of sweet dreams and alarm clocks

It seems marriage has been the talk of the country these days. What with celebrities getting hitched and all. Sen. Mar Roxas and Korina Sanchez's pledges of their love on national TV, thanks to Wowowee. And who does not know about Judy Anne and Ryan Agoncillo's secret wedding? Well, I have seen how their lives and careers blossomed during the past years that they're together. I mean, come on, Judy Anne has never looked her best, more and more advertisers are taking notice. And Ryan? Well, I admit to having a "crush" on him back in highschool, when I first saw him on his "Magpakatotoo ka!" Sprite commercial and reading his articles and interviews on teen magazines I used to collect. Again, I was on my early teenage years, so don't go asking me why I collect teen magazines, mmmkay? Anyway, I watched their "Unchanging Love" wedding special aired last week. And I was like, "awww, they both looked so happy and so in love, awww." In all honesty, with all my cynicism in this world, their wedding was a single-lighted piece of candle in a village having an outage, that there is still a smidgen of hope for the modern human race. But then, after the hoopla's faded, after the wedding's done, comes the bigger story: Marriage. They say every girl dreams of becoming a bride. Well, partly true. Who would refuse a gown made by Vivienne Westwood or Vera Wang? A sunrise or sunset wedding in a church, garden, or beach. Splendid as it is to dream of a wedding, but the thought of marriage wakes me up to reality. It's less pretty than most young people think. It becomes a bigger responsibility, a life-long commitment. Oooh, scary! And a divorcée doesn't look nice on a résumé, does it? And sharing a bed with someone each night of my entire life? Well, at least hardly anyone will accuse you of having a scandal if your sex marathon video tape happened to leak in pirated DVD haven called Quiapo.

Oh, well, guess it comes with age. I'm only 23 and not even half-a-hurry to find a groom in a population where there's a slimmer-than-anorexic chance of finding a single and undoubtedly straight male of my age to about five years my senior.

The marry month of June is about to begin in less than two weeks. And so, I thought of sharing this highly motivational email I received about two years ago. Read on!



LOVE vs. MARRIAGE

1. Marriage is not a word. It's a sentence (a life sentence).
2. Marriage is love. Love is blind. Therefore marriage is an institution for the blind.
3. Marriage is an institution in which a man loses his bachelors Degree and the woman gets her masters.
4. Marriage is a three ring circus: engagement ring, wedding ring and suffering.
5. Married life is full of excitement and frustration: In the first year of marriage, the man speaks and the woman listens. In the second year,the woman speaks and the man listens. In the third year, they both speak and the NEIGHBOR listens.
6. Getting married is very much like going to a restaurant with friends. You order what you want, and when you see what the other person has, you wish you had ordered that instead.
7. There was this man who muttered a few words in the church and found himself married. A year later he muttered something in his sleep and found himself divorced.
8. A happy marriage is a matter of giving and taking; the husband gives and the wife takes.
9. Son: How much does it cost to get married, Dad? Father: I don't know son, I'm still paying for it.
10. Son: Is it true Dad? I heard that in ancient China, a man doesn't know his wife until he marries her. Father: That happens everywhere, son, EVERYWHERE!
11. Love is one long sweet dream, and marriage is the alarm clock.
12. They say that when a man holds a woman's hand before marriage,it is love; after marriage it is self-defense.
13. When a newly married man looks happy, we know why. But when a 10-year married man looks happy, we wonder why.
14. There was this lover who said that he would go through hell for her.They got married, and now he is going through HELL.
15. Confucius says: man who sinks into woman's arm soon have arms in woman's sink.
16. When a man steals your wife, there is no better revenge than to let him keep her.
17. Eighty percent of married man cheat in America, the rest cheat in Europe.
18. After marriage, husband and wife become two sides of a coin. They just can't face each other, but still they stay together.
19. Marriage is a man and a woman become one. The trouble starts when they try to decide which one.
20. Before marriage, a man yearns for the woman he loves. After the marriage the "Y" becomes silent.
21. I married Miss right, I just didn't know her first name was Always.
22. It's not true that married men live longer than single men, it only seems longer.
23. Losing a wife can be hard. In my case, it was almost impossible.
24. A man was complaining to a friend: I HAD IT ALL - MONEY, A BEAUTIFUL HOUSE, THE LOVE OF A BEAUTIFUL WOMAN, THEN POW! IT WAS ALL GONE. WHAT HAPPENED, asked his friend. He says - MY WIFE FOUND OUT.
25. WIFE: Let's go out and have some fun tonight. HUSBAND: OK, but if you get home before I do, leave the hallway lighs on.
26. At a cocktail party, one woman said to another: AREN'T YOU WEARING YOUR RING ON THE WRONG FINGER? The other replied, YES, I, AM. I MARRIED THE WRONG MAN.
27. Man is incomplete until he gets married; then he is finished.
28. It doesn't matter how often a married man changes his job, he still ends up with the same boss.
29. A man inserted an ad in the paper - WIFE WANTED. The next day he received a hundred letters and they all said the same thing - YOU CAN HAVE MINE.
30. When a man opens the door of his car for his wife, you can be sure of one thing - either the car is new or the wife is.


Let me now hear you say, "awww."


...:::j u l i e:::...