Communication. Respect. Intimacy. Doing the dishes. Those are all things that have been called the secret to marriage. But Gabrielle Zevin has a different idea. Sandra Oh ("Killing Eve") reads her piece.
This is an unofficial transcript meant for reference. Accuracy is not guaranteed.
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Oh the from the New York Times and W B WB are Boston. This is modern the stories of love loss and redemption. I'm your host, Magna, Chakrabarti, the communication, respect intimacy.
even doing the dishes. These are all things
at one time or another. You've been told of the secret to a happy marriage, but Gabriel's
it has a different idea. Her ass, a is the secret to marriage, is never getting married.
It's read by Sandra, oh who's, just been nominated for an Emmy for her role in BBC America's killing Eve. She also starred for ten seasons on Grey's anatomy,
I am often asked if I am married. Sometimes I lie and say that I am,
Sometimes I lie and say that I am not neither answer feels entirely truthful to me
If I say I am not married, the true answer. People occasionally try to set me up with their offspring.
they seem to think I would be a great daughter in law. Actually
would be a great daughter in law. I send thank you cards. I am a terrific conversationalist. I can bake a pie,
I met the man, I'm not married to the second week of College,
you're wearing black on said,
I'm wearing black. This was
with some irony, we were standing.
in a black box theater everyone was.
In black. He had a girlfriend
so we didn't get together until several months later.
And together ever since twenty one years.
a year before I met HANS, a relative of his opened a credit card in his name in charge, the better portion of another relatives wedding on it, and then she forgot to pay the bill for years forever, actually HANS it and find out until two years after the crime when he was applying to graduate school, even after making arrangements to pay off the debt.
credit was ruined and he couldn't get student loans. The credit card company told him the only way to clear his credit would be to take the relative to court. Identity theft is a serious crime, the company said and she could possibly go to jail. Hans, wouldn't do it because the woman had a child and he didn't want the child to grow up without a mother. I liked that about him. He was in his early twenties and less than poor, but what difference did it make? He was a person of integrity and we were in love. We had been together six months. It can be awkward to describe the situation to people. I don't know they tend to ask, follow up questions. Why didn't you just clear the credit cards and then get?
red. Why didn't I I say lightly. The answer is many reasons, because I was eighteen when I met him and didn't know how long the relationship at last, because I was a
lot of money and I was embarrassed to ask my parents for help.
because neither of us had regular jobs and we both wanted to be artists more than we wanted to be married people, because
One of us need a good credit in order to rent apartments in charge, groceries because by the
we had the means to make honest people of ourselves. We felt as if we had been
gather too long to bother. But I don't say these things, don't you like weddings summer
ask- I love weddings, the odd mix of
religion, government and pageantry moves me it's like theater, but with real people. I have been to weddings
I have seen the white dresses. I have worn the bridesmaid's dress. I have smelled the roses. I never caught the bouquet, but I have watched its trajectory with enthusiasm,
I have heard the wedding band play shout and
have gotten a little bit louder now I have shocked the registries and I said the past
occurs, the towels the knives. I am comfortable with the fact that, as a person who has no plans to marry, I will not receive the pasta maker, the towel, the knives or the bars in return hunt, and I have been together-
a long time and for better or for worse, we have those things already. My accountant recently broached the subject of marriage with me. He has been my accountant for the last thirteen years and I feel as if he's my second most important, long term relationship.
we were discussing whether I should consider getting married now. I said it feels like it's been too long. I guess because I'm turning forty this year he said
well, there are reasons to be married when you're old
spell largely into two categories. What Hap?
when I die and what happens if I get sick and then die once on the way back from Japan, a customs agent was furious at HANS in me for sharing a check to suit case. When we work related, we were not family, which meant we needed to speak to customs separately, so how to deal with the problem of a shared suitcase. What was a customs agent to do? Well, you see, I remember saying when he was in college, a relative open up this credit card, and basically this encapsulated the reason to get married at this peaceful MC point of our lives because, as you get old per my accountant, life.
