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    "parsed_content": "175 Years of The TimesOn The New York Times\u2019s AnniversaryTimeless TrendsAn Unbelievable ShotA Daring AviatorOpinion: My Soviet SecretAdvertisementSKIP ADVERTISEMENTOpinionSupported bySKIP ADVERTISEMENTI Once Celebrated Marriage. Things Have Changed.Sept. 28, 2026, 5:00 a.m. ETCredit...Ben HickeyListen \u00b7 0:35 min Share full articleBy Curtis SittenfeldMs. Sittenfeld is the author of seven novels and two story collections, including, most recently, \u201cShow Don\u2019t Tell.\u201dSign up for The Ethicist newsletter, for Times subscribers only. Advice on life\u2019s trickiest situations and moral dilemmas from the philosopher Kwame Anthony Appiah. Get it sent to your inbox.As part of a series marking 175 years of eyewitness journalism, Times Opinion asked writers to revisit previously published guest essays. In 2015, Ms. Sittenfeld wrote about marriage after the Supreme Court\u2019s decision to legalize same-sex unions. Below, she annotates her original essay.\n \n \n \nWelcome, Everyone, to the Right to Marry (2015)For an institution that has, especially in recent weeks and years, been subject to such extensive and vigorous public debate, marriage is strangely unknowable \u2014 that is, any particular marriage is mysterious, to anyone outside it.Think of a couple in your life or the public eye, gay or straight: When they\u2019re alone together, do you imagine they\u2019re nicer, meaner or exactly the same with each other as when they\u2019re around others? Who attends to which household obligations? If they have young kids, how do they handle child care? How frequently do they fight or have sex? Are they, as individuals, fundamentally glad or regretful that they\u2019re together?As a novelist, I\u2019m supposed to be highly attuned to human habits and yearnings, but I can\u2019t answer most of these questions for most couples I know, and I can\u2019t answer all of them for any couple except my husband and me. In fact, I\u2019m not even sure I can answer on behalf of my husband, who\u2019s less a fan of soul-probing inquiries than I am.\u201cHow often do I annoy you, and how often are you glad that we\u2019re married?\u201d I asked him the other day when we were standing in the kitchen.Looking concerned, he set one arm around my shoulders. \u201cIs everything O.K.?\u201d\u201cI\u2019m writing an article,\u201d I explained.\u201cOh,\u201d he said and backed away.With the Supreme Court\u2019s decision Friday that the Constitution guarantees a right to same-sex marriage, surely I\u2019m not the only straight person tempted right now to send a message of marital welcome to the gay community. But this temptation isn\u2019t just presumptuous \u2014 it\u2019s downright absurd. Of the four couples who were plaintiffs in the landmark case, some have been together longer than my husband and I have. Surely, it\u2019s I who could learn a thing or two about commitment and devotion from the plaintiff\u00a0Jim Obergefell, a widower in my hometown, Cincinnati, who had been in a relationship with John Arthur for 20 years when Mr. Arthur\u00a0died of A.L.S. in 2013. The state of Ohio wouldn\u2019t recognize Mr. Arthur and Mr. Obergefell\u2019s marriage, which had occurred in Maryland, where the couple flew by medical jet to\u00a0wed on the tarmac. Or perhaps the plaintiffs\u00a0April DeBoer and Jayne Rowse, the Michigan couple who have adopted four children, including some with disabilities, could give me advice on striking a balance between attending to my kids and spouse.Obviously, marriage confers major legal and financial benefits, but it also provides less tangible ones. It\u2019s reassuring to officially have an ally, or extra cushioning between the individual and a sometimes-harsh world. For those of us aware of our own unappealing tendencies, there\u2019s comfort in the knowledge that it\u2019d be a pain for the other person to permanently part ways with us. Regarding the notion that marriage is a kind of entrapment, there\u2019s a part of me that thinks,\u00a0yes, exactly.Marriage also provides resolution; the time you once spent scoping out romantic prospects or thinking about tying the knot can now be devoted to professional and recreational development, by which I mean watching \u201cHomeland\u201d and \u201cLouie\u201d together after your children go to bed.And yet if praising the institution of marriage is acceptable \u2014 in an already much-cited passage in the court\u2019s majority opinion, Justice Anthony Kennedy\u00a0wrote that\u00a0\u201cit embodies the highest ideals of love, fidelity, devotion, sacrifice, and family\u201d \u2014 praising your own union is trickier.Announcing that you really like your spouse can make you seem square, corny, Facebook-ishly smug, or pre-emptively defensive. But you know what? I really like my spouse.The most frequent dynamic I encounter among straight people, both in pop culture and in couples I know, is that of the annoyed wife and the clueless husband. I\u2019ve heard female acquaintances lament \u2014 to name just a few examples \u2014 how frequently their husbands want sex, how infrequently their husbands want sex, how bad their husbands are at fixing their daughters\u2019 hair, and how gracelessly their husbands endure upper respiratory infections, a.k.a. \u201cman colds.