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thewayshecsit · 10 years ago

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“Here's a tip: if you're demanding an engagement ring for Christmas, chances are you aren't ready to be married (and he certainly isn't).”

According to my Timehop, I posted this link on Facebook two years ago today. Revisiting the article now, I still love it. The click bait-y title is a little much, but the content is spot on.

During a typical Monday Facebook scroll session, I’ll see that 2-3 girls from my college sorority got engaged over the weekend and are flashing their new bling all over social media. First of all, congratulations and I wish you lifetimes of happiness (for real). However... it does occasionally come across that many of these engagements are really about the ring and the wedding, and not the relationship and the marriage.

Regarding the flashing of the bling... When did “agreeing to spend your life with someone” equate to “becoming the proud new owner of a sparkly diamond”? (You can find the real answer in this fascinating article from the Atlantic. Hint: It has to do with an ad agency with the ambitious goal: “to create a situation where almost every person pledging marriage feels compelled to acquire a diamond engagement ring.”)

A friend of a friend recently married her high school sweetheart. When I heard that she got engaged, I asked my friend to see a picture of the ring (because, that’s what you do right?). “She’s not sending around pictures of her ring,” my friend told me. “She thinks it’s tacky and she knows that everyone would just be zooming in on their smartphones and picking it apart.” TOUCHE, friend of a friend. I am guilty of doing exactly that on several occasions. (She has a big, gorgeous ring, by the way, for all of you people like, “oh she must be embarrassed about it, that’s why.” No... I think it’s because she understands the sentimental, lifelong meaning of being engaged to a person, which has zero to do with said ring.) This really got me thinking about people who post pictures solely of their rings on Facebook to announce “We’re engaged!!” What? Who? You and the ring? That doesn’t spout much confidence about your ability (and desire) to stay with the same person for 70+ years.

As someone who has been in a relationship for almost 11 years and is still not married, I may be on the opposite end of the spectrum. I am of the belief that you don’t need a ring or wedding to be committed to someone. And although we are questioned about our “timeline” by almost every family member each time we’re together, we like being on our own timeline. We’ll have a wedding when we’re ready to be married. And a sparkly ring certainly isn’t going to change my feelings about or commitment to this man.

It does make me wonder, however, how much you can actually know a person after just one or two years of your life. Three, even. I’m not saying you should necessarily wait 11 years (that’s insane!), I just think it’s a pretty big deal to tell someone else that you’ll wake up next to them every single day for the rest of FOREVER. I don’t know if people ever truly wrap their heads around that idea. I know it’s hard for me, and I’ve already been with the same person for 40% of my existence.

Reading this article now, at 27 (yikes), it makes me proud of my many female friends who understand that an engagement ring or a crazy expensive wedding is not the end all be all. However, you’d be hard-pressed to find that belief perpetuated in the media. One of the Huffpo author’s best points details that inconsistency: “It makes me wonder what our world would look like if female accomplishments other than becoming a wife and mother were equally exalted. If we had First Job Showers, gifting briefcases and business suits, or Promotion Ceremonies, with hundreds of guests flying in to commemorate a woman's move to the C-suites. How about teen entrepreneur shows, instead of six (six!) different television shows about teen moms, which makes some girls want to get pregnant, so they can get on TV?” (According to Wikipedia, there are currently 46 TV shows about weddings and 28 about teenage pregnancy.)

I’ll end with my favorite quote from the article: “Try to make the life decisions your 37-year-old self would want you to make, not the ones the seven-year-old you fantasized about.”

#weddings #engagements #women #rings

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