on marriage

ellen cheng
Feb 14
18 min read

The lamb leads itself to slaughter, and the woman plans her wedding.

There are many details to consider before the big day – invites. Menus. Flowers. Dresses. The man follows her orders like a headless goose, and he gives as much care to the event as if it were a dinner reservation with a friend. As long as it’s not too expensive is his daily mantra. Thankfully, everything but the rehearsal dinner is paid for by the family of the bride – it’s almost like a modern dowry of sorts.

As the Big Day inches closer, the to-do list never seems to end; every detail must be meticulously planned, for this is the climax, the overture, what every day of her life has led up to … the beginning, and the ending … the wedding day, and salvation.

In a seemingly different planet, the man counts his days as a ‘free’ man. There are only so many days left before his relationship is minted by law and he is chained to his levittown suburban neighborhood. There are only so many days until his only reprieve from his bridezilla wife is walking the golden retriever and hitting the golf course with The Boys. His bachelor party marks his last days of freedom – there must be strippers and hookers, because what else are women, but bodies? Now he is a married man, and he only gets one.

On the day of the wedding, the bride is sent down the aisle by her father, all gauze and lace and white. People rise as she floats down the aisle, clapping and staring, and she can’t help but feel a swell of pride – she has shown these people that there is something right about her, because she is chosen. She subverts a life of loneliness as her father gifts her away like a prized jewelry piece; she excitedly takes the groom’s last name, and she sheds all reminders of her former life – she is simply trading one man’s last name for another.

Months and months of deliberations, planning, hysteria and excitement have culminated into this very moment – this moment where finally, she can look into the eyes of her prince, seal their love with a kiss, and spend the rest of her days working (because there are no gold diggers around here), taking care of the children, the dog, and the man himself. Paradise.

I recognize that not all marriages go this way. It is a gross generalization of sorts, but it is what has been packaged and delivered to us since we were born. Marriage has long been taught as a woman’s greatest achievement and as a man’s necessary evil. It is a rite of passage, and if you don’t get to experience it, then you might as well shun yourself to the shadows of society. The world is made for two, and any woman aged past 30 without a spouse must be a witch.

It saddens me that marriage is perhaps the one day where people are obliged to fly in and celebrate you. It makes sense why everyone looks forward to The Day – when else can you invite friends that you haven’t seen in years, where you can bring together every person in your life for good reason, and when else can you have multiple trips and weekends dedicated to yourself? I wish we could place the same amount of importance on other things in life – perhaps then The Day wouldn’t seem so necessary, as if not experiencing it means you have not lived.

I find marriage to be so fascinating because I knew nothing about it growing up. My parents were married in China, and they didn’t bring any wedding pictures with them to the States. All I know about the night is that they wore traditional Chinese outfits and my Dad got drunk for the very first time (there were no frat parties in Communist China). My parents immigrated from China to the US, and thus, there were no close family friends or relatives waiting to get married. Everything that I knew about marriage was gleaned from books, movies, TV shows, and fantastical daydreams with childhood friends. The Disney movies, YA novels and Taylor Swift songs all preached to me that one day, even I could be saved, and it would be in the arms of a dashing (white) prince that would understand me better than I understood myself.

I spent much of my tween and teen years miserable with confusion. Where is he? When will I meet him? I was half of a whole, and somewhere out there, my soulmate was stumbling around in the same blind daze. My heart seized with worry that maybe we would never find each other, and maybe … maybe I’m just gay, and I don’t even know it yet.

I poured my worries and frustrations into poems, songs, and books; I hungrily read romance novels as if they mirrored real life, I daydreamed to Taylor Swift songs with no abandon, and I even prayed to God sometimes (my family is not religious). Wherever he is, I hope he is well, my tween-self prayed, and I really, really hope we meet soon. I’m not sure how much longer I can wait. (I was 14).

