tl;dr
How to succeed at your first year of marriage.
by Ashley Henley
When you get home from your honeymoon, drop your bags, stop making out, and open all of your wedding gifts. You are allowed to laugh at the inappropriate and offensive grilling apron your new spouse’s aunt sent, but not too hard, as you don’t want to hurt his feelings. You will have to get creative for some of the particularly unappealing gifts. For example, if your dad’s best friend sends you a 20-pound ceramic jug with a celestial theme, you may want to consider using it as a toilet paper reserve in the bathroom or something to hold the cat litter. Another picture frame? Wrap it back up and give it to your cousin for Hanukkah next year; just make sure it's not the same cousin that gave it to you in the first place. Don’t feel bad, because at least you haven’t returned it.
Next, you will want to divide the task of writing thank you notes down the middle: you do half and your spouse will do half. This will prove to you that you are not like your parents; you are pioneers in a 21st century marriage, where prescribed gender roles have no place. But be careful as you brag to friends about the equality of your marriage, as this can be misleading. A few months down the line, you may find yourself doing dishes, scrubbing some tenacious tomato sauce off of your husband’s plate. You will glance over at him paying bills, still wearing the now grease-spotted grilling apron you’ve come to hate, and you might feel like your mother. This feeling will be amplified if you find yourself nagging your husband for letting this plate sit in the sink for so long. Go ahead and nag, as keeping it in for too long will cause an unwarranted explosion of anger for something minor down the line, like when you find some mysterious long black hairs that have clogged your favorite razor in the shower. This will cause an argument full of misguided anger. He will bring up your habit of leaving glasses half full of water all around the house, and you will remind him that he used to think it was charming and cute and reminded him of the little girl in Signs, who-you will remind him-ended up saving the entire family because the aliens ended up being immune to water. You never know, you’ll say.
After you’ve had a few of these blow-out fights, complete with door slamming and double standards, you will sit down to talk on opposite sides of the couch and you will think that you have failed at being married. You will recall all of the movies and TV shows you’ve watched that portrayed newlyweds as annoying love-sick puppy-eyed fools and you will say that you need to go to marriage counseling. That’s ridiculous, your dad will later say, as he takes a puff of his cigarette, a habit he thinks he’s kept secret from your mom for years, but which she really knows about and doesn’t say a word to torment him. You decide that you’re not going to take marriage advice from either of your parents and you pay $150 for a consultation with a marriage counselor, who will think you’re crazy. “There’s nothing wrong with you,” she’ll say. “This is all totally normal.” On the way home, you decide you’ll continue to see her because she’s great at settling arguments and you love it when you’re right.
One thing you’ll have to learn, and which will be hard to avoid, as everyone will let you know it’s the cornerstone of a good marriage, is the concept of compromise. You give some, I give some, and we all win. It seems easy enough. But when you’re single and only responsible for pleasing one person, it may take some getting used to. For instance, maybe one night, you’d like to indulge yourself in a guilty pleasure movie. Let’s pretend it’s National Lampoon’s Vacation with Chevy Chase-we’re just pretending here-AND you also want to order Chinese takeout from your favorite hole in the wall Chinese place, Big Chef. When you’re married, your spouse might make fun of you for enjoying the artistry of Chevy Chase, and you can respond that the genius of his comic timing is severely underrated, but that’s beside the point. He might also complain about Big Chef, because the name of the restaurant doesn’t make sense, first of all, and second of all, he doesn’t even like Chinese food. How can you not like Chinese food, you’ll ask him. At this point, it might even be easy for you to criticize his mother for indulging his pickiness as a kid and not making him try different foods, but I wouldn’t recommend going down this road. Suddenly, as you’re about to call up Dr. Arner, your new marriage counselor, you remember this concept of compromise. I have an idea, you’ll say, how about we watch Vacation and I will get to enjoy my dose of Chevy Chase, whom I know you hate; but instead of ordering from Big Chef, we’ll order from Ledo Pizza, which I know you love and I happen to hate, but I love you so I will suffer through it. You both suffer a little and you both get something you want. Problem solved.
There are some more straightforward, concrete things you’ll have to get used to, like wearing a wedding band and getting used to a new last name, if you’ve decided to piss off your parents and adopt his surname. First, don’t ever leave the house without your wedding band, as this will hurt your spouse’s feelings, no matter how true it is that you forgot to put it back on after you set it by the sink while doing his dishes, again. And when you accidentally sign a receipt with your maiden name, be prepared to get your defenses up, because someone is going to think that you subconsciously don’t even want to be married after all, and you’ll spend the next hour reassuring him that he is the love of your life.
