This Post Brought to You By the Crazy Guy at Starbucks

It’s a summer day and it’s hot outside. Earth shattering newsworthy fact, sure, but I never tend to realize how hot it can get in the inland Southern California town where I work. On a typical weekday I don’t leave my office. I normally just bring a sandwich and eat at my desk or stand in the kitchen rabbiting a ranch doused salad.

But today I decided to try something different. I’ve been struggling lately to find time to write, so today I decided to bring my laptop to work, so that at lunch I could escape to a local Starbucks and get some work done.

So there I’m driving, pull neatly into the little parking lot meant for patrons of the Starbucks, sandwich shop, or dry cleaner of the little mini complex. The A/C in my car isn’t superb, so I tend to leave my windows rolled all the way down as often as I can. I surprisingly couldn’t find a spot right in front to the coffee shop, so I switched my clunker into reverse and looked over my shoulder as I began to roll backwards.

“HEY WATCH OUT!” shouted a toothless man as loudly as possible. I slammed my breaks un-dramatically, as even a squirrel could have stopped my 0.5 mph pace. I turned my head even further and saw a truck was pulling out of their spot at the moment that I was backing up. Probably 15 feet away.

“WELL PULL FORWARD AND GIVE HIM SOME ROOM!!” he shouted, this time with a healthy dash of anger. Baffled at the frantic urgency of the stranger, I turned to see the truck had an extraordinary amount of space without my moving. However I was being screamed at in front of the lunch goers chillin’ in front of Starbucks and the sandwich shop, so in my frazzled state I tried to shift gears and move forward ever-so-awkwardly.

I realized the truck was already gone by the time I began to pull forward, and heard the angry man walk by my window muttering under his breath profanities sprinkled with “dumb” and “girl.”

I shook my head, backed up again, and parked in the spot I had planned to before the public humiliation.  I had three bags with me, my purse, lunch bag and laptop case, and climbed out of my car with as much dignity as I could muster. As coolly and confidently as I could, I walked up to the complex and smiled at each stranger staring me down…or up…or whatever.

I know I wasn’t wrong. But damn that was embarrassing! I’m sitting in the coffee shop wondering why the guy had to make such a scene about it. Was he trying to protect me? The truck? Assert authority? Who knows, but I’m admittedly rattled.

SO MUCH SO THAT I’M STILL TALKING ABOUT IT. I came here to write and thanks to the grizzly old alcoholic, I’m rattled and distracted from the task I set out to accomplish.

But such is life isn’t it? Why is it the very moment that we set our eyes on something, almost instantaneously there is a brand new obstacle flung in our face to try and beat us back into mediocrity. Or distract us, humiliate us, cause us to change course.

Well public humiliation or no, I saw something pretty incredible. Here a fitting hackneyed phrase comes to mind, something to the air of “The biggest hill comes right before your biggest success.” Yeah something like that. But I must be on the right track. If the oddities of the earth are trying so hard to distract me, what awesomeness are they afraid I’m close to accomplishing?

Don’t get distracted today. You have a goal and you have a mission. It’s summertime, there’s crazies about, there might be good TV on later. There will always be distractions, but try and make some time today to take one step closer to whatever it is that will make your life amazing and far above the status quo. You never know, your big break might be just right around the corner.

How To Make Sure Future-You Is Proud Of Today-You

“Why wasn’t this done on Friday?! This could have been done on Friday!” he said to me in a loud voice filled with frustration and fury.

I purposely allowed a 5 second pause, then calmly responded, “I would be happy to help figure this out and look into it.  As you know I was off on Friday, and we gave this to Kathy and Jake. This wasn’t my project….”

Cutting me off, “Joni, everything is your project!”

I couldn’t help but burst into laughter. Realizing the absurdity of what he just said, he laughed a little too…but then got right back to business explaining how very true that statement is. Everything IS my project at work. So I have to laugh every now and then or I’d flip out and be found somewhere downtown wearing my pants as a hat.

My personal life sometimes looks very similar to this. I don’t know about you, but the person who sat in my office yelling at me has a twin cousin very much alive inside my head. This drill sergeant manages the Joni Command Center, following up with all of my extra-professional projects. She sounds very similar:

“Joni! This was supposed to be finished a week ago! What happened?!” her voice shrill and panicked, often in the wee hours of the morning.

“Look, I needed a break. It was a grueling week and I just needed the mornings to sleep in last week.”

“That’s no excuse! There are never any excuses to give up on anything!”

