NEWLYWEDS

My mom called to tell me that two girls from my elementary school class are getting married. These girls are my age, entering their senior year of college, and they're already tying the over-hyped knot. How did this happen? Surely with the stark reality of sky-rocketing divorce rates and early development of their own lifestyle, occupation, and adult persona, choosing to jump the altar-shark is not only bold, but truly idealistic.


To understand the situation, we must look back to the early nineties. Recording artist and all-around poetic genius Haddaway posed us the question, "What is love?" He followed this query with the demand "Baby don't hurt me, don't hurt me....no more." It seems these two
feelings--love and hurt--are forever associated. For without pain, love has no meaning. Cameron Crowe told us in VANILLA SKY "without the bitter, the sweet just aint as sweet." Maybe these marriages will last a lifetime. Or maybe they will burn up like the SpaceShuttle Columbia. But we can't pass that judgement.

I think love is choosing to ride on a runaway train. It will inevitably crash. Either the tracks will end(break-up) or you'll hit the ocean(death), but either way your train is destined to collide with its own personal Armageddon. The sweet exists as a corollary of the bitter.


However, knowing this, we can still enjoy the out-of-control ride. We can still be exhilarated by believing maybe our train is different. Maybe our train just won't stop. That feeling. That belief is love.

And here we are, shitting on a few people who are idealistic enough to believe in their own Little Engines That Could. Laughing at their decision to wed like it's a tacky sports coat they wore to Formal. Their wedding should be just as special a forty-year-old friend who after 20 years of dating his sweetheart, finally made it official. Do these couple love each other on different levels? Obviously, they have different relationship timelines, but can't both loves be just as sweet?

I guess you can't try to understand someone else's love. If I were born one hundred years ago, I would have probably married my high school girlfriend. Fifty years ago, maybe my college girlfriend.

But I wasn't. I live right now and the future is what I make it. I've gotta respect these people's decisions and hope that they are happy. I hope they'd do the same for me. Toot. Toot.