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not married yet At first I was going to say that winter is here, but it isn't. Fall maybe, but not winter. Three or four feet piles of leaves make the driving just a little more exciting. One gets to weave down the street around them without appearing drunk. Earlier this week my friend Dan and I had our usual conversation about where we should be at this point in our lives. Maybe with him just turning thirty this month and me in the coming month, it was time to revisit it again. I don't know, but it gave us something to talk about in addition to movies and assorted pop culture junk. Both of us will admit that neither of us has traveled very far down the road to getting married and starting a family, but I don't see that as a problem. As far as I am concerned if and when I get married is not something that I need to dwell upon that often. That last line sounds awkward, but I like where my life is at the moment, because I know that it works for me. Life is not a set journey or a board game with certain stops along the way. Neither of us sees life as some kind of pattern that we need to follow, but Dan likes to be more critical of suburban life than I am. I have no problem with people getting married and having children. If that is what they want, then I wish them the best. For me it isn't the right answer. Maybe my opinion will change with time. Naturally Dan worked the film American Beauty and its gross parody of the American family into the conversation. He saw it as being very true and something to avoid as much as possible. I, however, think that what the film gave as a model to avoid is not found in reality. There isn't a set American family anymore and I often wonder if one ever really existed. A family has always had and always will have its share of problems. As often as people say that humans are social animals, they seem to want them to interact like machines free from error. The model of what America should or should not be is warped so often by the media. People should stop looking for a model to follow and do what is best for them. The sad part is that so many can not think for themselves and need some kind of support system. In the past a system was provided in the form of organized religion, but that structure eroded in the past few decades and left people stranded. Now in a surge of conservative values, we have all of these lost people returning to religion because they couldn't create their own structure. They needed some kind of external force to instruct them, which is fine with me as long as it doesn't interfere with my rights. I have to wonder if Dan gets pressured more by his parents to get married than I do. Oh, earlier this week my mom had left a joking message on my answering machine saying that I needed to watch the evening news. It seems that they were interviewing some of the most eligible women in Milwaukee. The common thread that they shared was their problems with dating. Quite simply all of them were very successful in their professional life, but left little time for socializing. One thirty-three year old woman put it this way: Men say to me, you haven't been divorced and you don't have any children, so what is wrong with you. After watching the show, I wasn't really sure what to say. None of it meant that much to me and I doubted that my life could coincide with any of theirs. The life I lead is more mainstream than the musician's life that Dan leads, but I am far from being ideal husband material. The hours that I work are not that conducive to traditional forms of entertainment. Nor do I have a lot of time to shower affection on someone else. Then there is the matter of my needing time alone. Of course now that I go back to read what I wrote I sound slightly bitter, but that isn't true. I did not set out to write a rant. I just know that I am a very opinionated person and do not like to be told what I should do. Some people interpret this behavior as anti-social and that is fine with me.
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