Random Questions… give me some comments as responses!

1. What are the top three qualities you look for in the person you want to date/marry?
2. Is it okay to kiss on the first date?
3. If you could survive any historic disaster, what would it be?
4. If you had to choose a different religion, what would it be?
5. If you had to describe the silliest thing people do in general, what would you say?
6. What is the most romantic gift anyone could give you?

1. Strong Faith in Christ, Amibition, and a willingness to learn and try new things
2. I think it can be, but I think it needs to be nothing too fancy… no going nuts on the first night
3. Pompeii… I think the pictures from those houses are gorgeous, and I think living in that time would have been nice… then to watch the volcano explode, I dunno… it’d be I think altogether awe-inspiring.
4. Buddism – It seems like there’s such peace, and just an emphasis is placed on self-awareness, which is something I respect greatly.
5. Get mad about the past – there’s nothing anyone can do about it now.
6. Something that embraced who they are – something they made or did or lived that is everything they are. I got a gift like that, and it was incredible.

Work done tally:

Midweek:

Economics – Read a bit of what I had to read… check
Modern Civ – Done
Strategic Marketing – That’ll get done today; I’ll write up a fancy little brochure for Slovak Folk Crafts… mmmhmmm.

Hope all is well. I’m off to Pittsburgh soon to go pick up my brother, maybe go to Ikea, and then head home. I’m feeling a little better, just achey all over.

peaceandlove

100.3 and rising… huwah!

So in the never ending irony that is my life, after pledging I’d work harder on my grades, I now have a temperatue of 100.3 and crazy body aches. I’m sick, folks, and chances are will be even post my return to Grove City.

Towards a more verbose entry:

The word diatribe… if you put bitter in front of it, isn’t that a little redundant? I mean, can you have anything but a bitter diatribe, or something related. In other words, I doubt you can have a joyful diatribe.

If I am in error, please let me know.

So my brother might get an externship at a place near home, which would be really nice for him – no rent, learning experience, and when I come home I can get homecooked culinary graduate food. mmhmmmm.

TO and MNF – apparently there was a cartoon in the Tribune Chronicle that showed a family talking about it, and during it there was Viagra commercials and all that. 50,000 people wrote in to the FCC to complain, yet I get to hear all about how Bob Dole is getting Libby going with the blue pill of might. It’s just a double standard, regardless of how true it is – if you’re going to be mad at one, don’t laud the other. How many parents do you think wrote in about the pre-game show, and then consequently used an ED drug that night? SHADY.

Speaking of shady, Harvard’s endowment, the largest in the country, is under scrutiny becuase of the amount they pay their investors. A smaller version of the article from the Wall Street Journal is on the AP wire, and copied here:

BOSTON – The top managers of Harvard’s huge endowment were paid more than $78 million in the past fiscal year – an amount some alumni say is wildly excessive.

The two highest-paid managers – David R. Mittelman and Maurice Samuels – received about $25 million each for the fiscal year that ended June 30, down from $35 million the year before, when the Ivy League school’s $22 billion endowment had higher investment returns.

The top six employees – including Mittelman and Samuels – together earned $78.4 million, almost all in the form of performance bonuses, the university said. That represents a 27 percent decline from the $107.5 million in the previous year.

Harvard Class of 1969 alumni have sent a series of protest letters over the fund managers’ compensation.

“The amounts they are paying these folks are obscenely high,” class member Stan Eleff said Tuesday.

Harvard Management Co. said its bonus system rewards only investment gains that exceed market performance and that the university would spend more if it had an external fund manager. Harvard’s endowment is far larger than any other university’s.

A) Crapload of money… one guy alone grossed 25 million this year.
B) What an endowment… my school doesn’t even have a major endowment… about 1% of our operation revenues are endowment (and I know we are about 50,000,000 in operating expenses every year)… and we do just as well… but imagine that kind of money in our pockets – we’d be going to school FREE!

In closing, I give you a speech from Alan Keyes that he gave for commencement one year at our school. It sums up what I think we as Grovers strive for – to be failures in the world’s eyes

hmmm

So I thought I’d send an ECard to a friend, and while watching MTV The Real World came on and this girl kept talking about “Cuddle Cards”… incessantly. “I sent my boyfriend a Cuddle Card, I always send Cuddle Card, Cuddle Card, Cuddle Card”

Say the words “Cuddle Card” a few times and you’ll understand why I wanted to punch the girl.

