In my Arabic class this morning we were translating an article from an Egyptian women's magazine that was about a woman who was having trouble in her marriage because her husband spent too many months away. My Arabic teacher then asked about who wanted to get married in the future and to my surprise more than 60% of the class raised there hands. I was surprised and a little bit terrified.
I think that I'm a little bit too young to be thinking about marriage. I also think that it's a ridiculous goal to have. I imagine that it will be possible for me to get married at some point, but it's the kind of thing I don't plan on happening. It feels ridiculous to plan on being married before meeting someone who you are certain that you want to spend the rest of your life with.
I refuse to feel bad for not wanting to be married. I don't think this makes me pessimistic or cold hearted to not think of marriage as some kind of requirement for a fulfilled life. Of course, I am terrified of loneliness but I don't want to set lofty expectations for my future. I don't want to be thirty or thirty-five and feel some kind of pressure to be wed. To me, ending up married to the wrong person is far worse than remaining alone for a long time.
Don't take this to mean that I am waiting for the "perfect guy" to begin contemplating marriage. I generally scoff at the idea of a "perfect" person, and I am fatally attracted to imperfections anyway. I just don't think that I should be contemplating or obsessing over marriage until I find someone who I am certain I could work things out with for a number of years who feels the same way that I do. This recent obsession with marriage that everyone around me seems to have is terrifying and needs to be stopped. Let's not put more pressure on ourselves than we already have to deal with.
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