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Christian
English Major
Writer
Thinker of odd things

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More of my "fundamental" views [Saturday, Oct. 02, 2004, 12:11 pm]

Why is it so hard for people to stay together these days? I just had to start asking that question after hearing about 2 divorces in the past few months. Divorces between some nice Christian couples that we have known for years. In one case, I could kinda tell the relationship wasn't very close, even though the news was still a shock, considering they have even more kids than we do. But the second one shocked me even more. Picture the people you would least expect to get a divorce, and then picture them divorcing. That's how it seemed.

And I hope I don't sound presumptuous, since 1), I'm not married, and 2), my parents are still together, so I have thankfully never experienced a divorce in that sense. But we're in a time when half of all marriages are ending in divorce. That's just awful. Is marriage really supposed to be all about personal happiness?

For some reason, whenever I hear about things like this, I always wonder if maybe it would be better to have grown up in the 1800's. Sure, there was more sickness and disease back then - but at least people generally stayed together. I like to think about the Pioneer days. I love stories like "Little House on the Prairie".

And I love the relationships in those books. I mean, you never hear Pioneer stories about Ma & Pa separating and going to court to divide custody of their kids, cows, and chickens, do you? Some of the people in those times didn't even know each other well before they got married, but they still stayed together, because divorce was something that was only for extreme cases, usually.

I often wonder why it was so different back then, and I came up with a little theory about it. Now, I'm sure there are lots of reasons, but this is just one I've thought of. Maybe it's because men's and women's roles were so much more defined back then. Women did one thing, men did another. They were still equal - because being equal doesn't mean being exactly the same (contrary to some of the ideas going around today). And women could still do many of the same things men did.

But they depended on each other. If there was no wife, the cooking and sewing and cleaning wouldn't get done, and the house would be in shabby shape. Not to mention there'd be no one to take care of the children during the day. And without the husband, there wouldn't be much income, and the harvesting and hunting and fishing probably wouldn't get done. It's almost as if they couldn't survive without each other. Yet, nowadays, it seems that a lot of people only want to find someone for emotional dependence.

I know this is a really old-fashioned, and "traditional" way of looking at things. But you know, the newer ways aren't always the best. Sometimes after something begins to fade away, we really begin to realize how important it was to society.

This goes right along with good manners and courtesy. I can't believe how some kids behave today. I remember hearing one woman say that if she had talked back to her school teachers the way kids today do, she would have been severely punished.

I know, I can't remedy society, as much as I wish I could. All I can really do is make sure to live the way I wish others would. Since I have such a problem with misbehaving children, I need to make sure that when I have my own kids, I teach them to be courteous. If more people would only do that, imagine how much better the world would be. I think it's sad that some parents are just too busy with their own careers, and end up neglecting their own children.

But I won't get into anymore of that today.

*Laura*

wander -- travel

Miss anything?

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