But it was good advertisement because I decided to go there and check it out… and as I was, I noticed there was a section for “Breaking Up”. WHO THE HECK BREAKS UP WITH SOMEONE WITH AN ECARD! I mean, I’m guilty of basically calling a relationship quits in an email (a dumb, uncouth choice on my part, and one which I learned my lesson by), but at least I had the niceness to make it personal. I can only imagine:

“Oh, alright,” I think as I’m checking my email, “a Cuddle Card from my girl… oh I love her so much!”
Click the link… and I get this.
“Well, that sucks.”

That’s bad. And I won’t be sending that one to the person I’m sending my Cuddle Card too (Have you gotten annoyed by “Cuddle Card” yet?)… it is in fact, this one. Sweet and cheezy all at the same time. 🙂

peaceandlove

ee cummings

I’ve noticed of late Lindsay and I kinda take whatever entry we last had and comment on it again. It’s kinda fun, because it’s a delayed conversation… I think we’re getting to know each other better now than when we were in school (and, unfortunately, never hung out).

Anyway, I wanted to put an ee cummings poem on the good ‘ol journal because of his uniqueness. I know I’ve talked about him before, and I love him becuase he defines what any individual wants to be – someone who’s understood by all on his own terms. You get what cummings is trying to say most of the time, but you have to think first. Anyway… here you go.

Humanity i love you
because you would rather black the boots of
success than enquire whose soul dangles from his
watch-chain which would be embarrassing for both

parties and because you
unflinchingly applaud all
songs containing the words country home and
mother when sung at the old howard

Humanity i love you because
when you’re hard up you pawn your
intelligence to buy a drink and when
you’re flush pride keeps

you from the pawn shops and
because you are continually committing
nuisances but more
especially in your own house

Humanity i love you because you
are perpetually putting the secret of
life in your pants and forgetting
it’s there and sitting down

on it
and because you are
forever making poems in the lap
of death Humanity

i hate you

mmmmmm good (and classic) poem time

In my brief tenure as an English major, I wrote a paper on “The Love Song of J. Alfred Prufrock” by TS Eliot. I give it to you, free ‘o charge:

S’io credesse che mia risposta fosse
A persona che mai tornasse al mondo,
Questa fiamma staria senza piu scosse.
Ma perciocche giammai di questo fondo
Non torno vivo alcun, s’i’odo il vero,
Senza tema d’infamia ti rispondo.

LET us go then, you and I,
When the evening is spread out against the sky
Like a patient etherised upon a table;
Let us go, through certain half-deserted streets,
The muttering retreats
Of restless nights in one-night cheap hotels
And sawdust restaurants with oyster-shells:
Streets that follow like a tedious argument
Of insidious intent
To lead you to an overwhelming question …
Oh, do not ask, “What is it?”
Let us go and make our visit.

In the room the women come and go
Talking of Michelangelo.

The yellow fog that rubs its back upon the window-panes,
The yellow smoke that rubs its muzzle on the window-panes
Licked its tongue into the corners of the evening,
Lingered upon the pools that stand in drains,
Let fall upon its back the soot that falls from chimneys,
Slipped by the terrace, made a sudden leap,
And seeing that it was a soft October night,
Curled once about the house, and fell asleep.

And indeed there will be time
For the yellow smoke that slides along the street,
Rubbing its back upon the window-panes;
There will be time, there will be time
To prepare a face to meet the faces that you meet;
There will be time to murder and create,
And time for all the works and days of hands
That lift and drop a question on your plate;
Time for you and time for me,
And time yet for a hundred indecisions,
And for a hundred visions and revisions,
Before the taking of a toast and tea.

In the room the women come and go
Talking of Michelangelo.

And indeed there will be time
To wonder, “Do I dare?” and, “Do I dare?”
Time to turn back and descend the stair,
With a bald spot in the middle of my hair—
[They will say: “How his hair is growing thin!”]
My morning coat, my collar mounting firmly to the chin,
My necktie rich and modest, but asserted by a simple pin—
[They will say: “But how his arms and legs are thin!”]
Do I dare
Disturb the universe?
In a minute there is time
For decisions and revisions which a minute will reverse.

