How to Be Husband-Free

Husband-Free Hula

2008-10-10T21:12:00.002-04:00

Wow! Husband-Freedom keeps turning up in the most unlikely of places! My own mother, married almost 50 years to the same man, is going on vacation to Hawaii -- without him! Don't get too excited, it isn't as dramatic as it sounds; she isn't leaving him, she is just leaving him home, because he doesn't want to go. Her traveling companion is another similarly situated wife with a stay-at-home husband (he stays home while she goes out and enjoys her retirement) -- a sort of Sisterhood of the Traveling Skirts! How wonderful that they are going, that they are going together, and that they are able to move beyond the pre-fab version of married retirement that mandates traveling as a spousal pair only. You go, girls!

We Don't Get Just One Day -- We Get a Whole Week!

2008-09-24T19:41:00.005-04:00

From the Alternatives to Marriage Project website:

"National Unmarried and Single Americans Week – starting Sunday, September 21st – reminds us that society should neither privilege nor penalize the state of being married as distinct from other important caring and interdependent relationships. On average, American adults spend as much time outside marriage as in it. Married couples are a shrinking portion of households, of parents, and of the workforce. Business practice and government policy must catch up: American adults deserve full respect and equal opportunity, not prejudice and clumsy social engineering."

It may be just a coincidence, but tonight the pilot of "Gary Unmarried," a new sitcom is on at 8 pm, EST. As one preview observed, remember when the single dad sitcoms featured a widowed man, not a divorced one? Progress!!!

You Can Put a Wedding Ring on a Knocked-Up Teen But She is Still a Knocked-Up Teen

2008-09-10T21:02:00.003-04:00

I know, I know, the media (and I suppose that includes us pesky bloggers) are supposed to leave the candidates' families alone -- but if their lives were so private, why do we all know that Gov. Sara Palin's 17-year-old pregnant daughter is going to get hitched to the baby-daddy???

And an even more interesting question -- with a whole slew of absolutely horrifying answers -- is, WHY, oh WHY, is the fact of their upcoming nuptials being shared with the American public -- heck, the whole world -- as though it is a good thing, a wise decision, an honorable plan???

Honestly, readers, if this same situation was happening in some marginalized, under-resourced, religiously fundamentalist backwater, the enlightened, civilized folks here in the U.S. would be tsk-tsk-tsking away about human rights, maternal health and infant mortality; but since the lucky bride is who she is, we are expected to turn a blind eye to the fact that getting married at 17, for whatever reason, seems very ill-advised, even under the best of circumstances.

Husband-Free Film

2008-08-23T19:01:00.005-04:00

Hot off the presses -- OK, I'm about one month behind, but what can I say? It's summer and I will always love biking more than blogging -- a documentary about 30-something single women being happy without a hubby is in the works! Check it out at www.seekinghappilyeverafter.com -- I am impressed, excited, and hopeful that the film's producer-people will check out How to Be Husband-Free!

(A big Husband-Free holler to Kristin for alerting me to this one!)

The only (minor) disappointment in the website promoting this exciting venture is in the section that provides bios for the many creators -- and it's the same problem that persists in other media, especially books -- and that is mentioning marital status. Why?

OK, people are nosy, they want to know, or be able to feel like they *know* the director, writer, producer -- but what does one's marital status really say about anyone, especially in relation to a work they are producing, whether it is visual or written (unless, of course, the work is autobiographical)? Does being married (or not) make one a better (or worse) director or editor? Does being married (or not) make one more (or less) able to describe or comment upon a social trend like Husband-Freedom with intelligence and credibility? It seems to me that including marital status in biographical profiles is the back-door equivalent of the using "Mrs." Haven't we moved past a place where we need to categorize and be categorized according to whether or not we have legal rights and responsibilities attached to our romances?

I Don't

2008-08-14T21:24:00.003-04:00

Yes, it's true -- yet another book casting a critical look at the institution of matrimony! "I Don't -- A Contrarian History of Marriage" by Susan Squire is next on my list, so look for a review in this space relatively soon -- but in the meantime, reviews in more conventional media outlets have been very positive. An added bonus is the very excellent cover -- I won't spoil it with a description, check it out at your local library or bookstore. I will mention, however, that the cover photo reminds me of a joke:

Q: What does a woman say to a man while they are having sex?

