People that want to be married . . .

Last night I was working at the Nationals Stadium - which is very nice, by the way! - and my coworker asked me what made me decide to get married. Note: I have only been working at my new job for about 2 months and this colleague and I do not work on the same project, so we're not well acquainted. I stumbled and stammered a little because when one is posed with a serious quite like that, there is so much to say that it's somewhat hard (at least for me) to articulate a succinct and appropriate answer without gushing or without saying too little - especially for someone I'm still getting to know. We were interrupted a few times, giving me some time to think of what I wanted to say.

I finally was able to tell her that Sig. Keswick and I have known each other for a long time (over 8 years) but have only been dating for 2.5 years. But I knew even before we officially began dating that he was the one. In fact, I knew he was special the day I met him! (More on that in a future post.) However, quite early in our courtship, probably even more than 1.5 years ago, I had already stopped "looking." I was happy whenever I was with him. He understood me better than anyone I knew. When we fought over an issue, we were able to resolve it because we valued each other's opinion and were willing to work through it.

She thought this was interesting as she is in her late late 20s/early 30s, has been engaged once before, but she's not dating anyone currently. She recently finished a book (I won't say which because I don't want to give it away, but let me know if you want to know more about which book it is), in which a mother tells her daughter "People that want to be married are married." This made her wonder what exactly did it mean and how did that apply to her? She's been in serious relationships, but ever since she began working at a nonprofit, she hasn't been in one since.

We discussed it and came up with some possibilities:

1. People aren't married because they don't want to be - they make excuses not to, they prioritize their work, life, friends, [fill in the blank] over being in a relationship because they don't want to be in one.
2. People are married because they put up with more (or they settle) -- I don't think it's necessarily that they settle, but it's possible they're willing to work through some issues more than others.
3. People who are married are mature enough to know what they want and make an active effort to find and keep it.
4. On the flip side, people who are not married are mature enough to know what they want and do not want to sacrifice what they want in order to be in a relationship.
5. Some people are just lucky enough to find the right person at the right time -- and then know it and work hard to keep it.

Thus, why did you decide to get married OR what do you think about the idea that are married want to be. We had more theories, but I'll spare you the iterations of the above.