a series of skirmishes with customs agents. I know he's right at this point, though. The math bothers me, I don't want to start over again at year, one I worried
If HANS and I were to get married now, it would
somehow be like saying the last two decades didn't count I have had for dogs with a man I am not married to. I have dedicated several of my books to him, but really they all cabbie. He is my most important reader and creative collaborator. We have traveled the world with one suitcase. We have cooked more than one hundred blue apron meals without killing each other. We have shared a dozen different addresses. We have built a life, but we are not married. We live in California, which means we are not even common law married. Some time ago we had not been married for fifteen years when we had an apartment by Riverside Park in New York. Hans woke up, looked out the window and said with boyish
almost biblical conviction, everything is telling me that's christian shop. She was on one of our favorite shows the flight of the concourse. We went down to walk or dog, and the woman was still sitting in the park. It was not Christian Shaw,
It could not have been less Kristen Schaal and now we say
to each other all the time everything
telling me that's Kristen, Schaal
It's amazing how often this can be worked into conversation. This won't be fun
anyone, but the man I am not married to your friends recently got divorced.
they had been together as long as we had, and I had thought they were happy, but
never know what goes on between two people. I asked her. What percentage of time would you say you were happy twenty percent? She said several weeks later. She revised estimate. Maybe two per cent to I said how can a person live in a state of two percent happiness
Perhaps three she revised again HANS and I are happy together. Most of the time we have the usual domestic squabbles. Our most frequent argue.
ends with him, throwing up his hand and saying
I'm not a handyman. Sometimes I think the secret to a long and happy marriage is never to get married in the first place.
although there are surely married couples that are as happy as we are not long ago. When a woman asked me, the marriage
question? I stumbled on what I believe to be the correct answer. I have
with the same man for more than two decades, but I am not sure either of us believes in marriage. I felt clever for stating my situation so concisely believe she's gotta believe is for little children and Santa Claus.
she was right. It's just words to say I don't believe in marriage. Hunting stayed with a purse
more than twenty years. I must believe in marriage. I must believe that
Life is better in a pair than it is single.
When I say I don't believe in marriage, what I mean to say is this:
I understand the financial and legal benefits, but I don't believe the government or church or a department store registry can change the way I already feel and behave
Because when the law doesn't find you as a couple, you have to choose each other every day and may be the act of choosing changes, a relationship for the better but successful Mary people must know this. Already I wake up in the morning, and I look at HANS and I think I love you. I choose you above any other person.
I chose your twenty one years ago and I choose you today. I believe you to be a constant in my life and I a constant and yours loving. You is the closest thing I have to faith. Everything
telling me that's Kristen Schaal Sandra Reading, Gabriel Evans Essay, the secret to marriage.
Never getting married, will catch up with Gabrielle
the.
I just lied and I'm a leave is an incredible broadcast reporter and reporter and Josh a hacker turned technologist
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I love spelling bee my boyfriend and I often play spelling bee together by together, I mean sitting next to each other playing into
really and not cheating. Sometimes when I open up spelling bee- and I see that you have completed a few words on your own, I feel a little betrayed.
It may have happened again. I have one friend
who, I will send screenshots from spelling bee of inappropriate words. Then I was get nervous. I sent it to my parents or something like that
me and my dad. We like a sponge together- and I wish to out I it said
A c K. P o t
yeah now run nice
I'm same as earth's sky. The digital puzzles editor for the New York Times. You can try, spelling bee and all our games at N Y Times dot com, Slash Games, Gabriel Zevon, says that despite the title of her piece, she really isn't anti marriage. The funny thing about all of it is that I think if all things had been different, if you know the relative hadn't stolen money from HANS or open credit cards in his name, I think we probably would have just gotten married, so I think some people when they read the piece didn't maybe understand that the pieces written with some sadness. You know this has been my life, but am I saying this is the optimal way, not nest?
