I Won’t Marry for Love
On love, marriage, and bureaucracy
Up to this day, on one of the dusty shelves in my parents’ house is a huge plastic box that has all the important papers I needed, will need, and papers that simply reeked of nostalgia and sentimentality. There was a blue folder, filled with wedding dress sketches I drew myself.
One of the hobbies I picked up when I was a kid was creating paper dolls and dressed them up with different dresses——at least my paper dolls could afford to dress up. It became a sort of escape.
I eventually wore out this hobby. But what stayed with me all the way to uni day was this longing for fancy dresses and roles that I imagined myself in. I sketched my dream dresses. I dreamed to be a bride.
Until I was 25. Or 27.
I cannot exactly pin what happened after that. Something shifted. I learned to separate love from marriage.
The past five years, everytime I passed by a wedding shop or saw a wedding photo shoot on Facebook, I asked myself why would someone spend a shit load of money on a dress that they could only wear once in their life.
Some stranger would say, you are just jealous and bitter because you’re not married or had a lovely wedding. Believe what you want to believe, but growing up in a culture of weddings as a performance, I learned to unlearn a lot of cultural nonsense. I do not understand why a couple and the family of both sides had to incur debts for the wedding. I do not understand why a couple start their journey together with debt in tow, instead of savings. I do not understand the whole performance of feeding people whom you half-hate or half-hate you.
Perhaps it is just me and my unresolved issues. But hey, it is my stand.
When Ellen, a good friend from Cebu, visited me in Munich, we talked about love, family, and life. Of course, we touched the topic of getting married.
Finishing her PhD studies this December, she intends to become a full professor before reaching 40. But she is torn between career and love. Story of our lives, I suppose. I chose love over career. Who knows what my friend will choose.
Most likely, A and I will have to get married because we have to. We need to.
She said, with a bit of shyness, You should marry for love. She was not the first one. We’ve been asked to invite friends and loved ones when we decide to settle down.
“I’m too old for that shit.” I mean I’m too old for that belief that love is marriage or marriage is love.
I love A. I love us. I love our life together. We have settled down. Like any committed couple does.
Love does not need a certain paper that certifies that you both love each other. That sounds ludicrous. It does not seek validation, especially from law and religion.
When his parents came over for dinner, and the conversation led to kids’ names, and A’s mom vehemently disagreed with A’s preferred son’s name. Eventually the conversation led to the last names of the kids.
A said if the parents are not married, and you do not inform the hospital in advance they take their father’s last name, automatically they carry the mother’s last name.
“If ever, we don’t have to inform the hospital,” I chimed in.
“Why am I not surprised,” A said and stroked my back.
Marriage is a different dynamic. Doing laundry together is love. Doing taxes together is marriage.
Like what Michelle Yeoh said, “I would have really liked just doing laundry and taxes with you.”
Sadly, love alone is not rewarded. Marriage is. Having kids is. Marriage and having kids are highly regarded in Germany.
Married couples have a very favorable tax deduction and married couples with kids also rip certain benefits that individuals do not have.
And as a foreigner here, most likely that’s the most plausible route we have. Unless I can convince A to move to Vietnam or the Philippines. I tried. Several times. I failed.
And if ever we do get married, most likely it will not be a spectacle. Most likely it will be just one of the many bureaucratic processes we have to go through.
Noone will be invited in our wedding. Noone will know until we see you in person and randomly blurt, oh yeah, we got married. Five months ago. Just the two of us, and some workers in a mayor’s office who, most likely, have done this witness role countless of times.