I chased it until it all but ran from me. I dated, and with every boy that was just as confused as I was, I felt myself growing more and more disillusioned. The Disney Princess movies had not taught me how to deal with a situationship. What if Prince Charming waited five hours to Snapchat Cinderella back? Did she wait 10 hours? Or did she just Snapchat back immediately to seem ‘mature’?

This went on for a year or so, until finally, I was completely spent. I had reached a low and dark place, and I didn’t have the energy to go on. Dating could wait – I had to find myself first.

In that period, my mind began to drift to other things. So much of what I was doing didn’t make any sense. I wanted to believe in a soulmate, but what if my soulmate was in Antarctica? How would I ever meet them then? What if my soulmate was born in 1970 and had already died? Did Osama Bin Laden have a soulmate?

In those hours of frustration, I picked up a book recommendation from a friend – Bad Feminist by Roxanne Gay – to further understand myself. It was life changing, but it seemed to cause even more anxiety than it quelled. The book and subsequent others entirely deconstructed what it meant to be a woman – suddenly, the age-old checkboxes such as loving the color pink and caring about makeup were not enough to fill the definition anymore. If men didn’t exist, would I like flared jeans? Would I wear leggings to the gym? Would I keep my hair long, or would I buzz it all off out of practicality? Would I still wear makeup? Would I talk in a lower voice? Would I manspread on the train? Would I have picked up wrestling in highschool and joined the military (probably not)? Would I even care if I got married? If men weren’t to exist, who would I be?

The fact that I didn’t have an answer to this question caused me great distress. I read books and enrolled in classes, desperate to gain some kind of understanding. Unfortunately, I don’t think that there is an answer – to know myself outside the male gaze would require growing up in a non-patriarchal society, which would be impossible.

I decided that I would no longer subscribe to being anyone’s ‘better half’ – I didn’t need someone else to complete me. Thus, I began spending my time on myself rather than fixating on my future lover – I started reading and writing again, I made new friends, I tried a kickboxing class, I picked up pickleball with my friends, I started playing the piano again, and I just lived as I imagine many men do – without desperation for a relationship, but with complete satisfaction in my own livelihood.

I was so happy and so fulfilled this way – every thought centered around myself, my friends and my family. It begged the question, what could a relationship provide that my current life could not?

Around this time, a friend told me some advice that a professor had recently bestowed upon her: “Who you choose as your life partner is the most important decision that you’ll ever make in your life.”

I could hardly believe her. More important than my career and my finances? But over time, I have come to understand the true gravity of her words.

You’re lucky to experience a happy marriage, but you are damned if you experience a bad one. Marriage is not a nice outfit that you can try on and throw out when it is out of fashion – it completely alters your life, especially if there are kids in the picture. It is a legal union of two people, and there are words like alimony and palimony. They could take the dog. Your spouse inherits your parents’ belongings if you pass away. This other person can decide whether you live or die if you yourself are unable to. They can choose between your life or your child’s, if there is such a choice. They could choose to make your life a living hell if you were to separate. And, until just a few decades ago, they could rape you, and it was not a crime.

Marriage is a lifelong contract. It is not a contract on an asset, but on you as a person, and it is perhaps the only contract where you will sign personal rights away.

The institution of marriage is about 4,350 years old, and its roots are not romantic. It was never about love – it was utilized to guarantee that a man’s children were his biological heirs (hence the importance of wedding a virgin) so that property could be passed down and heirs could inherit leadership roles (PBS). In ancient Rome, marriage was seen as a “practical means to a sensible end” in order to transfer “property, wealth, rights, responsibilities and alliances” (The Week). Once a woman was wed to a man, she became his personal property as well.

Further, marriage was not a religious act – in fact, it was only embraced by the church in the colonies in the mid-1600s. The Pilgrims were married by a governor and marriage was treated as a civil act.

