Shacking Up

Uncertainty--shacking up--uncertainty--shacking up.  Hmm, now those two words just fit together like a nice little puzzle.

Uncertainty means that something is not precisely known or fixed; that’s a great way to describe shacking up!  Here’s another part of the definition: “not confident.”  Now, you know I’m talking about you and your despicable lifestyle.  Unstable, unreliable, and undependable!  Those definitions fit what shacking up will offer you.

Instability is a good word for the kind of life you will live.  When I told my shackup honey bunches that I would be moving out if we didn’t get married, my comment was met with silence--that was not a good sign.  You don’t think that felt unstable to me?  You don’t think that felt unreliable and undependable?  Most of all, we were not on the same page.

You don’t think it scared me so bad that I got mood swings that were unexplainable (at least to him)?  The simple truth is, they weren’t for no reason; they were happening because of the fear and dread I had that after eight years there would be no marriage.  I wanted badly to push it so far down inside me that I wouldn’t see it for what it truly was...convenient for him.

There is no worse feeling than knowing that the person you’re just living with is undependable.  When you choose shacking up, it’s like you’re being test-driven, and if they don’t like the way it feels well--next.  You’re out of luck, and your children watched with their beautiful, innocent eyes while you lost your morals.  I grieve for those children.  I got that sinking feeling like I knew he wasn’t going to stop me from moving out, and I wasn’t sure he was going to marry me either!  So then what do I do?  You can’t rely on whether your life with this person will be permanent one day or off the next.  I know what you’re thinking right now.  “Well, marriages can be that way too!” Okay, you’re right.  Nowadays, that is true, but it shouldn’t be.  It wasn’t that long ago in the past when people stuck it out and just worked at it.  That “piece of paper” meant something.  It wasn’t just a piece of paper, it was a contract, a sacred vow taken in front of God, your family, and your friends that you would stick it out.

The strength of society depends on the strength of the family.  Our ideals will make or break us as a civilization.  I looked up the word ideal and here is the definition: “A conception of something in its perfection.  An ultimate aim.  Regarded as perfect.” In the book, Jews, God, and History, by Max Dimont, it states that three highly regarded philosophers make an observation that civilization is not a series of isolated happenings but a flow of events having continuity.  Each civilization follows a more or less predictable pattern.  They think each civilization is a living being, which, like a human being, has an infancy, adolescence, maturity, old age, and death.  How long a civilization lasts depends upon the ideas and IDEALS by which that civilization lives.  They say that civilizations go through the spring of early origins, mature into the summer of their greatest physical achievement, grow into the autumn of great intellectual heights, decline into the winter of their civilization, and finally die.