"Grown Up" - by Cheryl Mercer

"When I think about marriage, what I long for most, strangely enough, is not an elevated spiritual union with a man; that's a fantasy not readily envisioned. What seems wondrous to me instead are the small, shared rituals that bind a man and woman in familiar intimacy, the borders inside which they make love, choose furniture, plan vacations, quarrel over closet space and ex-lovers, share the toothpaste, and celebrate Christmas the same way they did last year. I've been in love myself, so I know something of what it's like to build a life together - the private jokes, the friends you share, knowing in advance which of you makes the coffee and which goes for the paper, even the comfortable tedium of hearing his or her favorite story told yet again. To promise to share forever the small - not only the grand - moments of life seems to me profoundly human, more intimate even than making love with someone for the first time."