So, where did the love come from? There are many theories – the Enlightenment embracing personal autonomy, capitalism, the Romantic Movement – but I subscribe to the belief that romance, as a genre, was born out of survival. Until 1974, women could not open a credit and could not get mortgages without a male co-signer. She could not own property independently, sign contracts or refuse sex (marital rape exemptions existed in the US until 1993). Her primary role was to cook, clean, take care of the kids, take care of the husband, manage finances, and more. While the man assumed the more “backbreaking” work of going to a 9-5, the woman’s workday never ended. Domestic abuse was prevalent, and women frequently powdered over their bruises with makeup while many resorted to alcohol or Valium.

Women only gained the independent right to divorce in the US in 1969 with California’s no-fault divorce law, which removed the need to prove fault, such as adultery or cruelty, in order to leave a marriage (this law is now currently being challenged by The Heritage Foundation in order to bring back ‘true American values'). This act, coupled with the 1974 Equal Credit Opportunity Act (which finally allowed women to open their own credit lines), resulted in a spike in divorce rates. But please, do tell me how relationships were better in the 50s because the divorce rate was so low!

I struggle to find anything romantic about a relationship where one party is owned by another. It’s much easier to survive in such conditions thinking that his lack of emotional intelligence ‘doesn’t mean he’s not a good man at heart’, his job is actually harder; he is ‘allowing’ you to be the housewife because he is ‘providing’, and his groping and his constant assault are just his ‘desire.’ (And shouldn’t you give in sometimes, anyways? He’s just a man, and he has needs!)

I was taught to idolize many things as ‘romantic’, such as: a man that continues to chase you despite you repeatedly saying ‘no’ is ‘showing effort’ (‘she is just playing hard-to-get,’ ‘she does like you deep down’), a man that always wants to fuck just finds you sexy (‘he’s just really into you!’, ‘you’re desirable’), an angry man is sexy (i.e., brawls, fights, sweat, muscles), a man who is territorial just loves you so (‘I don’t want you to wear that because I am protecting you’), and more … but I now recognize it as a deluded acceptance by women who saw no way out. Perhaps it was easier for the songbird to call the cage protection than to admit it was trapped.

The institution of marriage as it stands today has been incredibly glamorized in comparison to its humble beginnings, and I wonder if we have reclaimed our violent history through today's celebrations or whether we are just reinforcing an outdated tradition. The provider/breadwinner man is deconstructing as we know it, and that terrifies a lot of men, and a lot of women, too. There are a lot of privileges that come with such a man – one only needs to bring back a salary to be absolutely coddled for their rest of their lives. And there seems to be a lot to lose for women that have subscribed to this kind of man, too – for if this man was never required, they may not have needed to endure so much.

When I zoom out on what a marriage entails – outside of the terms and conditions – I find it simply amazing that we can find life partners at all. We change so much in a year, let alone a decade – I have outgrown so many friends, and somehow, my life partner will supposedly grow and change with me in the same direction. You need similar hobbies and things to do together. You need similar finances and spending habits. Your in-laws have to get along with each other and with you – it is not a nice-to-have. You have to have similar living habits. Your partner has to be the one to support you through your parents’ passing. If you have a child, your partner better be able to take care of the child even without your help. And on top of all of that, you have to stay attracted to them as you grow and change, both inwardly and outwardly.

When the excitement fades, reality seeps in: compatibility is not simply love and lust; it is making sure your partner has a good credit score, has a stable job, can take care of themselves and you and a child and a pet if you so may choose … has to be your age, also single when you’re single, in the same city as you … really, when you narrow it all down, marriage is genuinely a miracle.

It seems that some people get married to ensure their partner can’t leave. Marriage is the final destination – the large party, the extravaganzas and the court documents make separation all the more difficult – but to put it quite simply, there is nothing less romantic than forcing someone to be with you. You hate each other, but you are afraid to be without each other. You may not have learned who you are outside of a relationship, and sitting with that thought is terrifying. And so, each day passes with the hope that things will miraculously change.

This causes a terrible cycle – children are born into unhappy households and are not shown what a healthy relationship should look like, and they, too, search for chaos because that is all that they know. Generations can continue this way, with each promising the next that a relationship is needed – it is required – or else, what was all this sacrifice for?

