wished I was a vampire, living in a perfect romance with the hottest thing on the planet.

Then I closed the book.

Then I began to wonder. Is it good to read love stories or do they just whet our appetite (no pun intended) for what we don’t have?

Unlike real life, while I journeyed through the Twilight series’ love story, I kinda knew from the beginning it would all work out. Why? Well, the author has fans. Lots of them. And she probably wants to keep them.  (And, let’s face it, even though we live in a world where 13 years olds know more than our parents probably did at age 30, most likely she knew teenagers were not ready to be that disappointed about love if Edward and Bella didn’t work out.)

In essence, all that tragedy I read was okay, because I knew, in my heart, that Stephenie Meyer had my back. She would not leave me in tears, though she may extract some along the way.

Alas, we do not live inside a novel. The truth is fantasies are lazy, where your paramours do all the work, are veritable mind readers, say all the right things at the right time, and, bottom line, take on all the responsibility for making it work. 

On the other hand, real life partners have no super human capability, but rather will excel at disappointing, scaring, and being seemingly obtuse. Just when you think you want to throw up your hands, they will do something that will make you not want to give up. So, you don’t. Just in case.

Real life romance, especially the later kind when you have years of building the fantasy, shatters a lot of dreams. No one’s got your back. You must design your relationship and author your own story.

So, I decided – not to be bested by Edward and Bella – I would write my own happy ending . It’s one page long, single-spaced, and it goes into great detail about Husband’s and my love story finale, 40 years from now. It’s perfect. Why not? After all, if we don’t start manifesting our own grand finales, who will?

I might even have it framed.