As I said in my very first post, I’ve never been particularly excited about marriage. I’ve certainly been very excited about my wife, most notably in the tearing her underwear off and holding her down department. Marriage was just kind of a hoop to jump through on the way to the bedroom. Like the church was a location bounce for a compliance test. I just plowed ahead and completed all the tasks required. Propose check. Ring check. Wedding check. Booty on tap check. Alright.
It wasn’t until much later that I discovered I liked being married, and realized I liked the idea of marriage. Last year was the long difficult 14th year of marriage where I did an enormous amount of reading and thinking about marriage. Deciding and discovering I was in fact pro-marriage (if only for myself) was a surprise to me. However one of the greatest shocks to me last year was the discovery that someone else had been sneaking into our bed for the entire time we have been married.
John had been sneaking in for the first nine years of our marriage. If that wasn’t bad enough, when the thing with John ended, the bed didn’t even have time to get cold before Jodi slipped in and she took up residence. And that’s been going on for nearly six years.
Both my wife and I were appalled. All we wanted was each other and somehow it had turned into a threesome. Naturally we called Dershowitz and Feinstein (as an aside that phrase “Dershowitz and Feinstein” doubles as my wife’s safe word for episodes of underwear tearing and holding her down. It gets a better response than the old one of “the children!” because I’d frequently mistake it as her asking to switch it up into make a baby style pounding and there were some disagreements about what she meant) and… hang on, long parenthesis… Naturally we called Dershowitz and Feinstein and asked them for help. Is there any way we can get Jodi out of our lives and bed?
Turns out there isn’t. We can kick Jodi out at any time, but apparently the fine print says if we want her out, we have to divorce. Jodi and Co apparently wrote the fine print on the marriage law, and like fools when we did the whole church thing we must have been distracted at some point between the getting the photos done and having every female member of her extended family touch my ass on the dance floor, and we signed a marriage license. Boom, John moved in. Nine years later he moved out, and gave his set of keys to Jodi and she moved in. Awesome… more tea Jodi? Make yourself at home.
So anyway Jodi basically leaves us alone, which is good, except anytime we have some sort of discussion about being married or the wedding. Then she’s always sticking her nose in. Let me give you an example… my wife and I firmly believe that marriage is meant to last forever, we said that in the church for the wedding vows. I could prove that by going to the video of the wedding, but it’s on a VHS, accidentally taped over with a really good episode of Teletubbies from when the kids were little and purposely lost.
Anyway… we agreed that marriage was forever, no matter what. We made vows. Sweet precious vows. In sickness and in health, for richer for poorer, for World of Warcraft addiction and Irritable Bowel Syndrome. For love and uncontrollable flatulence. Jodi always kind of rolls her eyes a little at that. She just says that Connecticut is a No Fault divorce State, and basically anytime either one of us wants out she’ll be happy to tear up the marriage license and start deciding how to divide up half of everything. But we tell her “we made vows though”, she just sips her tea and says it’s all a verbal agreement and inadmissible in a court of law.
“In fact” she says, “you could have said nothing in that little church, or you could have said vows in Latin, Elvis could have been your best man, Joan of Arc the Maid of Honor and Moses could have done the service and it all wouldn’t matter any different.”
She paused for effect… “you could have just sung Puff the Magic Dragon to each other for all I care. The marriage license is your consent to the marriage agreement as defined by Connecticut Marriage Law. That’s what your marriage agreement is.”
We look across at Dershowtiz and Feinstein. They look bored.
I chime in with a question, “so what is our marriage actually an agreement for?”
Jodi looks over her glasses, “well getting married allows you to enjoy all the rights, benefits and responsibilities of marriage.”
…
“So what are the rights, benefits and responsibilities of marriage?” I ask.
“Well I’m afraid that’s not actually defined in Connecticut Law.”
“That seems a bit of a lapse doesn’t it? That just leaves it as a license to do something.”
“Well we’d prefer to not actually meddle in private affairs of the people if we could. It’s really all just for figuring out taxes to be honest.”
“It’s all just about tax filing?!?!?”
Jodi looks disapprovingly at me in a tight frown, “you’re not very romantic are you Mr Kay. It’s what you make of it; I would have thought you would have figured that out by now.”
“Ok, I have to ask then. Sex. What about sex then?”
“I’m just a metaphor for the State of Connecticut, you can’t have sex with me, it’s not possible.” Jodi looked over at Jennifer for a moment and gently patted her on the arm, “I see what you mean dear, he’s like this all the time isn’t he.”
“No I mean, I mean I’ve only had sex with one person for the last 15 years because that’s the agreement. That’s in the law right? One of the rights, benefits and responsibilities of marriage is sex right?”
“Oh no, we took the adultery laws off the books long ago. Frightfully messy things to police really. Waste of tax money trying to control all that.”
“What? You mean there’s no sexual agreement to marriage? To be faithful?”
“You’re awfully old fashioned aren’t you? No, no there’s no sexual aspect defined in marriage law. Anyone can have sex with whoever they want in Connecticut as long as they are of the age of consent and all that sort of thing. You can have lots of sex, some sex, no sex, sex with anyone inside or outside your marriage, it’s not really relevant to me. As I’ve told you before, marriage is really all about the tax. And I can break up that tax arrangement any time either one of you want.”
Jodi helped herself to a shortbread cookie. Dunked once and bit off a small piece. “Listen, I don’t really like to meddle, but just this once I’ll give some advice,” another dunk and another bite, “as I said before marriage is what you make of it, and as you know it can stop at any moment if one of you wants out.”
Then she crushed the rest of the shortbread cookie in her fist and dropped the crumbles into the tea cup. The she very slowly and pointedly tipped the cup over on the table and let it spill a slow spreading puddle across the cloth.
“Pay attention to each other. Don’t get sloppy. No one likes cleaning up someone else’s mess.” Then she sat back into the sofa with finger raised as if to say something more, but she closed her eyes mid thought and her hand eased down to her lap.
Then it hit me. “Holy crap I can have sex with anyone I want!” Holy crap I might have said that out loud.
Jennifer is a listener more than a talker and she had been silent for the whole conversation. With Jodi sleeping, Jen held me close for a few seconds. I’m tall and she is short, so she pulled me down to her and softly whispered in my ear…
“Dershowitz and Feinstein.”
And two spring loaded briefcases popped open across the table, ready for action…
Oh really. I smell a fitness test.
“We can do that if you want,” I said softly as I delicately found a good handhold of brunette hair and tugged gently. “You’ll still want to fuck me after the divorce.”
… and led her upstairs to explain things in… in greater detail.
Getting married is not a permanent finishing line to sexual competition. Sex ranking issues continue into the marriage, and a consistent DHV (Display of High Value) is an ongoing requirement.
No Connecticut governors were harmed in the making of this post. I have no idea if Jodi Rell likes either tea or shortbread cookies, or falls asleep mid sentence. It’s a metaphor.
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