I just did something stupid. Really stupid. I deleted all of my notes from my trip to the Newberry last week. They�re gone. I suspect there�s a way to get at least some of them back. I didn�t actually delete the file, but accidentally overwrote them when I didn�t realize I had the text selected and didn�t realize the mistake until after I�d closed out the program and gone back in. But I really don�t know how to fix it. I suppose it�s not the worst thing I could have done. The really important info has already been transferred into my dissertation and one set of things I found for a colleague I already sent off to her in an e-mail. I could easily reconstruct it on my next visit. Mostly I�m disturbed by the ease with which I accomplished the deletion. What if it had been my dissertation chapter? I�d be typing this from a mental institution. I think I have a date with Retrospect and my DVD burner this evening.

Given my current mental state � a mixture of distraught over the above event and elated over the glorious weather � I am grateful for elgan�s suggested topic today, as I am feeling a big uninspired. Elgan has asked why we got married, why we stay married and what we think is the value of the institution. Tough questions.

My husband and I dated for 8 years and lived together for one before getting married four years ago. At that point the question is not so much �Why marriage?� but �Why not?� I think ultimately the function of marriage has a lot more to do with the way you as a couple or two individuals want to fit into your world � family, friends, the world at large � than something between the two of you. But that certainly isn�t why we did it. Could I see us happily living together without being married? Sure, but I�m not sure I�d have wanted to have kids in that situation. In this country at this time, if you�re in a committed relationship with someone and plan to have kids, it�s just easier and safer to do that under the aegis of a marriage contract. I hope I don�t offend anyone who has chosen (or in the case of same sex partners has had chosen for them) to do it the other way. I certainly don�t mean to judge others. I just prefer the legal protection, since it is an option for me. And I feel strongly that it should be an option for everyone. But that wasn�t really elgan�s question.

We did feel a certain amount of social pressure to get married and since we weren�t opposed to the idea of marriage, that pressure may have affected us somewhat, perhaps making it easier to make the decision. But mostly we just knew we wanted to be together and wanted to say so in front of friends and family. Making the decision that this person is indeed the one I want to spend the rest of my life with is monumental. It marks a big change in who you are as an individual, even if you don�t think it should change the relationship. But of course it does, because when individuals change, the relationship changes too. In any case, when you�re jumping into the unknown, it�s really nice to have lots of witnesses. A fancy dress doesn�t hurt either. And I must say, our wedding was one of the best parties ever. Definitely a good way to start a marriage.

Why do we stay married? Because we like it. We�re both pretty solitary people who liked living alone, but after a while we realized we liked being solitary together. We still do.

What is the value of marriage is something I wrestle with regularly. I�m really not sure how to answer this. About the only thing I can get in marriage that I can�t get without is a certain amount of legal and financial protection, and even this is not guaranteed. And those protections are not offered to all who wish to make the commitment, which makes me very uncomfortable about the institution as a whole. I feel like by participating in it I am, in some way, condoning its status quo, which I certainly do not intend to do. But in any case, the part of being married that really has value to me, that has made me a different person than I was before I got married, is the decision to make the commitment. It is an amazing thing to be able to say, I�m making my life different, even though I know there will be some concessions, because the one concession I won�t make is you. And to know you mean it.

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