"If you love it you should have put a ring on it"

[mindstalk]

Does that mean Sauron was full of love? >-)

Congrats to a couple friends getting engaged. But "do we need a ring?" made me reflect on the extremes of my vicarious experience:

Friends 1&2: married at the shockingly early (for my social circle) age of 22, still together 14 years later, despite much military-imposed separation. Eloped to the LA courthouse with negative fanfare ("Oh, uh, we got married"); I don't know if there even is a ring.

College semi-friends: spent about a year on wedding preparations, down to having bridesmaids make their dresses by hand. Divorced badly 8 months after the wedding.

Huh, for that matter, I'm not sure my parents had any rings (well, wedding rings; I know my mother wore a non-standard ring or two), and they did the courthouse thing, and were together for... well, I don't know when they got married vs. living together, but let's say 35 years on the low end.

I figure exactly one LJ friend will grok my choice of userpic.

Comments

[lindseykuper]

Nope, wasn't planning to change my name!

Yeah, I think we'll be closer to the "elope to LA" end of the spectrum than the "spend a year making gowns by hand" end, but we'll see.

[mindstalk.livejournal.com]

We were all living in Pasadena at the time, so "elope to LA" represents truly least effort. Not sure why Pasadena courthouse didn't suffice... then again, I got called to jury duty in LA itself from Pasadena (federal court? don't know).

[mlc23.livejournal.com]

It was Pasadena courthouse (fit in between traffic court no less)! But you had to go to LA for the marriage certificate.