SARA Lee, I'm not giving anybody any advice, I'm just really reporting how I have lived my life but Gabriel knew that sharing her story would open her up to some criticism and she
I did hear from readers who took issue with the fact that she and HANS weren't married a lot of people did write. Me too.
tell me that in fact I had ruined my life. That
The moment that I got sick HANS would leave me for sure,
and in a moment he got sick. I would be out the door, but of course the reality of that is that he or I could be out the door even if
we're married, not everybody who is married, behaves wonderfully when something horrible happens you know, and when
about a getting married in a church doesn't come with any more guarantees than my just choosing him dead people also
tell Gabrielle to tell her that, because she didn't have children, she shouldn't have an opinion about marriage, which I think is really sad, because my life, probably I'm forty years old- will not have children in it, and so I
they feel very sorry, for people who think the only reason to have a long term relationship or to get married is for the children
Gabriel says that in some ways her modern love, peace served the same function
as a wedding might have. You know it's a very weird thing to say, but it's kind of true, if you think about it, a really good thing about a wedding is that you get to
gather all of your loved ones and people that are important in your life and say this.
Person means so much to me, and so we didn't have one of those, but I did get to say in the New York Times which few people still read, that this person is really
important to me in my life for now
Gabrielle and HANS are still happily unmarried, but she says they're open to
abilities down the line. You know as
get older. It apparently makes everything easier in life, so I I do think at some point. We might get married but it'll just kind of be like a very emotional trip to the DMV
it's about how it will fail to me as Gabriel. Seven is the author of nine novels and resume loss Angeles with her partner, hundreds more after the brisk Carmack Steve's use a freedom to shop. However, you, like you, can shop for a car on mine and on the lot once you find them,
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I've been sitting next to each other of playing individually and not cheating. Sometimes when I open up spelling bee- and I see that you have completed a few words on your own, I feel a little betrayed inside
It may have happened again. I have one friend
who I will send screenshots from spelling bee of inappropriate words. Then I was get nervous. I sent it to my parents or something like that:
me and my dad. We like a sponge together and I wish to out I it said
a c K. P o t
Yeah now run nice
I'm same as earth's sky. The digital puzzles editor for the New York Times. You can try spelling bee and all our games at N Y Times dot com, slash games, here's Sandra, oh! I gravitated towards this story because first, the
It was so fantastic. The secret of marriage is never getting married. There's a lot of truth in that and there's a lot of humor
and I am not married and I have no plans to get married. I kind of really identify with that sentence
and I really like how she explores what couple ship is. She really defines edge
HANS defined at their own way and I feel a tremendous amount of freedom and independence.
Thanks again to Sandra for reading this week's essay she just was
an Emmy nomination for outstanding lead actress for her performance in killing,
Daniel Jones. The editor of the modern love column for the New York Times says that the best personal
Sas shoe show a combination of intelligence and vulnerability.
vulnerable in
She is able to talk about
not marrying, but it's so small
in how she talks about what makes
a long term relationship and instead of trying to explain it, she really reveal
in this one line
they share, everything is telling me that's Kristen, Schaal and then how she sort
Incongruously ends the essay with that line.
I just thought I'm going to. Let that stand. That's smart and moving
at the same time. Modern love is the production of the New York Times and W B you are Boston, NPR station, its produced directed and edited by Jessica Albert Kate. Little key,
and John paraded sound design and original scoring by Matt Region. Our intern is Louisa Judge,
the idea for the modern love podcast was conceived by LISA Tobin Iris,
learn our executive producer. Daniel Jones is the
It or of modern love for the New York Times and adviser to the shop music for the past courtesy of a piano, and I want to give up
heartfelt shout out to a modern love alarm who is getting married and Marie Sivertson and
mosquito. Congratulations,
you to remember what we said at the top of the show
doing the dishes is one of the secret of a happy marriage.
I make no see you next week.
The.
Transcript generated on 2022-04-16.