Every Day!

It's November. Sometimes people who write blogs (I guess that's me) write every day in November. Let's give that a try, shall we? Now that I have free time and all...

I have been getting a lot of 'congratulations' lately. Every time an acquaintance or former colleague says that to me I feel slightly confused. I have to think for a second about what they are referring to. It seems bizarre to receive accolades for being married. It's like marriage is an achievement. You did it! You attained something! Congratulations!

The thing is, I don't feel that way. Daily life is as it was before. The only difference is that I share my house with someone and I have some gold on my hand. Jake and I planned one heck of a party, but we haven't succeeded at being married yet. We are still working on that one - will be forever.

I know that people mean 'yay for you that you found someone to love!' but sometimes what it feels like is 'yay for you being normal and following society's guidelines!', or 'You must be so relieved that you finally did that!', neither of which are messages that resonate with me.

Before being married I hated this idea that getting married was a goal in life. How counter-intuitive is it that one of our goals is to have a big party and go through a ceremony - almost to the exclusion of the actual task of BEING with someone through thick and thin?

So anyway - I don't think I feel 'married'. Jake and I laugh when we refer to each other as 'husband' and 'wife'. Jake called human resources and got the ball rolling to make changes on our benefits and life insurance - something that would not have occurred to me to do, and to be honest, it freaked me out. Apparently what makes most sense is for him to switch to a family plan and for me to waive my coverage, because I'll be on Jake's family plan. Even now, after processing it for a few days, I am not comfortable with this idea (it makes sense! It's cheaper!). It feels like letting go of some of my independence and autonomy - ridiculous considering we already share money and have invested a HUGE amount of money into a building together.

Married. Weird. Maybe it's only starting to sink in now? I wonder how this one will play out in my head. I guess we will all find out because I'm sure whatever I'm mulling over will make it onto here :)


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