No I fortunately do not battle with multiple personalities nor any other psychological or hallucinogenic disease. But I am pretty strict with myself and set a lot of goals. I wonder why I am this way…

I think part of the reason is that I’ve lived long enough to look back and see what I have and haven’t accomplished. I’ll think things like, “If I had started practicing German every day like I said I would when I got back from Germany 2 summers ago, I could probably be pretty good by now.” Well I haven’t. And thinking about it that way makes me want to call in dead and spend a month playing catch up.

But that also inspires and excites me. If I got started on this project and chipped away at it, little by little, every day? Hot damn I would have SO much accomplished a year from now!

I think it’s kind of like compound interest. The earlier you get things started, the greater your return will be because you invested early. For example, if I had $1,000 when I was 20 and shoved it under my pillow, what would I have today, 9 years later? $1,000, which is actually less than the $1,000 I had 9 years ago because of inflation hovering around 2-3% in that time period.

If I had gotten my head out of my ass and invested that in even a crappy mutual fund of 5%, thank you compound interest I’d have $1,551.33 today. Feel free to check my math, but regardless of if your answer is different, it’s going to be more money than if I hadn’t invested in anything.

And that’s the point. It’s important to invest in yourself, and to invest early. I don’t know, I look around and I see so much wasted talent. Strong, creative, intelligent people who will tell me of their dreams and aspirations, and then nothing will come of it. It has bothered me over the past few years, but there’s nothing I can really do about it but be encouraging when it’s appropriate. Which is why I’m here.

Life is going to happen to all of us, but there has to be some kind of a drill sergeant in all of us to get things done and make sure we understand our responsibility. Sometimes being the only person responsible for living your life in a way worth writing a book about can be scary. But shit, that’s why we can laugh at the whole situation sometimes and realize we are human. Some days we will make great progress, some days you’ll just sit and stare at your computer and not type a single word.

At least we are trying – if you’re not, start! Invest in yourself. Give yourself a little kick in the ass if needed. Do you want to look back in 10 years and realize that your dream of, whatever it is, never happened? Or would you rather look back and laugh with the drill sergeant, admiring the work you two have accomplished. You’ll tease her for being such an ass some days but grateful that she was because now, future you, can enjoy the benefits of all that hard work.

I want to look back that way. Some days feel like just another day, but God what a great day to be alive and able to do whatever we want. Today, just like any day, is the first day to making our crazy childhood dreams come true. Let’s take this day and go GET IT!

Memorial Day, Luxembourg and Saluting Am’urca

3-day weekend. Can you feel it? We have made it America! Memorial Day is this weekend and that means summer is HERE. Plus, we have 3 whole days to do whatever we want.

What are you going to do this Memorial Day weekend? Out of towning, hiking, beach-bumming, hot dog eating, kite flying, sweater knitting? Who cares, do whatever you want, it’s a 3-day weekend.

How about some memorializing while your face is stuffed with potato salad? Maybe even a eugoogily? If you don’t get that Zoolander reference then you’ve made Ben Stiller cry. And we don’t like seeing Ben Stiller cry, so make sure you watch Zoolander at some point in these 3 days of freedom.

Admittedly, I was half joking about the utter excitement of the 3-day weekend filled with kite flying hot dogs. I love a 3-day weekend as much as anyone, but I think the hype around Memorial Day weekend is a bit out-of-control and has rolled a smidge off track. The big chain stores always have some kind of Memorial Day sale, and we all plan parties on Sundays because for once we don’t have to worry about work on Monday. You can spend that Monday nursing a hangover instead if you want to.

But if JCPenny didn’t tell you on the weekend sale commercial, the purpose of Memorial Day is to remember those who served in the United States Armed Forces. Specifically it is for those who died while in service. So why is it when I Google “Memorial Day,” the top 5 searches retrieved regard rooftop pool parties, vacation planning, and local to-dos such as farmer’s markets, more drunken parties, and giant store specials?

That’s kinda fucked up.

I don’t personally know anyone who died in battle, as in, I’ve shaken their hand and heard them say, “how do you do,” only later to learn of their death in combat. I have a great uncle who died in Pearl Harbor (1941). Unfortunately I never had the chance to meet him, so that’s as close as I get.

So for me on Memorial Day, I have to dig a little deeper to get to the memorializing. I do think about my uncle and wonder what exactly happened…according to my Dad he was a pilot and was shot down in air, but I don’t even know if American planes were up yet since it was an ambush? Maybe he reacted quickly. Or maybe he was going for a swim with a Hawaiian cutie, but the family didn’t like that story so they put him in a plane. Nonetheless, the details are hazy and I instead reflect on his bravery for even being there.

