Posts tagged marriage
Bluebeard’s Last Wife

In the Bluebeard fairy tale, which enjoys variants across time and cultures, a boorish, rich, and mysterious man with a bluish countenance woos and takes several wives. After each whirlwind courtship and marriage, the new wife is given a key with which to breach a forbidden room. She’s instructed not to, but does so anyway, and discovers carnage; the bodies of Bluebeard’s previous wives whom he has beheaded, chopped to pieces, and/or hung from rafters or hooks.

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Emptied

That late-February day I checked me and the triplets into labor and delivery, it snowed six or seven inches, the world outside our room on the high-risk floor like a green screen, blank and full of possibility. Chad and I paid little attention to it—to its icy chill and constant shower of white—once we were inside the clinical ten-by-ten square room where we’d become parents.

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I Knew He Was Broken and I Married Him Because of It

During our engagement, his adoptive mother asked me why I was committing to a broken man. But that came later. At seventeen, I had only just fallen in love with Donald and was miserable about leaving him behind for a three-week trip to Europe with my mother and sister. I consoled myself by buying postcards in each new town, and writing “I love you” in the local language: “Jeg elsker deg” from Oslo. “Jeg elsker dig” from Copenhagan. “Jeg älskar dig” from Stockholm.

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There Is a Way Out

I sit in a local playground—small and fenced in, exclusive. This playground lies at the center of a larger park. This larger park, preserved by money from concrete and development, exists in the middle of an expensive neighborhood. A neighborhood known for its magnificent nature, its trails and hills, creeks and reservoir, as well as its schools, rich with funding and investment.

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When I Danced With a Wedding Crasher

Recently, my aunt met a good man and they got married. My family and I made the long trek down to Florida for the joyous event. We got to the hotel just hours before the rehearsal dinner and after a flurry of hurried preparation, we met with the family. As with most family reunions when you’re young, you tend to answer the same questions about your love life, college, and what your plans are for the future.

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