My biggest fear is as follows: I groggily wake up in a bed that I share with my husband, annoyed that I wasn’t able to get a proper night’s sleep because every dream was interrupted by a loud snore. My husband remains asleep as I start to get ready for the day – it is no use trying to wake him. I do not have time to wash my face before the child opens its eyes and begins to scream and cry. As if on signal, I dash to the nursery, cradle the child in my arms, beg it to stop making noise, and I begin to haphazardly throw some breakfast together. Almost as if on cue, my husband decides to enter the kitchen when breakfast is done. He scarfs it down and quickly changes and runs out the door, muttering something about being late for a meeting. I wash all our dishes, as I have picked up a second job as a maid. I quickly get ready for my own job and drive the child to daycare, where the teacher is cross with me because I am running late. She asks me how my husband is doing – he is such a good man for bringing the child to daycare on Mondays! None of the other husbands ever care to do so.

I’m a bit sad when the workday is over, because I don’t want to go home. However, today, my husband has graciously offered to pick up the child from daycare. I meet them back at home, hopeful that he has miraculously learned how to cook. He has made some sort of slop, like some sort of punishment for me asking him will you please cook dinner, just this one time? I throw the slop in the trash, curse at my husband, check to make sure the baby is still breathing (my husband has a habit of wandering off, especially when the game is on), and start cooking dinner. The baby screams and wails because it is hungry; my husband asks me how in the world I expected that he could cook dinner. Even better, he has left every kitchen utensil he has used to make the slop in the sink (“I tried to cook, so shouldn’t you clean?”). He slinks off to gamble or play video games or work out while I make us all dinner, still bone-tired from a day of work. I think, why did I expect him to cook, anyways? At least he tried with the slop.

The child keeps screeching until it is silenced with dinner. My husband reappears as I am setting the table, fresh from a workout. While my eye bags have darkened and the remnants of the birth have yet to leave my arms and my stomach, my husband is toned and shiny from all the exercise that he gets to fit in throughout the week. As he gobbles up dinner without so much as a ’thank you,’ he makes a comment that maybe I should try to workout more, you know, for health purposes. I count to 10 in my head to make sure I don’t kill him. Tonight, he washes the dishes for once, and I almost cry with joy, just because he is washing the dishes for once. I think, he is such a good man for washing the dishes, and I love him. And then we put the child to sleep, and we go to bed, and he gets some sort of attitude when I tell him that no, I don’t want to have sex tonight, I have been holding the baby all night and I do not want to be touched. His body is hot under the covers, and I can’t fall asleep, and, still brimming with slight anger, I drift to sleep with my eyebrows furled, and my wrinkles deepen. It feels as if my own family is killing me. My friends all lead the same lives as I, but we have all convinced ourselves that this is what we have always wished for.

Years later, when I am no longer young and tight and fit, my husband cheats on me with a girl that is younger, tighter and fitter. He says he just fell out of love.

I am forced to see him at least a couple times a month for the rest of my life, because now we are coparenting. I also have to pay him for child support, because I was the breadwinner.

I went to China, and the amount of invisible labor done by my aunts was striking.

Growing up, my father did most of the housework, but being in China was like stepping into another world. My aunts knew how to do everything without being asked, whether it was preparing tea, booking dinner reservations, setting the table, calling a taxi … they were the best personal maids that I’d ever seen. And they did all of this without a word, as if they could read their husband’s minds. Their movements were quick and automatic, and I briefly wondered if they were programmed.

I watched my uncles lay back without lifting a finger and then proceed to make a joke at my aunt’s expense. My aunt laughed it off naturally, as if we were joking about the weather.

Later, my aunt told me that a woman’s most important thing in life is to be a wife. It amazes me that our mothers and aunts often pressure us to protect a system that actively suppresses them.

My aunts and uncles are from another time - they were born before China was open to outside investments, when roads were still made of dirt and only one person in the village had a TV. I understand that they represent a patriarchal extreme, but this invisible labor seems to transcend geographical borders, as if it is passed down genetically.