A: It depends.

If the woman is a prostitute, she says "Leave the money on the nightstand."

If the woman is the man's girlfriend, she says "Oh baby, just like that, YES!!!"

And if the woman is the man's wife, she says "Beige."

"I think I'll paint the ceiling beige."

Husband-Free Happiness

2008-07-24T20:50:00.003-04:00

"The greater part of our happiness or misery depends on our dispositions, not on our circumstances."
- Martha Washington

A Gift That Keeps On Giving

2008-07-21T19:57:00.004-04:00

Another tale from the trenches, stranger than fiction, you cannot make this stuff up. I am a little spotty on the details, but according to my source, a Husband-Free woman recently received, from a married friend, as a gift which the recipient neither asked for nor wanted, a six-month subscription to eHarmony. As ever, I almost didn't know what to say about this -- how presumptuous. Really. And the real insult, the real shame of this gift, is that a six-month subscription to eHarmony is expensive, but cannot be exchanged or returned for a credit that could be used for some tasteful accessories or a sweater -- a nice handbag would be so much better!!!

Check out YouTube for some truly hilarious spoofs of eHarmony -- there were so many I couldn't even pick one!

Finding Balance

2008-07-14T22:37:00.003-04:00

Sunday -- yesterday -- was the perfect summer day, breezy, warm, not too humid -- and I had the great good fortune to spend half of it volunteering for a program that helps little kids learn how to ride bikes. All of the kids who showed up to learn except one were girls, from which I drew no conclusions, since the sample was so small, but it reminded me of when I first learned and how frustrated I used to feel before I finally got the hang of it -- kind of like becoming Husband-Free, and embracing your single life -- you have to find the balance and fight gravity. And practice, practice, practice!

Bicycling has done more to emancipate woman than any one thing in the world...It gives her a feeling of self-reliance and independence the moment she takes her seat; and away she goes, the picture of untrammeled womanhood.
- Susan B. Anthony, American suffragist, 1820-1906

Guy's Eye View

2008-07-13T22:21:00.007-04:00

While we're on the topic (these last few posts) of celebrity marriages that don't work out and what they have to teach us, check out a FASCINATING blog I came across recently for the guy's eye view on why the fellas are not so eager to get hitched these days:

Read it yourself at Men's Guide to Women.

A brief summary of the MGTW position: basically, most men do not stand to benefit very much from marriage, while the risks it presents are substantial. Check it out, and keep an open mind, ladies. Men (or your man, if you have one) might not be commitment-phobic or immature -- they (or he) might just be smart, honest and realistic. Would it be so bad if you were, too?

An excerpt from MGTW:

Men do not marry women in this day and age because legally, marriage is one of the stupidest contracts a man can enter into, though I for one am a happily married man.

And gentlemen, if you've come over to this blog from the MGTW, feel free to point your girlfriends in a Husband-Free direction -- it may get you both on the same page, although from different perspectives! And comments are MOST welcome from the other side of the side of the marital divide -- weigh in with where you're coming from; open dialogue can only help.

Three Strikes and You're Out

2008-07-11T16:34:00.004-04:00

I don't want this space to turn into a post-mortem on celebrity marriages, but I cannot let the follies of famed baseball player "A-Rod" go unnoticed, only insofar as the sordid details illustrate so well that the truth of the matter is that getting married is no guarantee of happiness -- to the contrary, it is a huge gamble, with a lot at stake. Did "A-Rod"'s wife ever think -- did she ever even suspect for one single second -- that the sacred union with her beloved would culminate in such a humiliating spectacle? I doubt that she did, or that Chrystie Brinkley did, any more than any of us regular non-famous gals would when getting ready to marry a regular non-famous guy. Who gets married thinking their spouse will cheat? Drink? Get addicted to gambling, porn, drugs? Work too much? Work too little? Ignore them? Refuse to go to counseling if things are clearly falling apart?

This is not to say that no one should get married because it might not work out -- but it should make any rational person realize that NOT taking on that amount of risk is not a bad thing, not at all.

