Making ourselves a perfect fit in marriage
Orson Scott Card
Even in the church, we postpone marriage later and later, as if it were a particularly unpleasant dental appointment. There's so much to do first — we have to "find out who we are." We have to get our careers established. We have to prove we're successful.
I had a taste of that myself when I got married back in 1977. I had sold my first novel and wanted to get it finished and delivered ... before I got married. So I was just a few minutes late getting to the temple because I had to finish photocopying that manuscript and get it into the mail.
What was I thinking? That it would somehow be better if my wife knew for sure that she was not part of my career as a writer?
That's such a silly mistake — that we must or even can "find ourselves" before we've made that lifelong (or longer) commitment.
Here's why it's a mistake: We don't ever "find" ourselves. Instead, in marriage, we make ourselves.
No, we make each other — as a joint project. We turn ourselves into a perfect fit. Our self is the marriage, and our part in it. There is no "I" without the "we."
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