Gabi Schaffzin wonders how he’ll know when his marriage is a success.
The checklists are getting longer, which isn’t logical. We’re two weeks out at the time of my writing, and we still have so much to do. We’ve had nearly thirteen months to plan this thing—how is our punch-list not dwindling away with each task marked complete? Nerve-wracking.
The fact that my fiancée and I are using spreadsheets and punch-lists to plan this wedding is par for the course—at least for us. We met at college, studying business. When we moved in together two and a half years ago, we had a spreadsheet of each possible locale; we recorded financial factors as well as those intangible considerations like commute, pool, and floor number. So the fact that she sends me Google calendar invites to wedding vendor meetings or “print timeline planning” sessions shouldn’t seem that unusual. I hope.
I’m not a “numbers guy.” I don’t work in accounting or finance. But somehow, I’ve always had a yard stick with which I measure success. Social conventions make it easy to define this “success.” We get graded. We take the SATs. We make dean’s list. We graduate with honors. We get the job. A promotion. A raise. A new job. Another raise. Win.
When we start to plan a big life event, it makes sense to turn to the tools with which we’ve met with success in the past. We make lists and project timelines. We track deadlines and send endless emails. And hopefully, on the big day, everything runs smoothly. Our guests will have a good time; we’ll take some pictures, have a few drinks, and enjoy ourselves. A well-planned, well-executed wedding will be a good sign, but it hardly guarantees marital bliss.
The next day, we’ll head off to our honeymoon (if the volcanoes, cabin crew strikes, and Greek protests don’t get in the way). Then it’s back to work.
After that, some big questions will hang over me. Is this marriage a success? Not yet? How about now? What about our children? Am I a successful father? And bigger still—how will I know? Which criteria should I use? This produces a palpable fear: where are the tools to minimize my mistakes when it comes to this “real life” stuff?
I wonder sometimes how my father measures his own success. He is an artist who spent the majority of his life making sure his four children were in positions to succeed on their own. In doing so, he put aside dreams of making art for the sake of art and focused on doing so for income. This is one of the reasons I consider him a successful father—but I wonder if he sees it the same way.
The male role models in my life – my dad and my older brother – have never pressured me to reach a specific or measurable level of “success.” They’re supportive of the decisions I make, even if they disagree. Instead of handing me a road map, they want me to take my own path.
So here I am, filled with fear and confidence: the fear that I have not yet made enough mistakes, and the confidence that I will make plenty and get through them. As you grow up, success is tougher to pin down. Without those social conventions to look to, it’s left to you to define. Once you’ve defined it, well, that’s just the first step.
As men, can we try to forget about ticking a checkbox and just work to enjoy life as it comes along? I’m not sure. In this column, I’ll explore the ways we define and redefine success, and whether we can ever actually achieve it. I’ll offer perspective from a guy who’s realizing that the yardstick he’s been using for 20-some years (before marriage and all its looming mysteries) is now, basically, useless. Shit.
When I write my next column, I’ll be a married man. I’ll be scared as hell. But I’ll be confident, too. And, you might have noticed, a bit confused. So I hope you’ll let me know if any of this sounds familiar, or naive, or just plain crazy.
The answer is when after 40 years at your mate and say you were and are the best thing that ever happened to me. Good luck and many years of joy.
Good luck but you won’t need it. Love from London on YOUR BIG DAY. XXXXXXXXXXXXX