Hitched or Ditched....I choose hitched

Tonight was the first episode of Hitched or Ditched.  It's a new reality show where couples are given 7 days to decide whether or not they're getting married.  Basically someone shows up on their doorstep and gives them an invitation to their own wedding and they have to show up that day and either say "I do" or "I don't".

Tonight's couple had been together for 4 years.  Apparently they fought a lot and broke up a lot but always got back together.  There was the usual jealousy, "my parents hate you", "my friends think we're crazy" sort of shit but after 4 years, including living together, you have to wonder if they are truly right for each other.  Lincoln's brother and his wife fight like cats and dogs and yet after 20 years of marriage they still look madly in love with each other when they think others aren't watching.

But I digress....

Lincoln and I have decided (read: I have decided) that each week after this show we will renew our wedding vows. Thank God we never had this drama in our relationship.  Lincoln and I met in August 1999.   We officially moved in together in October 1999 (and we had barely spent a night apart before that).  We joined our bank accounts in January 2000, got engaged on our 6-month anniversary in February 2000, and married in October 2000.  We found out on Christmas Eve 2000 that we were pregnant with Hannah.  Never once did I have a single doubt about marrying him**.  I was only 23 years old but it never even crossed my mind that it was even a remotely questionable act.  I asked him tonight if he ever had any doubt and he said "no" too.  The only person who seemed to have doubts was my sister Denise who said to my parents, "They can't get married....they haven't even had a fight yet."  My mother responded with "Could you live with Diane and not have had a fight?".......I still don't know how I feel about that comment.  LOL.

Maybe I'm just a "non-conflict" sort of gal but I've never understood those relationships where people fight all the time.  I can sort of understand a relationship where people have broken up once and gotten back together but more than once seems like a deal breaker to me.  Lincoln and I don't fight.  I can count on one hand the number of times we've had a real "major" fight.  One was over gun control, one was over whether or not our children could move back after college into an apartment over our garage (which still hasn't been built yet) and the other was over the government's involvement in equal pay for women.  That's it.  Three "major" fights in 10 years.  I just can't imagine fighting all the time.

I'm a TV addict, as many of you know, and this new summer season doesn't look very promising so Hitched or Ditched may have to become my new favorite.  If nothing else, it definitely makes me appreciate how wonderful I have it with Lincoln.

**When Lincoln and I were engaged we went down to NYC to visit my friend Chad.  That night, at PJ Carney's, we got into a huge discussion about gun control.  I remember going to the bathroom that night, looking at my engagement ring, taking it off, and wondering to myself "Do I really want to marry a man that thinks that way about gun control?"  I obviously put the ring back on and never looked back again.....but I still don't agree with him on gun control.  For those of you that made it to our wedding, you'll remember that in his vows he promised "never to bring up the 2nd amendment when we've been drinking." 

On an entirely unrelated topic, that is also the night I bought a beer for the bodyguard that survived Princess Diana's fatal car crash, Trevor Rees-Jones.  I've often wondered over the years if it was appropriate to buy a beer for a man who survived a drunk driving accident but it was he, in fact, that was standing at the bar drinking when I did it so I suppose it was okay.  And he did come over to say "thank you".  

But once again, I digress.....