Two things.
First: apparently romantic cohabitation does, in fact, lead to marriage more often than not (we can thank the CDC and their report on "Marriage and Cohabitation in the United States," for that bit of domestic wisdom). Doesn't matter whether the cohabintants' parents were married or divorced or whether they planned to marry when they moved in together. Either way, more domestic partnerships are becoming marriages. And nothing says "living on the edge" like my decision not to. Cohabitate that is. Story to follow.
Second: Date a "hot" person. This MSNBC article explains why. They'll make you look more attractive by association. I love studies like this. Just like I loved that study on "optimal female proportions" and its drug-like effect on men's brains. This time some evolutionary biologists at UC Davis would like to let you know you'll be considered more attractive if you're partnered up with a likewise attractive person. Because as humans, we like attractive people. But we like them even better en masse. One hot chick is good. But a hot chick standing next to a particularly good lookin dude is apparently that much more desireable.
It gets a little confusing when they start comparing male and female responses to attractive people perceived to be in a relationship with another attractive person. BUT, the article gave a good example using guppies. I used to be the proud mother of something like 120 guppies. They really do nothing but eat and breed. It's great. SO - in general, female guppies prefer to mate with brightly colored male guppies. HOWEVER - all bets are off if other ladies in the tank show a dull male guppy some love. All of a sudden the dull guppy starts looking better by association. Works the same way for people, too.
My one digression would be to mention that in my guppy-farm experience, the female guppy never had the benefit of choice. From the time she learned to flap her little guppy fins, she was knocked up (probably thanks to her little guppy brother, or dad, or cousin, but that's neither here nor there......except that I really did hope to create a new breed of hideously malformed guppy with like, seven eyes and extra fins and teeth and stuff....but that never happened. dang.). She never had a chance to mate based on preference. But anyway - enough about guppies.
The real question is "sure, Heather, but what does this tell us about John Mayer?"
Kidding.
Kidding.
Bottom line: this study pretty much explains that "King of Queens" show.
Kevin James, thank your lucky stars that Leah Remini is hotter than you, it's the only explanation for the fact that you're even indulged as a sitcom personality to begin with. It's got to be the explanation for how George Costanza managed to get dates. I'm even calling it the explanation for how Charlie Sheen ever gets laid (to speak nothing of married). Or David Spade. People find them more attractive based on the attractiveness of the ladies they're associated with. Also means you should think about finding a good-looking friend of the opposite sex to play "wingperson" when you're out and about. You'll become Hot By Association. That can only help. You'll entice someone based on how well you look alongside hot friend and live happily ever after.
Oh, and that "ever after" will probably involve moving in together - which, apparently most of the time - leads to marriage.
Heh. I so nailed that transition.
Yep - MSNBC summarizes that CDC report "Marriage and Cohabitation in the United States," by suggesting "that more people than ever are living together without being married. And...marriage itself is doing just fine, thanks. Contrary to past dogma, the study also shows that there is no longer a meaningful divorce gap between those who live together first and those who didn’t."
Sweet. Good for us for figuring out how to roll a successful domestic partnership into a successful marriage. And fantastic that those couples chosing to share a medicine cabinet before walking down the aisle are no less likely to stay married than those who maintain separate toothbrush holders until matrimony.
I've been on both sides of this particular divide. HOWEVER - call me old-fashioned, but the next time I end up in a "significant relationship" where the moving-in-together conversation comes up, I'm firmly in the "I'll keep my own shower curtain, thanks" camp. If special guy wants the honor of having my credit card offers and Victoria's Secret catalogues intermingled with his credit card offers and Bed Bath & Beyond coupons I'd like a band of gold involved.
Really.
Well, actually, you'd better be in it for the legal long haul or the sight of my shoe collection alone will send you running for your safe, manly place. Like under the hood of your car. Or it would take a brave, brave man to stare into the depths of my stackable rubbermaid makeup bins and not think "I've made a terrible, terrible mistake" anyway. And that coat closet? Yes, I do wear ALL of those. Regularly.
