Try Before You Buy
'Always get married in the morning. That way, if it doesn't work out, you haven't wasted a whole day''from the ever-wise eight-time married Mickey Rooney.
by Maggie from London
Dearest Lulu,
Rather sensible advice considering that the
UK Office of National Statistics has revealed that the number
of Britons choosing marriage has plunged to a record low,
the lowest number recorded since records first started being
kept in 1862.
Those marriageables in their twenties simply aren't tying
the noose, I mean the knot. They are waiting until they reach
their 30's, if inclined at all; the average age that men and
women marry increased to 36.2 years for men and 33.6 years
for women ' up by three years for both sexes since 1995. Too
much frolicking, fun, frivolity all around?
And although the findings suggested that almost three-quarters
of couples living together planned to marry at some time in
the future, so they say, only 3 in 5 actually reach the 'I
do, do you?... until we are both dead stage ' and more than
a third of these unions lasted less than 10 years. But certainly
you already knew that. Cheerfully living together until those
gold bands are exchanged and misery ensues'statistically of
course.
Presumably married experts predict that the decline will only
get worse if the Government pushes through plans to give wayward
cohabiting couples the same legal rights as their married
counterparts.
'Tut, tuts' abound. Those open-shirted-tieless-I'm-one-of-you-men-in-suits
have scrambled over each other to reach available microphones
to declare their allegiance to very, very tired, tiresome
'family values' rhetoric. Tedious Tory toff leader, David
Cameron wants premarital counselling and relationship classes
ASAP' to save those cohabiters from what exactly? Each other?
Conservative retribution? Sin? No Dave. The latter is only
in America.
Of
those couples who regarded cohabiting as advantageous, almost
50 percent said it gave them the opportunity of a 'trial marriage',
while 30 percent said they enjoyed having no legal ties. 70
per cent of married couples stayed together until their children
turned 16, compared with only 30 percent of cohabiting couples
said they enjoyed having no legal ties.
The survey said that a legal change designed to crack down
on 'sham marriages' may also have had an impact on the figures.
So that's what they meant by trial marriages'.
But hang on here. There is a bit more involved than slothfulness,
impassivity, fear of commitment, fear of deportation. Research
reveals that getting married prompts a 50 per cent increase
in housework. It also shows that most of the rows between
couples concern domestic responsibilities ' the lack of.
As reported in the latest edition of Economic Journal, when
a woman is blissfully, gleefully, joyously single, her domestic
duties - ironing, cleaning, cooking - take up about 10 mind-numbing
hours a week. But once she cohabitates with her partner, married
or unmarried, in his place or hers, another 5 hours is added
to her domestic enjoyment every week. Surprise. Surprise.
With regards to men, the effect is the exact opposite. Before
sharing their lives in one domicile with their treasured one,
men average 7 hours of housework a week'surely that's 7 hours
a month'.
Once men have acquired their personal valet/nurse/cook/cleaner
' their work load is reduced to 5 hours or less. 'Less' being
closer to the 22 minutes that it takes to uncork the wine,
pack the bathroom with the week's newspapers, stock the fridge
with beer'18 minutes and counting.
The research says that men are willing to take a back seat
' ie, a lie down on the sofa - because they think women enjoy
taking control of the house and all the duties. Here's my
other leg'. while women say they are forced to spend much
more time bent over the kitchen sink in their bilious pink
washing up gloves because they are frustrated by the stacks
of dirty dishes left by their partners - or the mound of clothing
worn less than 45 minutes or having to search for the toothpaste
top at 12 am. The arrival of children clearly means the housework
duties multiply.
Conservative Ian Duncan Smith recommends that services should
take advantage of the 'magic moment' straight after the birth
of children to encourage couples to get married. These guys
need to get out more ' or perhaps, stay in more.
Women who hate housework and are unable to gently persuade
their partners to participate could be inspired by one compelling
argument. Scientists discovered recently that men could live
longer if they did more chores. Hiding away from household
duties and shirking childcare can lead to them 'dying of boredom'.
So there you are. Best to save that '70,000 for the average
wedding, open a separate savings account, toss that spring
issue of Wedding Flowers, put your feet up, have a large glass
of Pinot Noire and hire a cleaner.
'My husband and I celebrated our thirty-eighth
wedding anniversary. You know what I finally realised? If
I had killed the man the first time I thought about it, I'd
have been out of jail by now.' Anita Milner
TTFN
Maggie
About the Author:
Maggie is from Manhattan, where she was a painter, then designer
of clothing, objects, textiles, interiors while writing for
various publications and her own webzine. She is permanently
based in London, the city of irony, from where she writes
regularly to her gal pal Lulu in New York.
You can read her amusing tales about London's daily life, people, current events, politics, fashion and culture at her website www.lettersfromlondon.com.
You can also read more of Maggie's letters to Lulu at Letters from London on this site.
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