If I had to name my biggest fear about getting married, it would be becoming strangers while still sharing a home. Knowing where someone keeps their coffee mugs, but having no idea what’s been on their mind lately.
When I picture marriage, I tend to picture an ordinary evening: the two of us sitting at the kitchen table, something to drink within reach, a few minutes before the dishes need doing. There wouldn’t have to be anything special to talk about. I’d just want us to still want to talk.
What scares me is how easily that time could fill up with everything else. Work, groceries, a repair that somehow requires three phone calls. We could spend an entire evening exchanging useful information and never quite have a conversation. Did you pay that? Are we out of this? What time do you need the car? All necessary questions. Not exactly the reason I’d want to marry someone.
I wouldn’t expect constant excitement. Some evenings, being tired together would probably be the whole program. Silence wouldn’t automatically worry me, either. There’s a comfortable kind where nobody needs to perform or come up with an entertaining account of their Tuesday.
I’d be afraid of the other kind: having something to say and deciding it’s easier to keep it to myself. Or realizing my partner had been doing that, and I hadn’t noticed.
There’s uncertainty in any promise about a shared future. I couldn’t know who either of us would become, or how we’d handle every difficult stretch. That’s part of what makes marriage feel like such a big decision.
Still, my fear comes back to that kitchen table. Years from now, after we’ve sorted out the groceries and the car, would we stay there a little longer because one of us had a story to tell?