But it's more than that.
It feels like a de facto cop-out when couples (one cited in this article, actually) say they "needed to get to know the person before a lifetime commitment.”
Sure. Makes sense. We hear that all the time.
I'll just play devil's advocate for a minute: what precisely about sharing a driveway means you know each other any better than couples who drive home at the end of the night? Is there something about shoving your clothes in adjacent closets that automatically invites you any more deeply into someone's soul? Or that taking turns cleaning the SAME toilet (instead of your separate, respective toilets) means you're any more prepared to grow old together? If someone doesn't wash their dishes, sheets, or shower tile frequently, it's not going to take a USPS change-of-address form to clue you into that if you know each other well enough to consider swapping vows. And slapping the same snooze button for a few years before you decide to make it legal doesn't mean you're necessarily better-prepared for the social, political or emotional implications of becoming a legal union when the knot's finally tied.
I could take that even further and say: people have stayed successfully married for 40, 50, 60 or more years without having any idea how to fold each other's socks or where they kept their spare trash bags ahead of time. People have raised perfectly functional families even when Mom and Dad didn't set up house until they got hitched. Yes, it's true - cohabitation has not always played the "marriage training wheels" role it plays today.
Let's spin this another way - when you're in the throes of a relationship that's headed in the "hey, let's live happily ever after" direction, you're spending most of your waking hours together anyway (er, that's been my experience from two different relationships that have come to the Diamond Ring crossroads). Meaning you know that he's got an idiosyncratic way of loading the dishwasher (the plates will never get clean if they're jammed so close together, but hey, he'll figure it out eventually...).
He knows that you're terrible about taking out your trash and that you leave the tags torn off of new clothes on the floor more often than not.
You know that he snores in front of the TV, he knows that you never learned how to blow your nose.
You know that he takes an inordinant amount of time grooming his fingernails (but nice that he bothers), he knows that you hit the snooze button 27 times before you finally get up.
You know the first thing he does when he walks through the door is head into the kitchen and stand in front of the fridge without eating anything. He knows that you let the week's newspapers accumulate all over the house, unread, then finally cart them out to recycling muttering how you need to "cancel your subscription" but somehow never do.
You know he goes stir crazy if he's indoors on sunny days and has trouble falling asleep when there's a full moon. He knows you fall asleep inside of 4 minutes as long as you're laying down.
And none of this required officially living under the same roof. It's absolutely possible to "get to know" someone intimately without necessarily taking up his cupboard space with all of your wine glasses or letting him eat up garage space with his bikes, snowboards, air compressor, whatever. You have your magnetic fridge poetry and he has his Men's Health magazines in the bathroom.
I've stood on both sides of this aisle.
I've accepted two marriage proposals in my life.
Actually followed through and married one of them.
Am divorced from one of them.
Lived with one of them before hand, lived separately from the other before hand. I won't mention which one ended which way, just that it doesn't seem to make a bit of difference in terms of how prepared you are to live happily ever after - cohabitation or no cohabitation.
So, we'll leave me to my own little independent household until such a time as I might be fortunate enough to find someone special to really (actually, truly!) grow old and grey and golden alongside. Because at that point, the combining of our respective lives (and all of the stuff and bad habits and quirks that go along with) will feel particularly special. A wedding will be more than an expensive excuse to get all of our friends together for a badass party, it will actually be the moment we start our very own new thing from our two separate single things.
And really, the article mentioned that couples that move in together and eventually decide to get married are no more or no less likely to remain married than those that take the big plunge "blindly." So that means I'm not missing out by not moving in.....
Just means I have my own close space that much longer. And we can have the Big, Serious Discussion about exactly WHAT we're going to do with all of my shoes from a strictly "theoretical" perspective ("theoretical" meaning "you can make your suggestions, but every last one of those shoes stays with me. Period.").
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