Insufficient Language!!!

There is an apparent absence of useful analogies for describing marriage.

Steve absolutely is my best friend, and my teammate, and my partner in crime. However, those descriptions are banal at best. I have had other best friends, and been on other teams, and paired up with people for activities I wouldn't have done alone.

There's no description in the English language of a union which enhances the self. Anything I try to compare marriage to -- friendship, teamwork, criminal activity -- is totally and completely wrong.

This doesn't mean that marriage is better than other things. (If the non-existence of a romantic partner is what makes you happiest, more power to you.) It's not objectively better than other human relationships. I'm just flummoxed by the total inadequacy I encountered when I searched for the words to answer a basic question: "What's changed since you got married?"

Nothing tangible. Everything, everything, a thousand times everything, intangible. And I can't tell you how or why.

Facing My Mortality

I'm 25 years old. I've lost two grandparents and known many other people who passed away -- strokes, accidents, diseases which won in less time than expected. But I've never considered my own mortality. Why would I? I'm young and healthy and I live in the first world, so even though I'm basically below the poverty line, I'm still vaccinated to the hilt. There's not an awful lot I have to worry about dying from.

I have promised another human being that one of us will be the one to bury the other.

This is the closest I've ever come to really understanding that one day I will die.

On Married Life: Month 7

Last week, I spent the whole day of our 7 month wedding anniversary cleaning the house. That's not so much a commentary on marriage as it is a commentary on why I didn't remember to blog that day, even though I intended to. 

The report from Month 7 is as follows: Marriage is not an adventure (yet). Marriage is a conduit for other adventures. 

Marriage is the reason that the final walls between my spouse and I are crumbling, leading us to even greater personal discovery. I already knew him; I'm learning who I am in the presence of another. That's a helluva adventure. 

Marriage is also the reason for more tangible adventures. Take, for example, my first visit to a theme park in 15 years and my first ride on a roller coaster ever. It didn't even matter that I puked my guts out. I was still with the person I most wanted to be with. I had fun.

Marriage is the reason I get to feel completely safe and completely independent at the same time. It's so much better than people said it would be.

On Being Called "Mrs. I."

Actually, no one has tried to call me "Mrs." People who should know better keep addressing me as "Amy I.," though: women who kept their own last names, people who see my unchanged name on Facebook, family who could have damn well asked.

It isn't bothering me (yet...), and I've realized why. It's something I had forgotten between the time my parents ceased to be my guardians and getting married. When my parents were still in charge of my life, EVERYONE ALWAYS GOT MY LAST NAME WRONG.

I grew up with my mother, step-father, and half-brother. They all had one last name. I had another. I had only contemplated this in the context of, "Hey, I know that everyone can be happy with a different last name, so why change mine once married?" I had totally forgotten that schools, churches, and acquaintances consistently addressed me by my step-father's last name.

I only recalled this because I recently volunteered somewhere with a man who had attended my parents' (mom and step-dad) wedding. I had earlier introduced myself only as Amy, and when he realized who I was, he said, "Oh, Amy Lip[redacted]!" My last name isn't Lip-. My last name has never been Lip-. But in that moment I recalled how, for many years, my last name might as well have been Lip-, and how it just didn't matter. He knew who I was. And after he meets my husband he'll probably call me "Amy I." Or maybe he'll assimilate the knowledge of my last name -- my "maiden name" -- and assume it is in fact my married name, because it is different from that of my parents'. I don't know. Frankly, I don't think I care. I'm the only "Amy" on the volunteer roster. I don't think I'll get lost in the shuffle.

So all the mail turning up for "Amy I.," who doesn't live here? I guess I'm acclimated already. I thought it would be an angry process but it turned out not to be. It seems that I've remembered how to tolerate it.