The other day I was thinking back to when my 9 year old was about 3 and we were reading a book about Cinderella and the end said, "And they lived happily ever after." My daughter looked at me and said, "Mama, do you know why they lived happily ever after? Them didn't have no children.". Of course we thought this was absolutely hilarious and realized that in no princess story ever has a child made an appearance. Now 6 years later and we still laugh about her observation.
As it normally does when I think about one thing something else will come to mind, which leads me to a whole idea swimming around in my head. I begin to think about what Happily ever after means and if in fact it does exist.
According to http://dictionary.reference.com the phrase means:
Spend the rest of one's life in happiness, as in In her romantic novels the hero and heroine end up marrying and then live happily ever after. This hyperbolic phrase ends many fairy tales. [Mid-1800s ]
Now that we see what the dictionary has to say, I think we can all agree that is what we thought the phrase meant. I know as a little girl I dreamed of my Prince Charming, my Knight in Shining Armor sweeping me off my feet. I imagined a life full of happiness and joy. A home with my husband, children and a dog. I imagined that everything would be peachy king and that all would always be happy and joyful.
Can I just say that married life was a bit of a shock!!
I am not trying to say that I am not happy, I am very happy in my marriage and my life. What I am saying is that the fairy tale life I always dreamed off is in fact that, a fairy tale. There is no such thing as a life with only joy and happiness, that type of life is only a dream. Life is full trouble anyway and when you marry/have a family that gives you more people with problems. There will always be ups and downs, like a roller coaster and we have just have to hang on and try our best to enjoy the ride.
I think that some young people marry, expect everything to be perfect and when trouble comes up they just don't know how to handle it.
We go through so much in life, more as we get older and closer to others. Marriage does add it's set of problems, but also gives us someone to go through those problems with. The last five years of my marriage have been clouded with difficulties; sickness, sorrow, grief. My husband and I have had to deal with so much and at one point I thought we were not going to make it. In fact a lesser man, one who just couldn't handle my depression, would have left me, but he didn't. He stuck it out, loved me, supported me and prayed for me. I guess he really has been my "Knight in shining armor".
Fairy tale marriages do not exist, but we can and have to work to make our marriages as happy as possible. When it comes to the ending of those fairy tale stories, I guess what we should actually say is, "And they lived Happily Ever After, (for the most part.)".
"That's 'my two cents worth', what's yours?
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