Lately, I've been thinking a lot about the idea of marriage. Maybe it's because I'm attending a wedding over fall break. Maybe it's because girls in my sorority and people on the Hustler staff are married or engaged to be married. Maybe it's because I spend too much time watching other couples - young and old - in love. Or maybe I just watch too many movies.

It's just so strange to me that my peers are at a point in their lives where marriage is something they want. I always told myself I was too independent to ever need a guy and that I didn't want to be married until my 30s. My thinking behind that was that if I waited, I would have plenty of time to do all of the things I wanted to do alone and also, I could make damn sure that the person I did end up choosing was really better than all the others, and therefore presumably the best for me.

Trusting myself has caused me to make quite a few mistakes in my nineteen-year life. Small-scale example: perm. I am faced with this mistake almost daily, as I was told at the DMV that I could not have a new drivers license photo taken (probably just because they got a laugh out of my smiling sixteen-year-old self with big 80s hair). But hey, I thought I looked pretty good back then. Obviously, everyone has had some rough years as far as looks (or hairstyles, more specifically) are concerned, so it's not a tragedy that I'm stuck with a lousy picture for a while. What scares me is the thought that if I decided to get married at a young age because I thought it was a good idea at the time, that that decision could potentially be something I'd look back and regret in the same way I regret hairstyles of ages past. Cutting your hair, buying a flat iron, or taking a trip to your colorist are nothing in comparison to getting divorced or living the rest of your life with a partner you're not really in love with anymore.

Coming from a Catholic family, marriage has always come across as something very sacred. I guess I just don't trust myself to make decisions when I feel the stakes are high. I know this is not a phenomenon unique to me, but I sometimes feel I take my fear of failure (failure to achieve perfection or make the best possible choice) to the extreme. I couldn't decide where to go to college. Once I got there, I couldn't decide if it was really "right" for me and whether or not I wanted to stay. I don't like to speak up unless I feel I'm well-versed on an issue. I would rather forsake sleep to spend hours reading PDF files to become knowledgeable instead of making comments in class, writing an article, or conducting an interview without feeling fully confident.

I guess that's why I find it shocking that my peers seem perfectly capable of falling in love and trusting their guts. I guess I'm a little jealous. I wish I could let go.

One of my mom's brothers and one of her sisters each married their high school sweethearts, had children, now have grandchildren, and are still happy together. This is why I don't mean to devalue the decision many people make to get married at an early age. Some people just know what they want and trust that pursuing it will make them happy for the rest of their lives. I just can't fathom the possibility that it could be me getting married in a few years.

Life just moves so quickly. I feel as though I've had very lofty expectations for everything thus far in life and that most things are not all they're cracked up to be. I guess I just need to take the pressure off of myself and of decisions and just go with the flow.

In the meantime, I'll be working on my massive list of things I want to do in my lifetime. Someday, I hope I'm ready to get to the sections that require a companion.