For I have known them all already, known them all:—
Have known the evenings, mornings, afternoons,
I have measured out my life with coffee spoons;
I know the voices dying with a dying fall
Beneath the music from a farther room.
So how should I presume?

And I have known the eyes already, known them all—
The eyes that fix you in a formulated phrase,
And when I am formulated, sprawling on a pin,
When I am pinned and wriggling on the wall,
Then how should I begin
To spit out all the butt-ends of my days and ways?
And how should I presume?

And I have known the arms already, known them all—
Arms that are braceleted and white and bare
[But in the lamplight, downed with light brown hair!]
It is perfume from a dress
That makes me so digress?
Arms that lie along a table, or wrap about a shawl.
And should I then presume?
And how should I begin?
. . . . .
Shall I say, I have gone at dusk through narrow streets
And watched the smoke that rises from the pipes
Of lonely men in shirt-sleeves, leaning out of windows?…

I should have been a pair of ragged claws
Scuttling across the floors of silent seas.
. . . . .
And the afternoon, the evening, sleeps so peacefully!
Smoothed by long fingers,
Asleep … tired … or it malingers,
Stretched on the floor, here beside you and me.
Should I, after tea and cakes and ices,
Have the strength to force the moment to its crisis?
But though I have wept and fasted, wept and prayed,
Though I have seen my head [grown slightly bald] brought in upon a platter,
I am no prophet—and here’s no great matter;
I have seen the moment of my greatness flicker,
And I have seen the eternal Footman hold my coat, and snicker,
And in short, I was afraid.

And would it have been worth it, after all,
After the cups, the marmalade, the tea,
Among the porcelain, among some talk of you and me,
Would it have been worth while,
To have bitten off the matter with a smile,
To have squeezed the universe into a ball
To roll it toward some overwhelming question,
To say: “I am Lazarus, come from the dead,
Come back to tell you all, I shall tell you all”—
If one, settling a pillow by her head,
Should say: “That is not what I meant at all.
That is not it, at all.”

And would it have been worth it, after all,
Would it have been worth while,
After the sunsets and the dooryards and the sprinkled streets,
After the novels, after the teacups, after the skirts that trail along the floor—
And this, and so much more?—
It is impossible to say just what I mean!
But as if a magic lantern threw the nerves in patterns on a screen:
Would it have been worth while
If one, settling a pillow or throwing off a shawl,
And turning toward the window, should say:
“That is not it at all,
That is not what I meant, at all.”
. . . . .
No! I am not Prince Hamlet, nor was meant to be;
Am an attendant lord, one that will do
To swell a progress, start a scene or two,
Advise the prince; no doubt, an easy tool,
Deferential, glad to be of use,
Politic, cautious, and meticulous;
Full of high sentence, but a bit obtuse;
At times, indeed, almost ridiculous—
Almost, at times, the Fool.

I grow old … I grow old …
I shall wear the bottoms of my trousers rolled.

Shall I part my hair behind? Do I dare to eat a peach?
I shall wear white flannel trousers, and walk upon the beach.
I have heard the mermaids singing, each to each.

I do not think that they will sing to me.

I have seen them riding seaward on the waves
Combing the white hair of the waves blown back
When the wind blows the water white and black.

We have lingered in the chambers of the sea
By sea-girls wreathed with seaweed red and brown
Till human voices wake us, and we drown.

And because it’s break, and I’m an two-fer mood, here’s another personal favorite of mine:

In the Shreve High football stadium,
I think of Polacks nursing long beers in Tiltonsville,
And gray faces of Negroes in the blast furnace at Benwood,
And the ruptured night watchman of Wheeling Steel,
Dreaming of heroes.

All the proud fathers are ashamed to go home.
Their women cluck like starved pullets,
Dying for love.

Therefore,
Their sons grow suicidally beautiful
At the beginning of October,
And gallop terribly against each other’s bodies.

Senioritis, Part II; and other various and sundry things

So as the semester is winding down, I’m watching my grades slowly head further and further south. If you could see a graph of afformentioned test grades, they’d range from a 95 to a 66… and they basically go in order.

I’ve decided that the problem is I’m just not being a good student. I’m not studying really, I read things just before the day of the test, and I’m basically bumming around waiting for college to be done. This is not exactly what I did my senior year of high school, but then again by this point I didn’t know where I was going to college yet, and let’s be honest – high school was a smidge easier than college (and, from what I hear from GCC alums, grad school is easier than undergrad… mmhmmm). So the answer is pretty simple – I need to be a good student again. The nice thing is I’m still completely capable of getting on the Dean’s List this semester, all I have to do is put the nose to the grindstone and belt out some good work.

