i got married on thursday and hated it by friday
what do i do when i love my partner but hate the institution of marriage?
Welcome to debrief! This newsletter is on pause and will be sent out semimonthly while I finish writing my book. This time, instead of an essay from the archives, I have a new essay for you, because N and I got married at the end of May, and… let’s just say I had a lot of feelings about the whole endeavor.
A few weeks ago, N and I went to City Hall and paid $35 for a marriage license. In New York, you must wait at least 24 hours after obtaining your marriage license to conduct the ceremony1 where the marriage license will be signed by an officiant, which is the act that then officially “marries” two people in the eyes of New York State. Contrary to popular belief, marriage isn’t between two people—it’s between one person, a second person, and the State—a tripartite agreement.
To be completely honest, I did not want to get married. Not because I do not want to get married—I have a wedding Pinterest board titled Little Girl Dreams that I started seven years ago!!—but because I did not want to get married like this. It shouldn’t surprise you to hear that I am somewhat obsessed with institutions—and while I am learning to question my lifelong devotion to institutions, I still have a stubborn view of the institution of marriage and what I want from it (and don’t want from it). And what I wanted was: a big party; being surrounded by friends from every stage of our lives; the one event in adulthood that busy people make concerted efforts to attend despite young kids, demanding careers, life.
What I did not want was to go through a metal detector in the same government building with construction in the lobby, take a ticket as if we were at the DMV, and be rushed through a one-minute perfunctory ceremony by an officiant whose name I wouldn’t even know until after the ceremony and I looked at our marriage certificate.
When I asked if I could set up a few cameras around the room just to record some footage, the officiant sounded exasperated. “It’s only going to be a minute,” she said, giving me a weird look like she thought it was odd for me to bring so many cameras for a ceremony costing all of $25.2 I felt immediately ashamed and only set up two cameras, even though I’d brought three. I already did not want to get married this way,3 and now my small attempts at imbuing the moment with frisson seemed overwrought, overly sentimental, lame.
N and I met in Family Law—a law school class all about marriage, divorce, blood and legal relations, the semiotics thereof—so we are no strangers to talking through what marriage means to us. If marriage is a present commitment to be partners until death (or divorce, the unspoken offramp), then we were married years ago. We both saw marriage as something we functionally were already in, and the ceremony—the wedding—was more an excuse to bring all of our friends together, in a society that makes it increasingly difficult to connect and spend time with friends in adulthood. That was what I wanted the marriage ceremony to be.4
So why did we get married, if we both wanted something else?
Legalities, of course. As much as we want marriage to mean one thing, the state inevitably dictates the terms of engagement—quite literally. N switched jobs recently; his former employer (in New York) recognized domestic partnerships for purposes of extending health insurance benefits to the partner (here, me), but his new employer (with a health insurer in New Jersey) does not.5
That’s it. The State of New Jersey decided the meaning of marriage for us: health insurance. Sexy!
After the ceremony, our witness (you need to bring one witness for a City Hall ceremony) took a few photos for us, I developed six ginormous water blisters on my feet, and then we called a car back home so N and I could get on our 4pm and 4:30pm work calls, respectively. I posted on Instagram and texted my parents (yes, in that order). We had a nice dinner and got ice cream. And that was it; that was our “wedding day.”
The next morning, I woke up to my mom texting our family group chats about us getting married and many congratulations and best wishes. And I had an unexpected reaction: I was furious. I wanted to snap fuck you in response to every congratulations! I regretted getting married; I regretted telling anyone about it.
I imagine I will be similarly angry when I become pregnant, if I am so lucky to have that opportunity. Even though I want to have children, my own assigned significance to being pregnant will differ from the societal significance of being pregnant. I will see being pregnant as a taxing experience that I nonetheless wish to have in my large tapestry of life experiences, while society will see me as a Pregnant Woman—a woman fulfilling her biological and social imperative, eclipsing all other accomplishments she may have.
Have you seen how strangers treat a Pregnant Woman? How they feel entitled to touch her belly, as if her uterus were no longer hers and hers only? How they comment on the sex of the future baby even if sex and gender do not matter to the parents or the future human being? How they offer endless unsolicited advice about labor, childrearing, breastfeeding, regardless of the parents’ views or values or capabilities? When I think about this, I want to rebel, never have children, never give others the satisfaction. A childless woman with a career has inscrutable values, challenges preconceptions; a Pregnant Woman is seemingly understandable to everyone, she must have values about pregnancy and motherhood that mirror yours.
