(no subject)
Sometimes i wonder who i will end up marrying ...what they will look like, what type of person they are and i wonder what juncture in their life they are in as i type this... in my lit class there are these two students Melvin and Tony.... These two student are engaged and had their first kid two weeks into winter term...they came from nor cal and need this one class in order to get their bachelors in Communications (Melvin) and Psychology (Tony the woman).... the couple comes to class every day, which is amazing considering they have a ONE MONTH old child....but that’s not the reason for this post.... i was under the assumption that like the only reason they were together was because she got knocked up....the other day we got a like 15 min break in-between taking our midterm and starting a new lesson... to make a long story short during this break i noticed how Melvin interacted with Tony.... and to my surprise Melvin is truly in loves with her... like making the first move to grab her hand and stuff like that....the best way i can describe this is its like that first week when you start going out with someone and like all you want to do is talk and be around that person...and it seems like relationships go in waves the honeymoon in the beginning then like reality where you two start to jell together and so on…my sociology book says that these are the relationship stages
1) Contact:
a) Perceptual: noticing how parties look at each other and their body-language.
b) Interactional cues: nodding, maintaining eye-contact, etc.
c) Invitational: encouraging the potential relationship (for example, suggesting a later meeting involving some social lubricant such as coffee)
d) Avoidance strategies: if one person discloses and the other does not: minimal response, lack of eye-contact, etc.
2) Involvement:
a) Feelers: hints or questions (for example: asking about family)
b) Intensifying strategies: furthering the relationship (for example meeting an old friend, bringing the other to meet family, becoming more affectionate, etc.)
c) Public: parties seen in public together often (if in a romantic relationship, may involve holding hands)
3) Intimacy- parties very close; may have exchanged some sort of personal belonging or something that represents further commitment.
4) Deterioration- things start to fall apart. In a romantic relationship, typically after approximately six months people move out of the so-called "honeymoon stage", NRE, or limerence and start to notice flaws. The way they address this determines the fate of the relationship.
…it seems that despite like two years together this couple is still in that honeymoon stage, which I find just amazing…