I set the goal in front of me that I wanted to hit a 3.3 before I graduated – this is completely possible if I get on the Dean’s List this semester, and plug through during intercession and next semester. The key is not losing sight of that focus. (as a bitter postscript, if it was for that stupid paper in management and the subsequent C+ in the class, I’d probably have a 3.3 now).

So CCO again. I need to figure out where to live after graduation. My parents don’t want me to go all that far away from home, and I won’t disagree. I think for the first couple years it’d be nice to still be within the area (as it is, CCO only serves the Ohio, West Virginia, and Pennsylvania areas). So I’m thinking if you draw lines connecting Cleveland, Erie, Pittsburgh, and Akron together, that’d be where I’d work. And there’s a lot there (I think I may have said this once).

Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind is a gorgeous movie. I recommend it to anyone who’s willing to be lost in a movie for a few mintues. It makes all sorts of sense at the end, you just have to get there is all.

I had to lead church today for an ailing grandfather (he has the flu, and can’t talk). It was really enjoyable, and I got all choked up at the end. Silly me. I’m just a putz 🙂

1. Cincinnati, Ohio
2. Carlisle, Pennsylvania
3. Springfield, Missouri
4. Olympia, Washington
5. Tacoma, Washington
6. Bloomington, Indiana
7. Seattle, Washington
8. Harrisburg, Pennsylvania
9. Overland Park, Kansas
10. Kent, Washington
11. Long Island, New York
12. St. Louis, Missouri
13. Bellingham, Washington
14. Kansas City, Missouri
15. Columbia, Missouri
16. Evansville, Indiana
17. Bremerton, Washington
18. Topeka, Kansas
19. Branson, Missouri
20. Knoxville, Tennesee
21. Chattanooga, Tennesee
22. Omaha, Nebraska
23. Indianapolis, Indiana
24. Albany, New York

…so apparently I’d really like Washington state if I went there.

peaceandlove

Woo! Sitting down with LiveJournal

Hey all –

I finally have a chance to write again. I apologize for not for so long, but you avid readers of my journal know that when school comes I don’t write as much. But breaks – yessir, I have time to read and to write.

The election is now a memory in the minds of America, but it’s backlash can be felt here and there. And it bothers me, not as a Christian, not as an individual who voted for George Bush, but as an American.

I’m growing steadily more and more disgusted by individuals who are constantly touting their disapproval of the reelection of W by saying “I’m so sick of this, I’m moving to Canada.” What American are you – one who was so adamant about getting Kerry in office to save the nation, but so willing to turn your back on it when it does not go your way? I find you to be more disgusting and more hurtful to this nation than any political pundit – because at least they have the will to stay in this country even if the majority do not agree. Isn’t that the same exact attitude you expressed frustration over when you felt this country was becoming partisan? And isn’t it part of the reason you don’t like W? Hypocrites. Regardless of whether you agree with the president’s politics you are an American over anything else – Democrat, Republican, Libertarian. And it saddens me you’d rather leave the country that allows you your freedoms.

If you’re that little of an American, leave. We don’t need you here, anyway. We need all people regardless of politics to care about what we have.

I was accepted into the CCO. That means I basically have a job. Which is fantastic – a major part of my life figured out, and the door God’s been waiting to open. I’ve been thinking about where I would want to try to seek a job if they have it open. Right now I see myself in about a 100 mile radius of home. That basically stretches from Cleveland to Erie to Pittsburgh to West Virginia and back around through Akron and Kent. It’s a tremendously large amount of colleges, especially when you look at CCO’s regional map. I thoguht for the longest time I wanted to be back at Grove City – it’s a dream of mine – but I realize that I have a vision that I recieved and GCC, and there’s other schools that want and need that vision. So I go where the Lord leads and be excited regardless. After all, it worked with Grove City, it’s worked with getting into the CCO, and I have no doubt God’s plan trumps my own any day. One of the biggest joys of being a Christian, I’ve realized, is the knowledge that the Creator of the perfect world has my best interests at heart. He loves me perfectly.

