I am just about finished writing my one-woman show to perform at my upcoming big birthday. I really have to give credit to hubski because much of it was originally written for hubski (various state of the lil reports). The name of the show is "Every Marriage is a Good Marriage (even the bad ones)." It starts like this:

I never intended to get married ever. I was interested in partnering and cohabiting, but not too interested in marriage. Marriage seemed somehow authoritarian and restrictive. My most serious partners over my first 20 years of partnering, also seemed authoritarian and restricting, as well as jealous and controlling. I didn’t trust marriage.

I’d had proposals. One went like this:

Offstage voice: I want to marry you. Not now, but maybe sometime in the future when you like me better.”

My first husband said,

Offstage Voice: Either marry me or move out."

Everyone hates moving.

One man also said to me,

Offstage voice: I have to see you, even if it has to be through bullet-proof glass.”

That wasn’t a proposal, but I liked his impulse towards self-protection.

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I will be arguing that every marriage is a good marriage: even the bad ones, but until very recently, my experience with romantic partners and husbands has been less than stellar.

Each of my early relationships was worse than the preceding one, with my first marriage ultimately being the most dangerous. Who knew that a Jewish marriage not only begins with glass breaking, but also ends with glass breaking?

Clearly my choices were based more on convenience than compatibility. Maybe I mistook intensity for intimacy. Maybe I just had no skill in living wisely in the world. Every marriage is a good marriage even the bad ones because they teach you to live in the world.

I went to a school of education in 1974 and graduated with a teaching certificate. I wasn’t long in my first job before I realized that teacher’s college mostly just exposes you to classrooms and children. If you don’t run away screaming, they give you a teaching certificate. Nothing I learned in teacher’s college was relevant in my first classroom.

I could say the same thing about life and relationships.