ANyone else think that long engagements are silly?

In My Humble Opinion
21

I think relationships move at different paces. I know some people who are engaged and married so quickly it makes my head spin, but it seems to work for them. I tend to move at a much more conservative pace, and luckily my SO moves at about the same pace, so we’re very compatible in that way. Right now we’re in a LDR, next we are going to live in the same metropolitan area, but we don’t plan to live together, at least not right away. We’ve both lived alone a long time and don’t want to stress out the relationship too much. A good friend of mine assumed we were going to move in together right away when he moved to Chicago and was quite surprised when I told her we weren’t.

So my point is that no, I don’t think long engagements are silly, exactly, because really, I generally don’t know the intimate details of why any relationship moves at the pace it does. I may wonder “wow, they’re not married yet” but I assume they have their reasons. If they’re good friends, I’ll probably know the reasons. I know a couple of people at work who have been engaged for a very long time (not to each other), and though I think it’s a little odd, I wouldn’t describe it as silly.

22

Stonebow, how did it affect our families when I began to wear that diamond? I mean, what was different than if we had just continued to date for the next two years?

23

ArrrMatey, how old is this person that he’s been engaged to your friend for 7 years and is still living in his parents’ house? That right there sounds really strange to me.

24

B and I have been engaged since November. We will almost certainly not get married before next June. I asked her to marry me because I wanted (and still want) to marry her, but I didn’t and don’t have a specific date in mind.

However, I have no plans to reneg on that promise and neither does she. We are having a long engagement partly because there is no need to get married right this second. Things feel fine as they are. We’re also dealing with a lot of school stuff right now, so the whole planning/getting married seems to both of us like an unnecessary amount of worrying to place on ourselves.

Meanwhile, we are living together. It’s giving both of us a very good indication of what life will be like once we make the bond between us set in stone and on paper, in addition to its current forms:)

And just IMO, one of the reasons there are more long engagements these days is that fewer people are in a “rush to get married so they can have sex”. There are fewer qualms and gossipy, hushed voices and more options for protection and birth control. That leads to longer engagements (and fewer, possibly, too).

25

Heh. I was engaged for about 24 hours. When it’s time, it’s time! :wink:

26

The Spouse and I got “officially” engaged in November of '95 and had our two ceremonies in May of '97. I don’t know if that’s exactly long, but it’s certainly over a year. We didn’t set a date for the wedding until somewhere around August of '96.

Part of the reason it took a while was because I was still finishing my last year of college when we got engaged, and there was no way I could deal with wedding plans and school at the same time. Part of it was that the jeweler who was making the engagement ring screwed it up twice (it was supposed to be done in Jan. of '96, and wasn’t ready until June), and we had to find another silversmith to make the wedding rings. And part of it was that the legal wedding was taking place in my hometown, since my parents were footing the lion’s share of the bill - so a lot of things had to be set up by phone, and things that would have taken one day in person took a week or two.

Now, this is with a largely homemade legal ceremony and an even less formal religious ceremony later. If I had done what my Belle grandmother would have really preferred and done the whole magnolias-‘n’-moonlight full shebang wedding with a guest list of 200 or so, it would have been fully two years from setting a date to wedding - it would have taken that long to get everything ready. I would find it very difficult to imagine being able to set up a wedding with all the bells and whistles in a single year - maybe if you had enough money you could manage it in eighteen months, but surely no shorter time!

Having said all that, if a couple has been engaged for something like five years and there are no signs of any sort of wedding planning going on, I might wonder what was up. One of the Spouse’s best friends and his SO did this for about three years, but then realized that they were pretty much common-law spouses at that point (this is Texas; we still do have common-law marriages on the books here), so they now present themselves as married, even though they never had a ceremony at all.

27

To be honest, when she got the ring is when my dad accepted that he could never have her for himself. :slight_smile:

But seriously, do your folks (always assuming folks are in the picture) treat every guy you bring home like he’s their son? That sounds emotionally taxing.

Engagment is a sign of impending family-ness. That’s not something you play around with.

of course, YMMV.

28

Oh, good point. But in that case, a long, indefinate engagement would be more concrete for the family.

:eek: Wow. That might fodder for a different thread.

29

I would think one reason might be-you really want to get married, but you just don’t have the money right away.

30

Or a place to live together, or like Contrary’s situation.

The trouble is, people like to know what’s happening. And if you get engaged, they want to know when the ceremony will be. Especially around here! They like to fit news into little categories like “Ethel’s daughter has graduated from high school” or “Bubba got promoted to Section Leader”. They don’t like things to be out there hanging.

They really don’t like being the last to know about something. So they keep this little tidbit “NinetyWt and Sweety have gotten engaged” hanging around in their minds so that when they get the first hint of a wedding date they can be the one to say" Oh - didn’t you know? They are getting married in October !!!" with a knowing nod and wink that shows they are in the loop. (Ya gotta love it here).

