Expectations

When we first marry we are all full of hopes and dreams for the future but after a short while things start changing and along with this our dreams and hopes start to change also, that's the nature of life to change. What is tearing so many of us apart is the fact that our partners don't share our vision for a future together. Many of them seem to be seeking a placid kind of life with little passion or emotion where they have a defined role. But for us the role that they assign doesn't fit. They expect us to be loyal and to work at maintaining the home and family possessions, and to devote most of our energy to these tasks and raising children. They often feel that they have done their part if they go to work and do whatever chores they consider necessary around the house. There is no need in their life for emotion or feelings, they will placidly sit in front of a television until their clothes rot off.

 

We on the other hand had a different set of dreams that are totally unlike the cud chewing television watchers. We expected partners who we could pursue life with, who would explore the world with us. But instead of a partner that would seek to integrate our lives into a harmonious whole we got someone that expects to maintain their own little world where we often end up being seen as an irritating presence that expects them to engage with us. They see no reason that we shouldn't be happy because they don't care anything about emotion or engaging in building joint happiness. They expect us to be happy with the things that we have and to derive all of our emotional needs from our children. They don't feel any responsibility to work toward giving us the emotional connection and support that we feel entitled to. Their approach to marriage looks more like a business partnership than any kind of emotional engagement.

 

This basic incompatibility is the stuff that gives us nightmares, when we married most of us had the idea that we cared very much about our partners happiness and we have often went to great lengths to try and please them. The key point is that what makes us happy is of no interest to them because I really believe what they want is stasis, a calm kind of unchanging environment where they are comfortable. We are the antithesis to this because with our messy emotions we represent chaos which they cannot tolerate. These people hate change but we perceive change as growth and it is required for us. I sometimes wonder if these people see sex as something that you have to do to get a partner, but they don't seem to realize that it's something you need to do if you want to keep a partner. 

 

These characteristics seem to divide us into groups that are totally incompatible in our ideals and the way that we wish to live our lives. But until we can come up with a way to keep these people from pretending that they are like us until they have us at a disadvantage we will continue to have the mental anguish and the pain of being yoked with a team mate who is dead set on pulling in the opposite direction that we need to go. I think what we need to come up with is something like the quick release on a parachute so that if we find ourselves entangled with these dead heads we could quickly jettison them and deploy our reserve chute. Divorce has become a growth industry and I'm sure it will be further streamlined. What we need to do though is learn to cut our losses quickly and move on before we end up wasting our lives on these living coprolites (Fossilized Dinosaur ****).