\u201d Meanwhile, in a scene in the new Pixar movie \u201cInside Out,\u201d as the wife in the family sensitively tries to understand her daughter\u2019s feelings, it\u2019s revealed that the husband thinks a lot about sports and leaves the toilet seat up.As it happens, my own husband thinks a lot about sports and leaves the toilet seat up (which I\u2019m not crazy about, though at the risk of betraying my entire gender, I\u2019ve never been sure why men are more obligated to leave the seat lowered than women are to leave it raised). But if once a day I\u2019m annoyed by him, 10 times a day I\u2019m struck by how lucky I am to be his wife. Hence the question I asked him in our kitchen, which, true to his character, he deftly avoided.In fact, one of the most useful skills I\u2019ve learned from my husband is what we refer to as deflection. It basically means doing nothing, or else engaging in a situation as little as you can. Say you get an aggressive email you don\u2019t want to deal with. Just don\u2019t answer it. As a person who once believed words can and should be harnessed to address all possible scenarios, I\u2019ve found the powerful passivity and near-silence of deflection revelatory.Additional lessons I\u2019ve learned from my husband are that after you wash your hands, flicking water at the other person just because he\u2019s standing near you is irritating rather than festive; that reading instruction manuals can be an excellent investment of time (though I still don\u2019t do it); and that if you and your spouse agree that you\u2019ve divided chores more or less equally, it\u2019s smart not to quantify things with greater precision.Admittedly, there\u2019s probably no surer way of destroying your marriage than writing a paean to it. I also should acknowledge that I have no idea if I like the institution of marriage or if I just like my specific husband. The jinx I\u2019ve invited here notwithstanding, I hope I never find out.But if you don\u2019t think marriage is for you, unless you\u2019re George Clooney pre-2014, you\u2019re probably correct. I\u2019d no more attempt to convert marriage skeptics than I\u2019d try to persuade my husband that brussels sprouts are delicious; it\u2019s their life, and they\u2019re his taste buds.Either way, I believe in the Cardigan Sweater Rule: If I\u2019m outside in the evening, the temperature falls below 70 degrees, and I didn\u2019t bring a sweater, I usually wish I had. If I did bring one, however, I often don\u2019t put it on; knowing I have it is enough to prevent me from feeling cold.Now that same-sex marriage is legal nationwide, plenty of gay people won\u2019t get married just because they can, just as plenty of straight people don\u2019t. Even so, how wonderful that the option exists for all of us. I\u2019ll offer it up right away, the part that, depending on your perspective, might seem ironic or juicy or enviable or tragic: I\u2019m now divorced. Upon rereading this essay 11 years after writing it, I\u2019m relieved that I didn\u2019t pretend in 2015 I had marriage figured out. Perhaps not surprisingly, I don\u2019t feel that I have divorce figured out, either. \nI mean this metaphysically, but I also mean that I find it hard to know how long I was married. My former husband and I considered ourselves separated by fall 2024, but maybe it was before that? He didn\u2019t move out until fall 2025, and the divorce was legal in January 2026. I told people that he happened to move out the same day that Ms. Taylor Swift released \u201cThe Life of a Showgirl.\u201d The album doesn\u2019t contain the song I listened to the most while divorcing \u2014 that was \u201cAll in Good Time\u201d by Iron & Wine \u2014 but I did sometimes listen to Swift\u2019s \u201cWi$h Li$t\u201d on repeat, which (ironically?) is about finding the person you want to settle down with. I\u2019ve discovered that many people have a divorce song. Here\u2019s a playlist with some of mine and my friends\u2019 songs. It\u2019s demoralizing and scary that gay rights seem less stable in 2026 than they did right after the Supreme Court made marriage equality the law of the land. Policing sexuality also seems ridiculous when half the people I thought were straight in 2015 aren\u2019t now. Several friends have told me I\u2019m the only middle-aged divorced woman they know who still dates men. Now I welcome advice from other divorced people, like my friend Alyssa telling me she makes plans every other night when she doesn\u2019t have her kids because that\u2019s not too much and not too little. My friend Felicity told me, \u201cIt\u2019s not that you might at some point spend a holiday alone. You definitely will spend a holiday alone, and it\u2019s OK and occasionally awesome.