That’s about it for tonight. Like Clint, I have about a gazillion things to talk about, and have no fear, I will discuss ’em all at great lengths… but for now, I want to curl up in my own bed and head to sleep. Goodnight, world.

peace and love.

hmmmm

I realized something as I was walking back from a meeting just now: there are only two things in this world that truly sustain me: Jesus Christ and sleep. Ironically, they’re both things I can never get enough of and never allow myself to have enough of.

dinner, working, late Buffalo meeting, sleep.

In the spirit of Lindsay’s journal…

Here are some random things that make me happy:

– goofing around with the guys playing poker in the wee hours of the morning
– praying with someone when their down
– making friends laugh
– eating cheap mexican food
– talking to people in oklahoma
– dodgeball
– good ankles and feet that don’t hurt
– the dedication all the guys in this housing group have
– goofing around at the waterfrong with some of my guys from last year
– …and the girls that purposely walked away from me every time I was around them because Taylor told them “that kid in the maroon jacket thinks you’re really cute”

Life isn’t all that bad. 🙂

DANGIT!

So no less than 6 weeks after I sprained my foot and 3 days after my roommate sprained his ankle, I did the exact same thing as he did in the exact same way.

So back to the crutch, friends. ARGH.

Courtship and Marriage paper

As I was writing this paper, it reminded me of a LiveJournal entry. So here is the uncut, unedited Courtship and Marriage paper I wrote… enjoy!

Sitting on the shelf above me is a black, spiral bound notebook. Unassuming in design, it stays here at school until every once in awhile I am able to open it up and look inside. Inside its covers are years of poetry, prose, and letters written to my future wife. Every page shows her that even since I was eighteen I have been thinking of her and preparing my heart for her. Without that dedication, our marriage would not be able to stand tall through all of the difficulties this world brings. And now, with Courtship and Marriage and this paper, I have had more of an opportunity to think about what it means to be dedicated to my future wife – to look at what I truly want in a marriage, what problems might come up, and how I can help to fix them. Throughout all of it, there is no doubt in my mind that there will be a dedication beyond what we have on this earth – even up to heaven.

In our current American society, it is more important than ever to go into the covenant of marriage with a set of ideals and to know what you expect out of the union. Going into the relationship without it can prove to make it quite difficult to navigate through the difficult times. As I’ve grown and matured, I’ve been able to see things in myself that I help to define what I think a marriage should be like. First and foremost, I see marriage to be pointless without putting God as the first priority in both my life and my wife’s. As important as my wife is, and in fact will be the second priority in my life, our marriage is certain to fall to pieces if we don’t set our standards to Christ’s and not the world’s. The Biblical basis for this comes from the Ten Commandments, where God declares “You shall have no other gods before Me” (NASB, Ex 20:3). It is part of our fallen human nature to want to put idolize something, especially when it’s right in front of us. And so it serves to reason that if you have the one person you absolutely love over anything else in the world, you would tend to put him or her above everyone else. However, my spouse, like me, is imperfect. She will make mistakes, and will not always make the best choices. If I allow myself put her over God, I’m guaranteed to be disappointed. Also, without the Father at the helm of our relationship, my wife and I have a greater chance to be tossed in the storms of life. Life is not always easy and it often causes couples who were close in the beginning of their marriage to walk away from it later disappointed and dejected, disenchanted about the marriage by the world. In the Abundant Living Seminar, it is mentioned that “it is imperative that a couple’s focus and goals be on the Lord. The closer they each get to the Lord, the closer they will be drawn to one another in spirit” (Authority and Marriage, 13). Without making sure that our emphasis is on a relationship that glorifies God first, my wife and are losing so much of what can be an amazing marriage that is beyond her and me.