That’s the problem I have with marriage: there is no good way of engaging with the institution under your own system of values without also reinforcing the existing traditional system of values that it represents. I can scream from the rooftops all I want about how my getting “married” wasn’t marriage to me, how I view it as a dressed-up “health insurance day,” but the message inescapably gets scrambled by the sheer monolith of the institution of marriage. My family will make a bigger deal out of it than I want them to; strangers will project their own definition of marriage onto mine. Hell, have you seen the creepy media coverage of whether Ben Affleck is wearing his ring, dubbed “ring watch?” I’ll spare everyone the future detective work—N does not like wearing accessories (he doesn’t even like wearing sunglasses) so does not plan on wearing his ring—but I doubt my proclamations will matter much. My own vision of marriage is subsumed by the great and storied institution of marriage; the State of New Jersey wins.
For me, there is always an uneasy joy when joining any institution. I was obviously delighted and proud to be accepted to Ivy League institutions for school, but I also resented how attending those institutions changed how strangers treated me, how I saw myself. Why couldn’t attending Yale simply mean that I studied a lot, equal to the diligence of attending, say, Chico State? I could be the same person and attend either school—yet my parents, and society, viewed me completely differently depending on the institution I was attached to. The same is true for Biglaw firms—I see how others’ evaluation of me changes when I say the name of one, then another, then none, the light in their eyes betraying how bought into institutions they are.
Whenever there is a disparity between your value set and the value set of others, you will feel pained. It is natural. Realizing that what you value so much isn’t valued by others—or conversely, realizing that what you value so little is of paramount importance to others—is an inherently isolating experience. This is true whether the thing we are talking about is a three-leaf clover you picked from your backyard or getting married. When we present someone else with these precious events, try to explain to them exactly what it means or doesn’t mean, we are giving them a piece of ourselves for them to accept or reject. That’s incredibly brave and vulnerable.
So no, I did not say fuck you in response to congratulations. I know everyone means well, and marriage—in whatever way, shape, or form each envisions it—means something specific to each person, something larger and more complicated than can be expressed in text messages or Instagram comments. Some meanings align with mine, and their existence helps me feel a little less alone. And some couldn’t be more different, but that makes them no less beautiful. ◆
Open Tabs
My friend
’s book, Modern Friendship: How to Nurture Our Most Valued Connections, is out today!! I sped through it, and it gave me a helpful framework for analyzing my past and present friendships—as well as scripts for how to reach out to potential friends and how to support current friends through tough life events. Anna’s been dubbed the “New York Times’ friendship correspondent,” and I can personally vouch for how great of a friend she is and how much she is worth listening to!Former OpenAI board member explains that Sam Altman’s ouster last year was actually because he’s a liar. Two execs came to the board directly to accuse Altman of creating a toxic atmosphere, psychological abuse, and being manipulative.
Ever wondered why your favorite influencers seem to become inauthentic as their following numbers grow? Researchers from Chapman and Berkeley created a model to map this effect of influencers starting out as inauthentic in the hopes of going viral, becoming authentic to grow awareness, and then becoming inauthentic again.
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The idea is to dissuade shotgun weddings, make sure you really want to do this, encourage you to fully contemplate the significance of what you are about to do, blahblahblah. This is why Vegas weddings are popular plot devices in media and in real life, because there is no waiting period to get married in Nevada. Go ahead, be spontaneous!
In case you’re doing the math, it costs $60 total to get married in the state of New York.
I’m also mourning the possible death that getting married in this manner disqualifies us from the New York Times mini-vows section. As a former lover of all things traditional, it was a dream of mine to be in the New York Times wedding announcements section. I even read an article in college about factors that increased the likelihood of being featured. Silly? Yes, but still able to evoke a grief in me I was not ready for.
I completely recognize this is an extremely privileged view of marriage. N and I are, by all definitions, very, very privileged and could therefore afford to remove ourselves from the more practical realities of marriage that drive many such unions. Our view of marriage should not be seen as a criticism of the many reasons why people marry, but rather simply that: our particular view of marriage for us.
Domestic partnerships for same-sex couples are recognized, but not for opposite-sex couples. I’m prettttyyy sure this is unconstitutional but the time and energy required to fight this with the insurance company and potentially in court far exceeds the time and energy of just getting married at City Hall. But don’t get me wrong—I did think about battling this in a fit of rage but ultimately decided this was not the hill to die on.
This was such a nice suprise in my inbox! I know you are focusing on writing so I didn't expect to receive your newsletter for a very long time. This might be one of my favourite essays of yours because it clearly explains some of the discomfort I feel at the idea of being pregnant that for the longest time I wasn't able to understand. I don't feel like congratulations are the right thing to write under such a nuanced post so I wish instead you'll have the opportunity to celebrate your wedding the way you wish soon!
I feel this sooo much. Ive been engaged for a year and a half and every time someone starts asking me about my wedding plans i get a weird bubbling rage bc of exactly this: " there is no good way of engaging with the institution under your own system of values without also reinforcing the existing traditional system of values that it represents.... My family will make a bigger deal out of it than I want them to; strangers will project their own definition of marriage onto mine." Its kind of a formality for me too, and i just know everyone elses ideals on what it "should" be are going to stress me out. Thank you so much for sharing this.