Happily Ever After, Where Are You?



"Before her wedding day, she thought she was in love; but since she lacked the happiness that should have come from that love, she must have been mistaken, she fancied.  And Emma sought to find out exactly what was meant in real life by the words felicity, passion and rapture, which had seemed so fine on the pages of the books."  (Flaubert, Madame Bovary  I:5)



Last month while Christmas shopping, I came upon a Barbie wedding set complete with Barbie in a beautiful gown, Ken in a dapper tuxedo (although there is something a little boxy about Ken), Stacie as bridesmaid, and Kelly as flower girl.  I immediately called my sister to tell her about this treasure.  Who could I give it to?  At $40 it was a little pricey for the cousins' exchange, and none of my girls play with Barbies.  As I'm describing the toy to her, she says, if you love it so much, why don't you buy it for yourself?  That's ridiculous.  I instantly started an internal investigation as to why I would be so drawn to the Barbie wedding set.  As a younger mother I detested Barbie, and told my mother and mother-in-law that we would be a Barbie-free house.  I realized my short-comings as a feminist however, when my oldest daughter turned four and I orchestrated a ballerina themed birthday party.  The mother of one of her little friends came up to me outside the preschool, and said " I found the perfect gift!  A ballerina Barbie!"  My heart sank as I failed to summon the courage to politely ask her not to introduce Barbie to our house.  A smaller chested, lithe Barbie in white tutu and slippers was opened to the delight of my four-year old.  We still have her, and although her hair is a little ratty I'm loathe to through her out, perhaps as a symbol of my weaknesses as a feminist, or perhaps because secretly I adore Barbie and the grand fairy tale she represents.

A few months ago I attended a mother-daughter church luncheon where the key-note speaker used the Cinderella story to illustrate the character traits of humility and self-sacrifice.  The woman sitting next to me, to my surprise, whispered, "I hate the Cinderella story. It's the worst thing we can tell our daughters-that if you find prince charming all your problems will magically disappear. Besides she wasn't showing humility or self-sacrifice for her step-mother, she was showing weakness and simple-mindedness!  She should have sued her step-mother for her part of the estate and for abuse."  Because I wasn't expecting this comment from this particular mother, I found myself mulling over her words long after the luncheon.  Why do we perpetuate the Cinderella story, in its myriad forms, that marrying prince charming is the best way to ensure happiness?  Why don't we address the search for happiness in a different way, i.e. you develop the ability to experience happiness here and now, and that it doesn't just magically happen for you when you've contrived the "perfect" wedding?

My family and I saw an exhibit at the Peabody Essex Museum about a year ago called "Marriage Rituals around the World."  It was a mixed media exhibit with gowns and other wedding accouterments from various cultures and times periods, as well as fascinating wedding videos from "around the world."  As I was watching the videos with my cynical, grouchy Saturday-morning self, my husband was trying to inspire awe in my daughters over the dresses and elaborate cakes.  These videos were truly exotic and a little strange, but they made me wonder, why do we as a species apparently, lavish and concentrate our efforts in such a way on marriage?  Perhaps, it's because marriage is a symbol of hope, regeneration, and a new beginning for the parents of the bride and groom.  But what of the bride and groom?  The bride and groom are not looking for regeneration or a fresh start, or the prospect of newness and vitality that babies bring.  For the bride and groom, they have been promised happiness and bliss.  As Emma in Madame Bovary experienced, the happiness that Charles Bovary was in a position to provide her was not passionate and definitely not rapturous.  Emma was quickly disappointed that her marriage was not as the romance novels had told her it would be.  She was ill-prepared to confront this reality, felt trapped, and sought what would be a tragic escape.  She was deluded by her desire for a more fulfilling, passionate union, into believing that passion would bring her happiness. The question Emma's character poses for us, is how can we change the marriage narrative so that we know what kind of happiness to expect, look for, or create for ourselves? 

I've found myself in a philosophical morass with regards to feminism, marriage, and my own daughters.  I often feel as though I've married my prince charming - he's romantic, intelligent, engaging, spends time with tthe kids, cooks, and even wakes up at 5:30 am to change my 7 year-old's wet bed while trying to keep it quiet so I don't wake up.  Even though he is a perfect match for me, happily every after does not follow by necessity.  We experience our moments of crisis, frustrations, and times of wondering how we will ever make it through.   I definitely want my daughters to experience happiness with a spouse, but since marriage doesn't gaurantee happiness, I want them to understand what marriage is in real terms.   My sisters and many friends of mine find ourselves in the weeds of marriage: we're done having babies, the bad habits and resentments of a decade-plus have accumulated to a staggering height, and the demands of older children physically and psychologically make us almost long for the simpler up-all-night-with-the-baby days.  If there was passion in the early days, it is often very hard to find or summon now.  The challenge that this stage of marriage presents is that we can find ourselves at the breaking point, where we question if we really love our spouse, if it's "worth it" to stay together, where we wonder as Emma did,  "Oh why, dear God, did I marry him?" (I:7).  Knowing that similar troubles await my own daughters down the road, yet believing that marriage is ultimately worth pursuing, in what context do I encourage this endeavor?

Clearly, the Cinderella story will not work, and it's a good thing I didn't buy the Barbie wedding set, so I don't perpetuate the happily ever after myth with my youngest two.  Instead, I hope that by witnessing the many arguments and moments of forgiveness that my husband and I share, along with relatively chaste scenes of ardor and affection, my girls can see that marriage is hard, but it's happinesses are not elusive. Yes, I adore the wedding gowns as we drive past the local bridal shop, and perhaps I'm overly enthusiastic when I point out to the girls, "Did you see that one with the beautiful sparkles?"  Yet on the same day they might receive a lecture from me about how important it is for them to develop their own independence and sense of self.  I often caution my oldest one against marrying too young, as I did, and losing those precious years of self-actualization.  Perhaps these challenging "middle" years of marriage are what make us nostalgic for the fairy-tale romance (and Barbie wedding sets), when believing in the fairy tale made happily ever after possible.  Now the burden is to make happily ever after actual through commitment, love and the openness to accept the kind of happiness available to us.  Perhaps taking ownership of our own happiness, recognizing that our spouse is not the creator of our happiness, and avoiding the tempting trap of escape are the first steps towards a feminist marriage.