For the first year, you must understand that people-friends, acquaintances, family, store clerks, the mail man, and the lady at the DMV-are going to want to know how married life is, and they will ask you. It is best to be prepared for these situations with a boilerplate answer, especially if you get the sudden urge to call your spouse the “ol’ ball and chain”. Please don’t say that. Instead, say something about how wonderful it is to have married your best friend and how waking up next to your spouse is like a dream. Talk about how much fun you have together when you’re not even trying, like when you’re just sitting on a park bench making fun of everyone that walks by or sneaking flasks of vodka into the movie theater. You can say something about how lucky you feel to have found your perfect match in another human being, or about how you fall more in love every single day. They will love this, and it’ll be great because it’s true.
by Ashley Henley
When you get home from your honeymoon, drop your bags, stop making out, and open all of your wedding gifts. You are allowed to laugh at the inappropriate and offensive grilling apron your new spouse’s aunt sent, but not too hard, as you don’t want to hurt his feelings. You will have to get creative for some of the particularly unappealing gifts. For example, if your dad’s best friend sends you a 20-pound ceramic jug with a celestial theme, you may want to consider using it as a toilet paper reserve in the bathroom or something to hold the cat litter. Another picture frame? Wrap it back up and give it to your cousin for Hanukkah next year; just make sure it's not the same cousin that gave it to you in the first place. Don’t feel bad, because at least you haven’t returned it.
Next, you will want to divide the task of writing thank you notes down the middle: you do half and your spouse will do half. This will prove to you that you are not like your parents; you are pioneers in a 21st century marriage, where prescribed gender roles have no place. But be careful as you brag to friends about the equality of your marriage, as this can be misleading. A few months down the line, you may find yourself doing dishes, scrubbing some tenacious tomato sauce off of your husband’s plate. You will glance over at him paying bills, still wearing the now grease-spotted grilling apron you’ve come to hate, and you might feel like your mother. This feeling will be amplified if you find yourself nagging your husband for letting this plate sit in the sink for so long. Go ahead and nag, as keeping it in for too long will cause an unwarranted explosion of anger for something minor down the line, like when you find some mysterious long black hairs that have clogged your favorite razor in the shower. This will cause an argument full of misguided anger. He will bring up your habit of leaving glasses half full of water all around the house, and you will remind him that he used to think it was charming and cute and reminded him of the little girl in Signs, who-you will remind him-ended up saving the entire family because the aliens ended up being immune to water. You never know, you’ll say.
After you’ve had a few of these blow-out fights, complete with door slamming and double standards, you will sit down to talk on opposite sides of the couch and you will think that you have failed at being married. You will recall all of the movies and TV shows you’ve watched that portrayed newlyweds as annoying love-sick puppy-eyed fools and you will say that you need to go to marriage counseling. That’s ridiculous, your dad will later say, as he takes a puff of his cigarette, a habit he thinks he’s kept secret from your mom for years, but which she really knows about and doesn’t say a word to torment him. You decide that you’re not going to take marriage advice from either of your parents and you pay $150 for a consultation with a marriage counselor, who will think you’re crazy. “There’s nothing wrong with you,” she’ll say. “This is all totally normal.” On the way home, you decide you’ll continue to see her because she’s great at settling arguments and you love it when you’re right.
One thing you’ll have to learn, and which will be hard to avoid, as everyone will let you know it’s the cornerstone of a good marriage, is the concept of compromise. You give some, I give some, and we all win. It seems easy enough. But when you’re single and only responsible for pleasing one person, it may take some getting used to. For instance, maybe one night, you’d like to indulge yourself in a guilty pleasure movie. Let’s pretend it’s National Lampoon’s Vacation with Chevy Chase-we’re just pretending here-AND you also want to order Chinese takeout from your favorite hole in the wall Chinese place, Big Chef. When you’re married, your spouse might make fun of you for enjoying the artistry of Chevy Chase, and you can respond that the genius of his comic timing is severely underrated, but that’s beside the point. He might also complain about Big Chef, because the name of the restaurant doesn’t make sense, first of all, and second of all, he doesn’t even like Chinese food. How can you not like Chinese food, you’ll ask him. At this point, it might even be easy for you to criticize his mother for indulging his pickiness as a kid and not making him try different foods, but I wouldn’t recommend going down this road. Suddenly, as you’re about to call up Dr. Arner, your new marriage counselor, you remember this concept of compromise. I have an idea, you’ll say, how about we watch Vacation and I will get to enjoy my dose of Chevy Chase, whom I know you hate; but instead of ordering from Big Chef, we’ll order from Ledo Pizza, which I know you love and I happen to hate, but I love you so I will suffer through it. You both suffer a little and you both get something you want. Problem solved.
There are some more straightforward, concrete things you’ll have to get used to, like wearing a wedding band and getting used to a new last name, if you’ve decided to piss off your parents and adopt his surname. First, don’t ever leave the house without your wedding band, as this will hurt your spouse’s feelings, no matter how true it is that you forgot to put it back on after you set it by the sink while doing his dishes, again. And when you accidentally sign a receipt with your maiden name, be prepared to get your defenses up, because someone is going to think that you subconsciously don’t even want to be married after all, and you’ll spend the next hour reassuring him that he is the love of your life.
For the first year, you must understand that people-friends, acquaintances, family, store clerks, the mail man, and the lady at the DMV-are going to want to know how married life is, and they will ask you. It is best to be prepared for these situations with a boilerplate answer, especially if you get the sudden urge to call your spouse the “ol’ ball and chain”. Please don’t say that. Instead, say something about how wonderful it is to have married your best friend and how waking up next to your spouse is like a dream. Talk about how much fun you have together when you’re not even trying, like when you’re just sitting on a park bench making fun of everyone that walks by or sneaking flasks of vodka into the movie theater. You can say something about how lucky you feel to have found your perfect match in another human being, or about how you fall more in love every single day. They will love this, and it’ll be great because it’s true.