Secondly, here on earth, I see a marriage as a partnership. The word, taken from the Anglo-French word coparcener, means to be a joint heir (Merriam-Webster Online). Personally, I find that to be the best way to describe my marriage. We have been given by God a reward – each other – and get to be heirs to all that comes with the blessing. As a result, we have to work together to be guardians of the reward and prove ourselves worthy. This means different things for each of us in our roles, but means we both have an incredible amount of responsibility to God and each other, and an equal say in how we can have the marriage run as smoothly as possible.
As the husband, I feel my role is best summarized by being the ambassador of my wife, family, and God. An ambassador is an individual who represents his domain to the outside world at the behest of the rest of the people living with him. He seeks to bring good tidings about his domain to foreign dignitaries, and works to bring peace to each side so that it is possible to forge long term relationships. He never turns his back on his own country or disrespects his country, even if it means turning his back on someone else. In the same way, I as the husband must be the representative of my family to the outside world and show them what it is to be an Anderson. In all circumstances, I need to be loyal and loving to my wife, and never once bad mouth her in front of others (Thrasher, Marriage Responsibilities, October 18). When something tries to infiltrate my family to hurt it, it is my job to stand in its way and if I have to, to take the family away from it in order to protect it. In the domain of marriage, I am its representative.
My wife, on the other hand, could be thought of as the president of the domain. She is the benevolent leader of the world on the inside. She oversees the needs of those in her territory, and will do everything in her power to provide for the needs of her people. She provides strength and encouragement to those who represent her, and gives them advice and help when they need it. When I am married, I see my wife as the one who is able to take gracious care of the home and all of the intricacies that entails. She provides the heart and soul – the encouragement for those who are downtrodden. As we go through the decisions of life, she gives me advice and help when I need it. She defines with her life what it is to be a part of the domain we have become heirs to. (Thrasher, Marriage Responsibilities, October 18)

Together as a couple, we have a continued responsibility to be proper caretakers of God’s gift of our marriage. As joint heirs, this means that we have to be sure to take care of each other as best we can. When one of us is down, we build each other up. We strive in all ways to encourage spiritual growth in each other, and help each other to make the best decisions in our lives outside the home. Without any of this, we are doomed to be taken out of the inheritance of love God has bestowed upon us.
Another one my core beliefs about marriage is the sacredness and importance of have a marriage that places an emphasis on having children. The two biggest things I want to do with my life are to be a husband and a father because I find no higher calling on this earth than those two professions. In Genesis, God gives Adam and Eve a mandate to Noah, saying to “be fruitful and increase in number; multiply on the earth and increase upon it” (NASB, Gen. 9:7). This is something I also take personally as a calling from God. To have the opportunity to take a life, dedicate it to God, and help it grow is something so exciting and fantastic to me. Obviously, there will be difficulties and worries – in my own family I know I have caused plenty gray hairs atop my parent’s heads. However, in the world we live in and the one we will bring our children into, there is and will continue to be a short supply of true and Godly individuals, and I will make it my pledge then as I do now to do all that is in my power to raise compassionate and caring children. Even more so, to be able to have a stable, loving household for a child to grow in is becoming rarer. Since 1960, the rate of out-of-wedlock births has gone from one in twenty to one in three (Bennett, 179). Being blessed to have had a loving mother and father raise me together, I can’t imagine not having the benefit of understanding what it is to live without both parents to teach me and would not want anything else for my children. However, even with all of that, I feel God has groomed me to be a father, and I look forward to starting a family with my wife.

Obviously when you live with someone there are bound to be problems. No one can ever expect to live in an imperfect world without them. I have learned, however, that the best way to solve problems is to anticipate them and deal with them before they get larger. Three particular problems come in my mind when thinking about marriage: jobs, and the ambition of being in the work world; money woes and how to be able to have enough money for kids, college and retirement; and personality differences.

My biggest fear when coming into marriage is being able to balance my home life and my job life and having my wife do the same while still having our ambitions realized. In my home growing up, my father worked everyday while my mother stayed home and raised my brother and me. It was so beneficial to have my mother at home when I returned from school and have a hug or encouragement waiting for me. I have always believed that a mother can do a much better job than a father when tending to the day-to-day needs of a child. Her warm touch and gentle spirit make her a better candidate to clean a scraped knee and kiss the pain away than a man’s more “There-is-a-problem-now-I-need-to-find-a-solution” attitude. This even proves out in the real world: Constance Hardesty of Youth and Society reported that:

Males who, during childhood, had a mother who worked fulltime as a homemaker reported greater orientation toward employment. Sons who reported that their fathers spent enough time with them in their childhood had greater orientation toward employment. Finally, young adult men who reported a greater desire to imitate their fathers reported a higher orientation to employment. (283-297)

