the altar of marriage
On a flight back from an engagement celebration weekend, I watched a movie called The Roses. The movie is a dark romantic comedy, focusing on an architect and chef couple who move to California from the UK and have kids. The architect husband works while the chef wife stays at home with the kids until Husband’s latest and greatest project falls flat (literally), sending him into a depressive spiral about his ability, intelligence, blah blah blah. In the depths of Husband’s failures, Wife’s restaurant that she initially opened as a casual side project starts to take off, ushering in a complete switch of gender roles. Husband becomes the homemaker and primary caretaker, turning the two children into track prodigies, while Wife’s culinary career skyrockets her into stardom and wealth.
The plot develops as you might expect - the two become increasingly aggrieved by the other’s existence, with Husband accusing Wife of being unable to step out of the spotlight and acknowledge his skills as an architect after he builds his dream home for the family (funded by Wife’s success), and Wife accusing Husband of stealing the children and molding them to resemble his likeness rather than hers. In the middle of an argument, they say something like “someone has to sacrifice at the altar of marriage” and that’s stuck with me this week. The writers probably didn’t mean much beyond stating the obvious: marriage takes place at an altar and requires sacrifice. But seven (7) people in my circle have gotten engaged in the last three weeks, so I’ve been ruminating about “the altar of marriage” in slightly more metaphorical terms…
In my opinion, altars are used to signal two things: something is being worshipped and something is being offered to the worshipped. So in the case of marriage, what is actually being worshipped, and what is being offered to or sacrificed for it? I think in the movie’s case, the object of worship wasn’t actually marriage - they get to the point of hating each other and (spoiler) basically threatening to kill each other, so it couldn’t have been the couple’s commitment to each other, and it certainly wasn’t the legal contract they signed to document that commitment. Instead, sitting atop the altar were their children. Wife initially gave up her career to have children; Husband took over when his career went on pause and Wife had greater earning potential. Husband and Wife were driven apart by the sacrifices they each made for their children - Wife supplied funds (and gave up time with the children) and Husband supplied time (and gave up recovery of his career). If not for the children, Husband could focus on rebuilding his career without needing Wife to fund his next big project (their dream home). If not for the children, Wife wouldn’t have had to put her career on pause in the first place. But if we take children off of the altar, what’s left? I guess we’re left with the choice that people make to share their lives with each other - to give and take, even if unfairly divided, and to reserve space and time that could otherwise be spent on yourself. But that’s focusing more on what you lose. What you gain is companionship, both in this moment and promised going forward. You gain a foothold of predictability, or at least the appearance of one, in a fundamentally unknowable world. So maybe the object of worship can be your partner as you know them, or the expectation of lifelong commitment, or the act of loving continuously. The offerings could be remembering how they take their coffee, supporting their career, or letting them go when they want to leave.
It’s been strange to view my life through the changes happening to the people around me. It feels like one of those color theory illusions, where the same shade of grey looks different depending on if it’s against a blue or orange background. Strictly speaking, I don’t think my life has really changed much from last year, three years ago, or even five years ago. But when I think about how three years ago, five of those seven friends were single, it feels like my life has become one shade darker than what it used to be. But like the optical illusion, it’s actually the same color as before. Perhaps I feel mentally or emotionally different, but practically, things are the same. (To preempt the consolations that life doesn’t happen on a timeline, I’m not falling behind, etc. - I know!! - these observations are just the product of limited in-flight entertainment and November apparently becoming THE month for engagements.)
TLDR; I might die alone, but I could’ve lived a long happy life without seeing Benedict Cumberbatch and Olivia Coleman kiss.