Having been through the dreadful ‘D’ myself I would
still suggest that if you think you need a pre-nup what you really need is not
to get married.
It’s not about being unrealistic concerning
relationships but expectation is a powerful thing. Once you boil it down to
worries about who gets to keep the dog or the new oven, marriage – which some
would argue is a strange archaic concept in any case - is pretty much in the knackers’
yard.
Couple that with the current wedding psychosis,
evident at all levels of society, fuelled by women’s mags and the big soap
opera which is celebrity life in the 21st century, and you are on a
hiding to nothing – going through the desert on a horse with no name.
According to one bridal magazine I had a quick
shufty through while waiting for the dentist, the expected cost of a wedding is
now around £24k. Having once been to a wedding fare, I still can’t work out how
that figure is reached. Before you criticise - everyone should go at least once
wedding fare in their life even if there is no one you know getting married.
The sense of relief when you leave is worth every second spent inside.
Worse again is that young folk of less than ordinary
fiscal means seem to feel they have to do it in the prescribed way. A young
acquaintance of mine spent much of last year attending hen do’s (we’ll go into
that horror another time) and then weddings. Usually the couples were from
ordinary backgrounds with fragile incomes and already burdened with student
debt but still there were the stately homes in the background, the ridiculous
dresses, the chocolate fountains, sumptuous receptions, jewellery, wedding cakes
that wouldn’t have looked out of place in a Disney cartoon. Whatever happened
to funky weddings? Whatever happened to make-your own dress? Granny made the
wedding cake? Friends did the flowers and we all just had a good time?
We’ll leave themed weddings because I feel a
migraine brewing.
When I look around my mature married friends there
is absolutely no correlation between the amount spent on a wedding and the
longevity of the marriage or the quality of the relationship. Though on
reflection there may be an inverse relationship! In fact three of the longest married couples
I know with solid relationships that have weathered the storms, eschewed the
whole financial meltdown, shop-front, meringue dress, six tier monstrosity
events completely. Is that possibly because they were always more focused on
the relationship?
My uncle’s in-laws had the distinction a few years
back at the ripe old ages of 106 – to have been (then) the longest married
couple in Britain – marrying in their late teens. Obviously I did not attend
the wedding but I’m pretty sure they managed without a chocolate fountain.
Leaving multi-million dollar celebrity circus
weddings to one side (at least they can afford it I suppose and no one expects
them to last) this mania for showcase nuptials feels suspiciously like national
psychosis? We supposedly know that money doesn’t equate to love so what is going
on here? Young people have to get into debt to get educated, to buy a house,
even now to get employed as the trend for internships (unpaid work to you and
me) seeps in along with zero hours contracts and other work inequities. But
getting into debt to get hitched? What is that about?
Tack onto the other end of that scenario the idea of
pre-nuptial agreements and doesn’t marriage become ultimately pointless?
Pre-nups are legal in America and in their defence, have provided much media
entertainment over time. Until now per-nups have been kept at bay here but are
now being championed by some law firms.
But if young people are saddled with the idea that
they have to get hitched in a blaze of tat with birds of prey flying down the
aisle with the rings and flesh spilling out of thousand pound frocks, champagne
receptions and manor house settings so that there is nothing of the personality
of the families involved but it’s simply a homogenous characterless modern
magazine wedding – should pre-nups start with how to divide up the wedding-day debt?
Cartoons are in the usual place and for the people
who still can’t find them – for heaven’s sake GO TO THE RIGHT HAND COLUMN AND
CLICK ON THE ORANGE ‘Amanda Baker’