Tuesday, January 24, 2012

Marriage kills......haha just kidding.

A little over a year ago, I was newly engaged, heart all aflutter and eager to start my new life with my soon to be husband. It was such a lovely, exciting time. So it always struck me as odd that when I told people I was getting married, very often I was met with a gasp and "...but you're so young."
By the way they said it, you'd have thought I said, "I'm terminally ill." It was quite perplexing. The strangely condescending looks and comments that came when people noticed my no-longer-nake- left hand abounded. Word on the street is young marriage will kill you, strip you of your freedom, suck the life out of you and leave you a joyless, travel-less, adventure-less being. Riiiight.

Since I'm young and I'm married, it's often assumed that I'm some sort of "advocate" for young marriage. I'm not. I don't think there's anything wrong with having things you want to accomplish by a certain age or before getting married. That's great. I also don't think there's anything wrong with wanting to get married.

I'm all for getting married when you're supposed to. If that's when you're 20, well, pop the sparkling cider and mazel tov to you. If it's in your 40s, that's wonderful too. When it's meant to be, it's meant to be. But for some reason, young marriage is often seen (in my experience) as an uneducated mistake, naively throwing your life away. Well, I'm here to say young marriage, for the right reasons, can be swell. I daresay wonderful and exciting. Quite the opposite of how it was presented to me. I thought I'd take some time today to tell ya the truth. This is mythbusters, marriage style. Note, I'm just talking about marriage. We haven't been blessed with our own little monkeys yet, so my perspectives are purely those of a new wife, (hopeful) not yet mother. Here are the myths, debunked, in no particular order.



1. You can still travel when you're married! I know the general belief is that marriage basically clips your wings and puts you in a cage. But guess what? It's not true. Since Eric and I have been married, I've been on several great trips to places I've never been before. Nothing exotic, but enough to feed my desire to keep moving around. I even got to go Minnesota (of Kardashian fame ;) to see my sister. The best part about traveling now is that I have a built in traveling buddy. I can't even tell you now many trips I planned when I was single that fell through because of my friends' schedules. But now I have my adventure partner and in the next few months, we have a couple of trips planned! Little things. A road trip up the coast to Oregon, a belated honeymoon to wherever. Maybe I won't always travel on a whim, or every six months or even every year, but when I do, I know I will have someone by my side to turn to and say, "Isn't this amazing?" Up above is me at Lake Havasu

2.You can still go out with friends! Sure things change and you find yourself saying things like, "Let me check with my husband." Then you'll giggle to yourself over saying "husband." Maybe you check the bank account to make sure it fits in the budget. Nevertheless, girls night out still exists. I'm not gonna lie, you're interests shift a little. I don't really do the single girl scene. I don't really want to talk about that hot guy over there. My hot guy's at home. Eric feels the same way. But even though more often than not we do couple things, we're okay with each other taking the occasional night out with just the girls/guys.

From my last outing--The Pistol Annies concert in Hollywood with two of my favorite ladies.

3.You can still participate in the fun, wacky traditions of you're singlehood. Example: You can still do New Year's Eve. Why not? Who doesn't love a good sparkly dress, a built in dance partner and a guaranteed midnight kiss? Heck, you can even still be that couple whose midnight kiss seems to last a little too long....not that we're guilty or anything..;) You can still do the shots and dance til your feet hate you. Every now and then, a good ridiculous time is nice. We had a few of those while living in AZ. They're even better when you're together.


New Year's Eve in San Diego with a few of our favorite people

Flagstaff, AZ--twas here that we helped cross a few shots off the tequila list.

4. Adventure still exists. I mean, marriage itself is a pretty huge adventure. But let me just say in the past seven months, we both swam next to a waterfall, I jumped off a cliff, Eric fed a giraffe, I conquered an amazing hike all by me onesie. Eric fought fire in multiple states, I learned to cook. We were homeless for 48 hours, we moved three times, and we're looking forward to adding another Nicholson to our tiny apartment. Yep, life is still exciting.
me vs. the waterfall

Eric with the giraffe--he's so proud of this picture :)

Yes, marriage definitely changes you. It changes your life in the most profound way. But I promise it doesn't ruin your life. I'm lucky. More than that, I'm blessed. This is what God called me too. My age, though significant, is irrelevant. God asked Mary to carry a His son when she was 14. His will isn't age specific. For me, it was to get married at 21. Sure, the world told me my life was over and doomed to regret. Me? I'm satisfied.