Movin' Out

2008-07-06T10:01:00.005-04:00

I can only imagine that this Uptown Girl's latest divorce makes her split with Billy Joel look like a walk in the park -- it turns out that retired super-model Chrystie Brinkley, soon to return to the ranks of the Husband-Free, was married to a grade-A SUPERFREAK. Who knew? Her louse of a spouse looks so vanilla on the outside, and it turns out that he makes Rick James look tame (I think, in New York State, it's called "Pulling an Elliot Spitzer"). An underage mistress on the payroll, three grand a month on porn, and tacky screen names ("hornylad"???) -- if this is not enough to make her swear off the altar and buy her own damn diamonds, I don't know what will!

It brings to mind a timeless quotation I came across recently:

Marriage is a lottery, and the more [a woman] thinks about it, the more she feels the independence and safety of a single life.
-- Charles Dickens

Independence Day

2008-07-04T13:11:00.006-04:00

Happy Fourth of July! What better day to celebrate your independence than on the day our Founding Fathers (and Mothers!) claimed freedom for all of us?

We hold these truths to be self evident...

Independence is happiness.
- Susan B. Anthony

Those who desire to give up freedom in order to gain security will not have, nor do they deserve, either.
- Benjamin Franklin

Independence is loyalty to one's best self and principles, and this is often disloyalty to the general idols and fetishes.
- Mark Twain

Now get out there and celebrate your Husband-Freedom!

Lord, Hear Our Prayer

2008-07-01T08:21:00.006-04:00

Now that wedding season is in full swing, I expected some great dispatches from the trenches, but nothing quite as wonderful as what popped into my in-box recently: in sum, a dear Husband-Free friend of mine went to a wedding, and during the church ceremony, was seated with some other Husband-Free gals. Imagine their shock, when during the Prayers of the Faithful, along with prayers to end the war and heal the sick, they heard "...and we pray today for all single people, that they, too, may one day know the joys of holy matrimony..."

I don't even know what to say to this!!! I had no idea that Being Single had been added to the Seven Deadly Sins view the deadly sins here -- although, if you stop and think about it, being single (instead of being Husband-Free) could be construed as Lust, and perhaps even Envy and Sloth as well. Silly me, I thought that God helps those who help themselves...

"Wedded Bliss"

2008-06-26T08:08:00.007-04:00

I don't know how he would've felt about Husband-Freedom, being a married man and all (twice, if I'm not mistaken), but I couldn't let the passing of famed comedian and social critic George Carlin this week go unnoticed in this space. See obituary here

I can't claim any detailed knowledge of his substantial body of work, but, like most Americans, I am familiar with his observations about the internally contradictory and/or inaccurate phrases that pepper our culture, like "military intelligence" and "jumbo shrimp." I'd like to think that he would be pleased to add "wedded bliss" to that list. Rest in peace, George!

It Takes a Village to Buy a House

2008-06-22T21:32:00.003-04:00

One of the hallmarks of advanced Husband-Freedom is home-ownership. Fiscally, owning your own home can be the foundation for financial security and stability, but getting a downpayment and closing costs together usually takes time and effort. Socially, home ownership says "I've arrived!" but emotionally and psychologically, it can be scary, even downright terrifying.

This is where friends and family come in, at whatever stage in the process you might find yourself. It can take real courage to ask for the help and support that you need, whatever that help and support might be -- but just think of the housewarming party you can have once it's all done! You can cash in on all the weddings you've been to over the years and register for all of the gifts you've given but never received in return: mixers, monogrammed towels, sheets, place settings, flatware, etc.

Also, don't hold back if you know someone who is Husband-Free has started to move toward home ownership -- offer your help, ask about the process, and reinforce that what they are doing is so terrific in every way that you can -- no one will be offended! And not many people can do it alone.

Sometimes, You Get What You Pay For

2008-06-19T08:13:00.004-04:00

Excerpted from Marriage Ain't Prozac by Susan Jane Gilman in "Single State of the Union -- Single Women Speak Out on Life, Love and the Pursuit of Happiness" edited by Diane Mapes:

Thanks to our culture, many of us view marriage through a mindset of scarcity. We're told that if we don't "hurry up" and "find" a husband, all the "good ones" will be "taken." So our search for a partner becomes like hunting for a Prada blouse during a one-day sale at Neiman-Marcus. We race to the store, tear through the racks like maniacs, looking for something that "fits," and hope that we'll beat the other shoppers to the best bargain before closing time. The fact that we have to choose one outfit to wear every single day for the rest of our lives just makes us even more insane.