What annoys me is the ones who say “you haven’t set a date yet ?? What’s taking so long ??”

I just wanna slap those people.

31

I was giving my dad (age 89) a tour of the SDMB. He saw this thread and said “That guy is just trying to get into some gal’s panties.” He’s actually quite sharp for his age, but some old ideas die hard. :stuck_out_tongue:

32

I see no problem with long engagements… but of course there are some things that might indicate problems and show that they are never going to get married. Like the couple engaged for 7 years. That’s pushing it a little I think, c’mon if you haven’t even started planning at this point it’s time to take a good long look at why you are together. If it’s merely because you have been together so long… well I think it’s time to run far and fast.

Of course everyone has different ideas on how to work things. One of my friends was engaged, and they had planned to get married after they both finished college (it would have been probably 5 years from time of engagement to graduation) but I do know that she dumped him about 3 months ago… one year into college. I don’t know all her reasons but I can honestly say that I think it was a good decision for her. Sometimes it doesn’t work out.

Of course if I ever get engaged (maybe someday) I wouldn’t want to put it off for years, but I’d probably take at least 2 years to plan everything and whatnot considering my family will want the big church wedding. Unless I just elope which part of me thinks is the better idea.

33

Exactly.

I’ve perfected my reply when asked when we are getting married. I smile and say “We are aiming for October 10.”

If they push for more details, I just say I have an unresolved issue with the IRS that must be handled before we can get married.

If they push even more, well then they get the whole story. Can’t say I didn’t try to give them the short version :smiley:

34

Contrary, that’s my parents’ anniversary, actually. They’ve been married, oh, let’s see, almost, oh, 28 years.

Good luck, and I hope it all works out!

35

Thank you, Guin. I intended to marry Mr. Levins 4 1/2 years ago, but I decided against it because

a.) I didn’t want to go the JP’s office. I wanted, if not a huge traditional wedding, at least a celebration of some kind with friends and loved ones.

b.) I wanted my parents to be there. They didn’t like the idea that I was marrying an Evil Hispanic Guy (who’s a fifth generation Texan too, but you know these old-school West Texas racist theories die hard :rolleyes:) and they just about lost their mind when I told them I wanted to marry him. Threatened to disown me, the whole nine yards. I thought giving them time to get used to the idea was a good thing; I thought they’d get over it.

c.) We didn’t have the money for anything but the JP’s office; saving up for a wedding that no one is helping you pay for is a big deal, particularly when you don’t want to go into debt, or make foolish financial decisions, i.e., “Well, we need a new car but so what! I want a wedding more!”

So that’s why I’ve been “engaged” for 4 1/2 years…we’ve finally begun planning a spring wedding, in Vegas. Because you know, if you’re not going to be traditional, why not throw a hell of a party? :stuck_out_tongue:

Oh, and for those of you who may be curious, I told my mother we’d set a date, whether she planned on attending or not, b/c life’s too short and if she doesn’t want to be a part of my life, I’ll get over it. She didn’t talk to me for three months.

And just last Wednesday she suddenly changed her mind and said she’d go. Whether Dad goes is a whole other issue, but Mom has promised she’ll be there.

So I resent any implication that Mr. Levins and I aren’t “serious” about getting married, or that we lack commitment to each other; we’ve gone through hell to get here, and we never once thought that perhaps we were a bad idea. If anyone wants to raise an eyebrow b/c we’ve had such a long engagement, that’s their problem.

36

Long engagements are for weak willed, wishy washy fence sitters.

37

Riiiiiiight.

Clearly you read this thread all the way through.

38

Good grief. Why on earth would you even waste the time forming an opinion about the length of time someone is engaged? I’ve never looked at any friends or acquaintances and thought about whether they were committed based on how long they were engaged. None of my business.

For the record I can’t for the life of me remember how long I was actually engaged. I certainly don’t have an engagement ring which led to quite a few people being put out.

39

There’s a double-entendre, and possibly triple, in there somewhere, but I am not about to try to fetch it out. It’s just so beautiful sitting there all innocent-like:)

40

Four year engagement here.

I honestly don’t give two hoots of shit if anyone thinks it’s silly. It worked for me, and that’s all that matters. :slight_smile:

If I’d gotten married within a year of the engagement, others would think I was silly for getting married so young. Others would think I was silly for marrying the person I chose, and still others would think I needed to fulfill X requirement before marrying. You can’t win, as someone, somewhere will think one of your choices were silly.

Funnily enough, I don’t think any engagement/marriage scenario is silly, as long as all parties are happy with the situation. The whole “their life”, “each to their own” and “whatever works for them” thing.