My fourth wedding anniversary is this week. It approaches shortly in the wake of a… well, let’s just say a rather large and unexpected slap in the face from my parents, of all people. It’s a bit of a story, and the details would just be a bit too identifying if certain people stumbled across it. Besides that, there’s not much of a way to talk about it without just sounding whiny. Last but not least, it’s more than a little embarrassing that my parents would behave that way. But it’s big enough that Hermione, Primus and I will be pulling out of an upcoming family event in response.
What does this have to do with my anniversary? Well, it puts me in mind of another fictional quote:
I am not altogether on anybody’s side, because nobody is altogether on my side.
–Treebeard, from The Two Towers by J. R. R. Tolkien.
A simple quote, but anybody who has swallowed the Red Pill is well familiar with it. It’s applied to me my whole life. Politics? Democrat or Republican, none of them is on my side. Cliques in school? None of them is on my side. Employers? None of them has been on my side (except perhaps my current job – I’m extremely lucky in that). Even “best friends” and surrogate father figures (another story for another day), not altogether on my side. And right now, as so many other times in my life, even family – not altogether on my side.
When I was dating Hermione, long before we got married, my uncle asked me a deceptively simple question: “Why her?” What is it about her that makes her so special? At the time I didn’t have a good answer for him. The best I could vocalize was something along the lines of, “Just because.” But over the years I’ve come to understand exactly what it is. Once upon a time I was lucky enough to find one person who is altogether on my side, or at least who was willing to be. All she asked in return was that I be willing to be altogether on her side. So I did the only sensible thing: I married her.
There’s a strong anti-marriage sentiment in the manosphere. I get it, I really do. The rules of the institution have been twisted, and they’re pretty stacked against us men right now. It should make men think pretty hard before they go through with it. But for those who question so much why they should risk it, there’s one simple answer – the same answer for both men and women. If you do it right, and you manage it with the right person, you really can find somebody who is altogether on your side.
My marriage, like all marriages, isn’t perfect. If it were, this blog wouldn’t exist. But there’s one thing, the most important thing, that we managed to get right from the beginning: we’re on the same side. And that alone is worth everything else, even if I need to be reminded of it sometimes.
Thanks, dear, and happy anniversary.
