Marriage: How To Last The Long Haul

Cultivate stubbornness. Embrace change. Acknowledge that there’s more than one version of truth. Here are some ways to stay the distance.

- Ada Calhoun

The last wedding I went to was abroad. The timing was auspicious. My husband of 13 years, Neal, and I had been through a rough patch, but seemed to be on the other side of it. Our son, Oliver, aged 11, had lots of friends; parenting now largely involved making oven-top popcorn and handing it to the kids while they traded Pokémon cards. We’d reached a new, happier normal.

And yet. A week before our trip, Neal realised he’d misplaced his passport, prompting a week long search through cupboards and attics within a 200km radius, during which I began a stressful new job. I had to delay my flight by a few days because of this opportunity – a gig from which I was terrified of being fired because I’d already mentally spent all the money. Neal had to parent solo for the first half of the trip. That wouldn’t have been too bad, but Oliver became sick upon touching down on foreign soil and spent two days throwing up, and going in and out of a fever. With every new text message from Neal, I panicked, second-guessing all his decisions.

By Saturday, our friend’s wedding day, the three of us, with our passports and health restored, were sitting on a patio at the edge of a cliff, looking out over the sea while Yazoo’s Only You played from the speakers. Our friend stood under a canopy as his fiancée walked towards him, and I got teary and reached over Oliver’s head to put my hand on Neal’s shoulder.

After the ceremony, Neal was called on to do a song-as-toast. ‘I wrote this on the way here,’ he joked, waiting for the backing music to start up, and then he did a devastating cover of I Would Die 4 U by Prince, who had just died days before. Everyone sang along with the chorus and hugged one another and cried.