Halving It All

2008-06-17T20:02:00.005-04:00

I think it's commonly assumed among women-who-want-to-wed that getting married means half as much housework, or at least, a lot less than you have to do on your own. There was a women's movement, after all, and most couples nowadays are dual income, so sharing the housework is part of modern marriage, right?

Wrong. Check out this NY Times article published this past Sunday.

The Singles' Table

2008-06-15T21:24:00.003-04:00

On Saturday night I went to wedding reception as the guest of one my Husband-Free gal pals (skipped the ceremony -- too far away from the reception for public transportation) and had a lot of fun, especially by being the only girl-girl couple at the singles' table -- heck, we were the only same-sex pair at the whole reception -- and by leaving our nature of our relationship (friends since graduate school) wholly unspecified, in a sea of heterosexually normative behavior reinforcement.

Despite having a really pleasant evening -- drinking, dancing, good food, nice people -- I was nevertheless struck by the incredible sameness of it all. Maybe it is just this sort of uniformity and tradition that is attractive to prospective spouses -- you get to join and participate in something larger than yourself that connects you to generations of married couples, etc. -- and in these rapidly changing times, there is something sort of comforting about the few traditions that have survived. But I still couldn't help but wonder, if each and every couples' love is so special, so unique, why filter it through such a uniform process?

My Momma Told Me

2008-06-14T00:06:00.002-04:00

I had a lovely, Husband-Free evening with one of my favorite Husband-Free gal pals, and in the midst of drinking and snacking, she shared with me a funny anecdote -- when she was getting married, right before the wedding, she asked her mother, "Mom, aren't we going to have The Talk?" to which her mother wisely replied, "Honey, I don't think there isn't anything you don't know already," but my friend persisted. "C'mon, mom, isn't there something you want to tell me? This is going to be my wedding night, after all." And her mother replied, "Well, let me tell you, there are going to be times when he comes to bed and you just don't feel like it. When this happens, whatever you do, DON'T MOVE. Even if he snuggles up next to you and puts his arm around you, you have to act like he's not even there. If you even twitch, then all bets are off." I LOVE THAT ADVICE. What an honest answer!!! If we could all be so honest...

The Broken American Male

2008-06-13T09:13:00.003-04:00

...is the title of a new psych/self-help/relationship book by Rabbi and radio star Shmuley Boteach, the thesis of which seems to be something along the lines of "men are emotionally shut down at work and in life, so this is why they are shut down in relationships," etc. (I'll be checking this out of the library ASAP.) The unfortunate sub-title of is the good rabbi's book, however, is "How to Fix Him." Why doesn't he fix himself? Why are women responsible for men's brokenness? Don't we have enough work to do -- AND we have to fix the men at the same time? I'd be happy if someone would just fix my windows...

I'm Your Handyman

2008-06-11T21:09:00.006-04:00

One of the very few times I have wished I had a man in the house is when I encounter a task better suited to Mr. Fix-It than myself, usually involving home repairs or improvements. This past winter, for example, I discovered that my front windows were drafty, and that my efforts to remedy the situation were fruitless. So, I did what any reasonable, fiscally-responsible gal would do -- I called a guy (in this case, my guy) to come over and help. A brief word about the B.F. -- what a gem! Smart, funny, patient, kind, supportive, trustworthy, and utterly incapable of fixing my windows.

As I watched him struggle and wrestle with these uncontrollable squares of glass on one of the coldest nights of the year, while the freezing air poured into my house, I was reminded of a conversation I'd recently had with another modern, well-educated fella -- the conclusion of which was this: men don't know how to fix things anymore. My dad, his dad, your dad, can probably repair anything from a hair dryer to a spaceship. They paint walls, they change oil, they mow lawns, they install major appliances. Today's men? Not so much, unless the item in need of TLC is related to audio, video or internet.

My point? Whether you have a husband or not, you are going to have to hire a handyman. Check out this cute site: Husband-for-Hire. And try to find one in your geographic area -- your married friends can probably recommend one...

In Sickness and In Health

2008-06-09T22:04:00.007-04:00

Thinking about voting for McCain? Think again:

McCain likes to illustrate his moral fibre by referring to his five years as a prisoner-of-war in Vietnam. And to demonstrate his commitment to family values, the 71-year-old former US Navy pilot pays warm tribute to his beautiful blonde wife, Cindy, with whom he has four children.

