E-Harmony, E-Charmony and E-Matrimony

Most marriages these days don’t seem to last.

Some will end in less than 73 days, which does not give some ladies enough practice writing their new married names (like how many H’s in Humphries?)

Some ladies nowadays ask themselves once they date a guy three or four times, “Is this the man that I want my children to spend every other weekend with?”  

But marriage can be harmonious if you let it. It is great to find that special person you want to annoy and aggravate for the rest of your life. But the secret to longevity is to understand a few of the unwritten rules about that union of two people.

From the beginning, I knew I wanted to get married. I met my wife when she was 15 and I was 18 (no jailbait/cradle robbing comments please- it was a different world way back then. Pilgrims got married at 15) and I immediately said that we would be spending our lives together in a suburban home with a beautiful fireplace with kids and pets and a white picket fence, a willow tree and a two-car garage. Truth is, that over 30-plus years since that day, she still claims I shorted her half a garage. So humor is the first rule to success

My wedding reminded me of an audition for a role in a major motion picture with all the plotting, planning and cameras. (But without all the extra VH-1 hoopla). Especially when the rabbi said to me, near the end of the ceremony, “Congratulations! You’ve got the job!” Now just prior to that he had me stomp on a glass wrapped in a handkerchief, which according to my spouse was that last time I was going to be allowed to put my foot down on any subject, which shows that compromise is the second rule for marital success.

Now a mother has a tendency to push your buttons, mainly because she installed them. But after a while your significant other becomes the chief engineer in pushing those buttons, because they are the ones that maintains and services the machinery, which shows that allowing for change is the third rule.

Women complain to each other about PMS, but it is their partners that will tell you that this is the only time that their wives can really be themselves. An example of this would be best explained thusly. My wife started her job as a School Psychologist after a summer off. (She wasn’t really off ,as she did tons of Psych testing, saw private Psych patients, got her children’s book published and so on.) 

Shortly after that she returned to her school and they asked her to fill out some forms and they caught her at a time of the month when most men would run for the protection and seclusion of the hills if they are smart. The form, as you have seen a hundred times before, stated “In case of emergency contact” and she wrote “A Doctor, Stupid! What is my electronic salesman husband going to do for me? Change the channel? Google it on the net? A real good doctor is who you should contact in a emergency!”

This shows that knowing when to back away, be quiet and become invisible is the fourth rule.

They say that true success in life can be traced back to the woman behind the man. Now, while with some married men procrastination can be an important survival tool, to others it can be what causes the rift, the shifting of tectonic plates and the rise of marital volcanic ash that is followed by a deafening KA-BOOM.

You see the guy who invented the first wheel was a putts. The wife who nagged the second guy (who invented the other three wheels and made her a wagon because she was tired of walking) now she was on the money, which is shows that being able to please your partner is the last rule. (And come to think of it, I seriously doubt if she was a Kardashian.)