Friday, February 26, 2010

Dating and Engagement: How Long is "Right" And When Should You Ignore Conventional Wisdom?

what-is-cost-cutting-dating--55I'm going to say it up front: I don't pretend to know the answer to the above question.  But as February comes to a close, I'm primarily just curious to know if there even is a right answer.  The reason why?  One of my besties just got engaged!  To someone who she had not been dating for very long (i.e. weeks, not months- and yes, she has a serious rock, it is for real).  My attitude?  We're all quite grown up and capable of making decisions, and she will always have my love and support.  Besides, if she is happy, who is anyone else to judge?  Frankly, if we all accepted conventional wisdom, most of us would be too frightened to ever even get married.

Just think of all the rule breaking that goes on these days.  I know happily married people who had kids before they were married.  Or people whose parents thought a 6 month engagement was too short and thus, a bad idea.  I know people who married someone who has been divorced.  And I know people who've been harshly criticized for meeting their spouse online.  Plenty of people poo-poo on these matches, and yet these are very happy couples, as far as I can tell.  And some of the plain vanilla, so called "perfect" marriages I've seen have completely fallen apart.  Is it all a crapshoot?  Does it come down to hard work?

What do you think?  In a society of increasingly fuzzy boundaries, are there any dating/marriage rules that just shouldn't be broken?  Or is it just more gray area to give us more gray hair?

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