In essence, those sons who had a father who was working and a mother who stayed at home were more likely to strive for success. That being said, the chances of me finding someone to marry either in my undergraduate or post-graduate collegiate life is very good. And it seems that it would be frivolous for my wife to spend all of that time in college and not be able to achieve whatever she wanted to do before meeting me. I would feel very guilty if after all of her studies and her desire to go out and work was extinguished just because I decided what was best for the family. However, if she does not want to stay at home when we have younger children, we simply run the risk of having children who don’t feel nearly as attached to the family, spending time back and forth in daycare and homecare.
The best way to anticipate this problem before it occurs is to talk to my fiancée frankly before we choose to get married. It is important to have a clear understanding about what one expects about marriage and how to deal with each other’s desires. Through the discretion process, I plan to make one of my biggest priorities to find a woman who shares the same attitude I do concerning a mother staying at home, because it’s much easier to share a vision that it is to try to change someone’s mind when they’ve had it made up already.

Secondly, another of my concerns is money and how to have enough to do everything we need to do as a family. Money is one of the things that most couples argue about – in fact; about 50 percent of problems in a marriage have something to do with money (Hendricks, 111). Without money, it is increasingly difficult to do much in this world. When I get married, I want to be sure that I can fully provide for my family’s needs. This obviously includes basic staples such as money for food and shelter, but even from the start of our marriage, I want to be sure to have the money to support my children through college later in life, and to start having money for retirement. Retirement alone will cost a significant amount of money. Assuming 7.5 percent interest, it will take $2,206,509 of today’s current dollars to be able to spend $1,000 a week in retirement (Retirement Calculators). And with trying to balance all of that on just one income makes it even more daunting. However, even with all of the frightening truth about having enough money, the solution is simple – being willing to say no to myself in order to save for later. Budgeting my money even before I’m married will help me have more money to work with in the future. Indeed, it gets more and more difficult to save money with more and more mouths to feel and people to take care of. Thinking ahead allows for when it’s just me to forgo some of my expendable income for the sake of taking care of a family in the future.

The last major problem I envision is dealing with the differences in personality that inevitably rise out of living with someone else. The simplest way of dealing with this issue is to become a student of yourself and your mate and to learn how best to treat each other. For example, I have taken a lot of time to learn about myself as it relates to the Myers-Briggs test. I am an ENFP. This means I am an individual who looks at life as one exciting experience and needs to experience it for all it’s worth in an authentic manner (Kiersey 156). This floods into my relationships as well, being someone who strives to bring the best out of others and to enjoy my partner through motivation and inspiration (Personality Page). However, even with all of those good things there are things which I don’t do very well. I have a major issue with finishing a project once I start it. Always on the lookout for something newer and more exciting, I tend to go for that rather than finishing what I already started (Personality Page). Knowing these things not only helps me try to grow and to learn how to, in this example, stick to whatever project I am on, but also to find someone who will help me to be an individual who will stay on topic and encourage me to stay focused in life. In the end, having different personalities can be the biggest blessing in a marriage, but only when husband and wife appreciate each other for them.

I realize even now that marriage will not be perfect – with two imperfect people I can’t expect it to be. However, I feel that even with all of the problems that may occur God put my wife and me together for a reason, a reason which should never be broken by divorce. There are countless verses that support this, but even with all of that, I think it’s just a waste. If I am going to spend countless hours, a large portion of my heart, and significant amounts of money on the person that I believe more truly than anyone else to be the person I want to spend all of eternity with, why would I be silly enough to break it off after the goal was accomplished? More than anything, divorce shows a lack of preparation in the front end of a relationship, and a hope that it will just all fall into place after the wedding.

I went to Burger King yesterday in the Outlets for dinner. As I was waiting for my order, I overheard two women working behind the counter talking about relationships:

“I don’t need a man to keep me satisfied!” yelled the manager.
“Wait, aren’t you married?” returned the other woman.
“Oh, that’s just out of convenience.”
“Yeah, for cheaper taxes and better care insurance rates, right?”
“Exactly.”

That’s the type of marriage I want to avoid. The degradation of one of God’s more sacred gifts reduced to nothing but a tax shelter. But yet, that is simply the way our world is going. We look for convenience and when it does not work, we choose to go our separate ways. As I have had a chance to think about what I want my marriage to be, it has allowed me to think about being the man who will do all he can to treat and love my wife as a friend, lover, and indeed an extension of myself. Though there will be problems, I want to work as hard as I can to work with her and go through them together to make us stronger and closer. Because when it comes right down to it, I see my Savior in my future wife’s eyes, not dollars.