But there is another Mrs McCain who casts a ghostly shadow over the Senator’s presidential campaign. She is seldom seen and rarely written about, despite being mother to McCain’s three eldest children.

She was the woman McCain dreamed of during his long incarceration and torture in Vietnam’s infamous ‘Hanoi Hilton’ prison and the woman who faithfully stayed at home looking after the children and waiting anxiously for news.

But when McCain returned to America in 1973 to a fanfare of publicity and a handshake from Richard Nixon, he discovered his wife had been disfigured in a terrible car crash three years earlier. Her car had skidded on icy roads into a telegraph pole on Christmas Eve, 1969. Her pelvis and one arm were shattered by the impact and she suffered massive internal injuries.

For nearly 30 years, Carol has maintained a dignified silence about the accident, McCain and their divorce. But last week at the bungalow where she now lives at Virginia Beach, a faded seaside resort 200 miles south of Washington, she told The Mail on Sunday how McCain divorced her in 1980 and married Cindy, 18 years his junior and the heir to an Arizona brewing fortune, just one month later.

Maybe he thinks he is Wife-Free. Click here to read the story.

Size DOES Matter

2008-06-08T20:27:00.004-04:00

...and sometimes bigger is better, and longer can be better, too! Especially when the extra-large, extra-long thing in question is that extended-episode-being-marketed-as-a-movie called -- yes, I'm still on this -- Sex and the City! Yet ANOTHER review has got it all wrong, although at least this time the critic is a man, so maybe he gets a waiver of some sort...YES, SATC is exactly like a super-sized episode -- and that's a GOOD THING, Mr. Anthony Lane of the New Yorker magazine, not a bad thing! And why in heaven's name would be it be anything else, if what the fans want is more of the same? (If it ain't broke, don't fix it!) Does Michael Patrick King fancy himself the new Quentin Tarentino? And did he submit his masterpiece to Sundance and Cannes??? I DON"T THINK SO!!! Film critics, I beg of you, open your over-educated, overly-serious minds to the possibility that this film, as an extension of a (wildly popular and utterly unique)television series, cannot and should not be measured by the same yardstick as arty, effete foreign films, let alone the same standards by which we judge classic literature (WHO THINKS COMPARING SATC TO ANNA KARENINA MAKES ANY SENSE WHATSOEVER? RAISE YOUR HAND!!!....I didn't think so...)

Lastly, and on a Husband-Free note, do not, I repeat, DO NOT criticize these characters as being "obsessed with a ring" and "defining themselves...purely by their ability to snare and keep a man" -- first of all, because this only describes Charlotte, and secondly, because OUR CULTURE IS OBSESSED WITH THIS AND DEFINES WOMEN THUSLY. It is not the fault of Michael Patrick King and the products of his imagination/observation that this is true. Nor is it his fault that -- at least there was some truth in this review -- you [men] are not worth it. Try harder next time, Mr. Lane. Harder can be better, too.

Click here to read Mr. Lane's review

I Don't Have a Horse in That Race

2008-06-07T13:57:00.008-04:00

In honor of the final triple-crown race today, I invite you to click the following link: Marriage Race Horse.

This should take you to an audio file on a site called Odeo. Just press play and enjoy!

"The Wife"

2008-06-06T21:51:00.004-04:00

...is the title of a novel by Meg Wolizter -- one of my Husband-Free gal pals loaned it to me, and I have been enjoying it immensely. I am struck, however, by the inherent stupidity and pointlessness of this statement about the author from the back cover: "She lives in New York City with her husband and two sons." Who cares? It may as well tell us that she has a mortgage instead of a lease, makes her calls from a landline instead of a cell phone, and goes to a doctor who is out-of-network for her insurance plan -- really, who cares? And the irony of this, on the jacket of a book that calls into question much of what is traditionally valued about marriage. Regardless, I love this passage:

[My husband] once told me he felt a little sorry for women, who only got husbands. Hubands tried to help by giving answers, being logical, stubbornly applying force as though it were a glue gun. Or else they didn't try to help at all, for they were somewhere else entirely, out walking in the world by themselves. But wives, oh wives, when they weren't being bitter or melancholy or counting the beads on their abacus of disappointment, they could take care of you with delicate and effortless ease.