I can only mentally prepare myself for the future rifts that will occur when I once again fail to bring home a boyfriend in my 30s. I’m sure it will cause great distress for my aunts; however, I don’t know how to explain to them that the survival tactics that they are trying to pass down no longer translate.

In the wake of the overturn of Roe v. Wade, femicides and the rise of alpha male podcasts, I am dumbfounded when society asks why people are waiting to marry and why the birth rate has been dropping. It is not a ‘liberal issue’ – divorce rates in the South are much higher than divorce rates in the North (Census Bureau). I think if I could be the father, then I, too, would want nothing more than to be a husband – it derisks my life from almost every standpoint. I get a therapist, a maid, a cook, a caretaker, a second income, a babysitter, a best friend, and someone to fuck, all in one, for free.

I’m also confused, because I thought men loathed the idea of marriage – no boy is brought up dreaming about what tux they will wear on their wedding day or pushed to read romance novels from a young age. Most men scoff at romance movies to this day. It seems that women are starting to have the same appetite for marriage as men do, but for some reason, that’s a big problem. Why should we crave relationships with men that seemingly don’t even want one themselves? Am I to believe that every single boy is also brought up as a romantic, or is it an uncomfortable realization that you cannot get this amazing, five-for-one deal any longer?

I think marriage, if built on a solid foundation, is a beautiful privilege, and one that I would be very lucky to experience. However, until the day that we peel back the layers of the patriarchy and allow men to be emotional and feminine without being labeled as homosexual, until women’s health, pain and deaths are taken seriously, and until women are seen as autonomous individuals with more to offer than partnership and a womb, I think we will remain where we are today, with a generation of high-achieving lover girls that have a subconscious hope for love, but a sobering understanding that they may not get so lucky.

I have been biding my time in posting this, simply because despite all my rage against the institution of marriage, I can’t say that it hasn’t crossed my mind. I’ve never been one to have Pinterest boards of wedding dresses, but I haven’t ignored all conversations on what kind of diamond cut do we want, and who would we invite to our wedding? I’ve dated boys and tearfully imagined walking down the aisle to them, and our wedding is on some grassy cliff overlooking the ocean, and the sun is high and the waves are glittering.

There is a small voice in the back of my mind that tells me that I need a boyfriend at the most random times. The voice feels foreign, like it’s an intruder. Sometimes, it works, and I seriously consider downloading Hinge for 10 minutes. However, my life is so busy that I’m not sure I have the time for a serious relationship right now, and I’m not sure I need one, either.

I’ve decided that this voice is an old remnant of a patriarchal upbringing; it’s dust and cobwebs left in the corners of my mind that I will never fully be able to cleanse. It has been imprinted upon me as a child, with every girls’ movie, TV show and book that never failed to have a love interest, when any friend or teacher told me that a boy who was mean to me or hurt me secretly liked me, to when I was forced to sit next to misbehaving boys so that I knew, from a very young age, that my role was to fix them.

I am constantly fighting an onslaught of messaging that my life as a woman would be much better if I was taking care of a man. These lessons are intergenerational, and I wouldn’t be surprised if at this point, they are genetic. Only the most subservient, patient, emotionally aware, kind, and obedient women could have survived until this day – others were cast aside by society or left to rot in brothels or on a stake. We have been domesticated, and no knows our origin.

I have always been a romantic, and I don’t think that will ever leave me. I have chased love as if it were something that I could catch, but it is slippery, and it comes and goes as it pleases.

All I know is that my current life – my life that I spend with my friends, my family and myself – is fulfilling enough. I invest in myself and the people around me, and a romantic partnership becomes an afterthought. I will welcome it with open arms if it happens, but I refuse to live my life in a state of longing.

Make friends. Do the things you love. Exist, and enjoy it… and I honestly believe that it will find you. Whether we die in the arms of someone or not, no one can escape love – you just have to hope that you will be ready for it when it comes.

There is no more waiting and there is no more yearning, for I already have the love that I’ve always dreamed of.