2012 and Divorce

So, we just got done watching 2012. An apocalyptic movie with lots of special effects and mediocre script. What stood out to me was not the end of days but a seemingly mundane detail: a split up family.

At the beginning of the movie Dad came to pick up his two kids, was criticized by his ex wife for not seeing them more often, while the new husband said a jolly hello and left for work. This probably did not stand out as a detail to many because, well, it is commonplace. Average. Acceptable. And a present detail in many other elements of popular culture.

I am going to come clean here. I am a child of divorce. In fact I don't even remember my "real" father and have no relationship with him (sort of hard to do that when you don't know where he is!) My mother remarried when I was young and for all intents and purposes my stepfather is my real father...although I don't have a relationship with him either, but that is for another post. Overall, I do not think that being a child of divorce has ruined me or warped me or caused me to not be able to have adult relationships. But it did have an impact. It started the shaping and belief in me that divorce was okay.

Also, I have a blended family. I am my husband's second wife and we are raising his two children from his first marriage. And for all intents and purposes I am their real mother.

Last year, right about this time I was seriously considering a divorce. I had moved out, things were disintegrating in accelerated time and I was out of options. This was not going to work. This was not what I wanted, my only option was to walk away. Walk away and start over. I didn't want to analyze why it wasn't working. I didn't want to try to figure out what my role was in it not working. I certainly didn't want to try.

Trying is hard work. Trying meant putting aside my self and looking at the bigger picture. It meant admitting the things I was doing wrong. And frankly popular culture said I didn't have to try. No one was judging me for leaving, in fact I do believe I had several supporters. We hear all the time that half of marriages end in divorce, celebrity couples are on and off in the change of a channel and before your ten year reunion you hear about so and so and their failed marriage. Divorce is cheap and fast. And romanticized and scripted and played out over and over. Until it is normal. What has become abnormal is putting stock in your vows and honoring them.

What are vows anyways? We grew up having our Barbies repeat them over and over and dreaming of our wedding, we never paused to consider the marriage. Our vows just became part of the script we memorized and carried very little meaning in the end.

Now, I am by no means judging those who divorce. I believe that my mom and even my husband made the right decisions for them at the time. And seeing as how those decisions have greatly impacted my life I don't know how they could have made them any differently.

I am saying that I wish our popular culture wasn't so focused and full of broken homes and families. I wish it wasn't normal, because I don't believe it was what was intended for us. Instead I wish we could watch family played out in a functional manner. Where mom and dad respect each other and model a committed relationship for their children. It might be a little Leave it to Beaver, but I don't think that it is such a bad place to be!

At this point in time I am committed to my marriage. It hasn't gotten all that much easier in the last year, although we work on it one day at a time. It has gotten better, and richer and fuller and happier. Because we are committed, and we work hard for it and we both believe in our vows. Because I took time to reflect upon my vows and exactly what it was I promised!

I am excited when I think to the future about the legacy I am leaving to my children. We are not perfect, but we are doing the best we can. And perhaps one generation and one family at a time we can rebuild a sense of what commitment means.