With the Heidi Klum/Seal breakup, I got to thinking. The old bromide says it should be harder to get married than to get divorced — and I must wholeheartedly agree. The same amount of legal wrangling and energy expended on gay marriage should be allotted to creating hurdles for any marriage, shouldn't it? The collateral damage of a broken marriage — gay, straight or yet to be devised — is monumental.
Ask any kid or adult from a home where the wheels fell off mom and dad's marriage. Not one ever says, gee the divorce was great! Failed marriages are costly in every imaginable way — emotionally, financially, log-jamming courts - the sheer waste of time is tragic.
The government should stay out of our personal lives - but they should require a similar screening process for marriage as for a driver's license, no? The risk of an unskilled driver is ruined lives. Same for mismatched spouses. In fact, unless there's a fatality or maiming, the blowback from the broken marriage is more devastating than an ordinary car wreck.
So many couples marry for the wrong reasons. Usually they are quite aware they're on a course to disaster and forge ahead anyway. I've known several engaged couples who were in relationship counseling. Is there a more vivid, waving, flaming red-flag than that? People often marry wrong simply because they think it's easier - easier than being single, easier than searching for the right mate, easier than living alone.
Some religions make at least a cursory attempt at helping couples do some pre-nuptial evaluation. The government only asks for proof of age, a fee, a pulse and it's a done deal. Once the marriage craters, the religions are not involved at all and the government really gets involved. None of it makes much sense, does it.
When Tony Bennett sang Marry Young, he was giving bad advice. About two-thirds of couples who marry at 24 or younger will divorce. Sinatra was doubly nuts when he crooned The Second Time Around, since 67% of second and 74% of third marriages end in divorce. Truly the triumph of hope over experience.
The Klum/Seal (is that his first or last name?) breakup was announced with the usual publicist's claptrap: the deepest respect for one another throughout our relationship and continue to love each other very much, blah -blah, zamma - zamma, so much in love we must separate or risk spontaneous combustion! Puh-leaze.
Now some are blaming the rift on the Alpha Wife Syndrome, where milady's career dwarfs hubby's, igniting primeval resentments. Think Nick Lachey & Jessica Simpson or Sandra Bullock and Jesse James. Or maybe Sandra just wanted to retch each time he reached for her with his hands — tattooed "PAY UP SUCKER." That's ssssexy.
I couldn't locate any data for the divorce rate of unions berthed by Match.com or eharmony. I suspect if their odds of marital success were any better than pheromones and sappy love songs, they'd trumpet the stats in their commercials.
Maybe some geek will reverse engineer an app from billions of pages of divorce documents and isolate 10 questions that will irrefutably determine compatibility. Next time you walk into that crowded room and lock orbs with Mr. or Miss right, don't even speak. Simply exchange smart phones loaded with the Don't Be A Sap App, and answer the 10 queries of romantic destiny. If fewer than 7 sync up, walk away with your phone, your dignity and your undamaged life.