\u201d She recommends a pajama day and movie marathon on Thanksgiving. And when I told my friend Susanna that sometimes without my kids I eat popcorn for dinner standing up, she said, \u201cPopcorn is fine, but sit down.\u201d\n I also collect examples of amicable divorces, such as the exes who recently went viral for entering their daughter\u2019s wedding reception, smiling and with arms linked, to Swift\u2019s \u201cWe Are Never Ever Getting Back Together.\u201d I\u2019m delighted by Kamala Harris\u2019s joke that her blended family is \u201ctoo functional\u201d and by Doug Emhoff\u2019s ex-wife Kerstin Emhoff, saying of Ms. Harris, \u201cI love our blended family and am grateful to have her in it.\u201d In 2025, when I told people that I had already grieved my marriage but hadn\u2019t grieved the family unit, my divorced friends said things like, \u201cIt\u2019s been seven years and I\u2019m still grieving the family unit.\u201d I also feel extraordinarily bad that I can\u2019t explain divorce to our dog. I might be projecting, but I think she wonders why the five of us aren\u2019t still sitting on the couch together watching \u201cSchitt\u2019s Creek\u201d like we did in 2020. Oof. This sentence was definitely written by the version of me who hadn\u2019t spent many summer mornings in the office of a mediator who charged $375 an hour. Once after mediation, I said, \u201cI think you\u2019ll be a good ex-husband.\u201d He replied, \u201cYou mean like Jimmy Carter? A better ex-president than a president?\u201d This paragraph is the one I now find the saddest and most lacking in self-awareness. I can still see the argument for deflection with people you barely know, but not in close relationships. I used to imagine there was one clear reason for most divorces, but this isn\u2019t how I feel about mine. There are several reasons, and they\u2019re mostly clich\u00e9d, like \u201cWe grew apart\u201d or \u201cIt ran its course.\u201d Toward the end, I felt as if the best versions of ourselves had married and the worst versions of ourselves were getting divorced. It turns out that invoking a jinx doesn\u2019t prevent a jinx? And I\u2019m not sure I\u2019ll ever marry again, but I still want the best parts of a good marriage: sharing meals and trips and TV shows and a bed, talking about everything, making the hard stuff easier and the adventures more fun.\nI have a boyfriend, a kind, irreverent visual artist and a divorced dad. We met on Hinge and went on our first date on Jan. 1. Isn\u2019t it remarkable that I\u2019m not too superstitious to mention him here? Apparently, I\u2019ve learned nothing. Maybe, between perimenopause and climate change, I no longer need to bring a sweater? Sometimes I think of all the parts of my current identity that I once would have found inconceivable, which is to say that I\u2019ve become a gluten-avoiding chihuahua mom divorc\u00e9e in an eroding democracy. That I didn\u2019t anticipate this outcome is simultaneously terrible, funny and beautiful. I now know that when people tell you they\u2019re getting divorced, you don\u2019t say, \u201cI\u2019m so sorry!\u201d or \u201cOh no!\u201d But it\u2019s OK, and maybe recommended, to say, \u201cI\u2019m sorry and congratulations.\u201d\nAs it happens, my divorce is not ironic or juicy or tragic, but it might be enviable because once, near the end, my ex was driving our kids somewhere while I stayed home, and he called me from the car to tell me that baby turkeys were in the yard.\nThe truth is that my ex and I came to feel let down by each other in deeply painful ways, that I found going through a divorce to be the hardest experience of my life, and that we continue to frustrate each other intermittently. But I\u2019m grateful that we both still want good things\u2014stability, delight, baby turkey sightings\u2014for the other person.\n \n \n Welcome, Everyone, to the Right to Marry (2015)Curtis Sittenfeld\u2019s novels include \u201cRomantic Comedy,\u201d \u201cRodham\u201d and \u201cPrep.\u201d You can listen to her divorce song playlist below.AdvertisementSKIP ADVERTISEMENT",
    "published_at": "2026-09-28T09:00:58+00:00",
    "author_name": "Curtis Sittenfeld",
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