The biggest memory I now return to for Memorial Day, however, is when I was in Europe a couple years ago and went to Luxembourg. There is a large military cemetery there where General Patton is buried, aptly named Luxembourg American Cemetery and Memorial. Visiting that memorial was one of the most moving experiences of my life, and the second time that I’ve cried in a military cemetery, the first being my father’s funeral.

We had toured a few different sites of World War II, but this was something different. The soil was given to us from the Luxembourgers and is officially a plot of American land. So naturally we joked on the lines at the gate, one foot on either side, “Now I’m in Europe! Now I’m in the US! Europe! US!”

But reading about the war plan, how Hitler really did fucking take over Europe, and how desperate the situation was, gave me goose-bumps for the duration of my time there. Walking around from grave stone to monument to grave stone, you could literally feel the powerful strength these soldiers had as they gave their lives to thwart the forces of evil.

And that’s what Memorial Day is about. We all like to try and somehow relate to ourselves, our families and puff up our own pride with what we have done. But Memorial Day has absolutely nothing to do with us who aren’t dead from fighting in a war. It has everything to do with those whose lives were cut short, whether they believed in the cause or not, and paid the ultimate price to fight for our country.

Memorial Day is important America. Even if you are anti-war, guns, or think that we could just have a conversation with our enemies and things would be alright, sometimes fighting is necessary. WWII is a perfect reminder of that. In 1944, concentration camps were ramping up to be an even more effective form of genocide, as that was when they installed organized gas chambers and ovens to fucking incinerate human beings on a massive scale. That was when the Battle of the Bulge occurred and one of the biggest turning points of the war. On the very soil I stood, 5,000+ American soldiers remains are buried there, most of whom died in that important battle.

What would have happened if General Patton and his army didn’t march in and kick some ass? I don’t even want to play that game. The game I will play is one of gratitude and solemnly consider the circumstances under which they fought. And with that, thank you to God for our military. Thank you to our Vets – I am so happy you are still here with us. Thank you to the men and women who died in battle, who starved, froze, were shot or stabbed to death fighting for my country. I wouldn’t have the life I have without you, and I am absolutely grateful for your service.

Thank you. I salute you. RIP.

As the Girl in a Brother’s Band

I love sleeping in. I find great joy in slowly awakening as dreams naturally transition out and reality fades back into consciousness. No alarm jolting this progression with immediacy. Just a soft, gentle stirring when my body whispers, “ok we have now fully recharged, let’s go boss.”

Saturdays have largely been removed from the ranks of restful slumber, as I have spent the last several months training for a marathon and it’s too damn hot to run 10+ miles in San Diego’s late morning/afternoon. It’s not so bad though, I can normally get up around 8:30am to meet my small running crew on time, and these days I consider that sleeping in.

However last Saturday, my dream-filled state was slapped into reality by the hand of my cell phone, as over and over again it was blowing up with texts around 6:00am.

Rolling over with as much urgency as I could muster, I tried to silent the inconsiderate device. I vowed that heads were gonna roll if someone wasn’t on fire and somewhat within driving distance so that I could actually do something about it. Thoughts of burning buildings flashed through my mind as I fumbled over my nightstand trying not to knock over my water glass.

Once I finally got to the obnoxious little computer, I discovered no such emergency. Turned out instead World War III was in full effect as my brothers, who so thoughtfully included me on a group text message thread, were ferociously assailing unspeakable insults towards each other. Name calling, personal attacks, and thoughtless verbal canonballs were hurled back and forth with only seconds between each injurious message.

The first thing I did was lay back down, slap my hand to my forehead and groan. “What a bunch of babies,” I said out loud to the empty room. It was a group message that included my three brothers and myself, two of whom were in the middle of this bloodless battle.

I’m more or less used to this behavior by now. So I sent a couple of texts calling for peace, but my efforts were, as usual, ignored. Each of the fighting brothers felt their words, texted with about as much thought as it takes to realize a poopy diaper smells like poo, were valid. Both felt justified tearing down the other mercilessly in front of me and my other brother, who surprisingly wasn’t involved in the fighting whatsoever.

It was an annoying way to start the morning to say the least. After spending a few hours trying to sort them out, the brothers concluded the conversation by blocking the other’s messages and vowing never to speak again. With a sigh, I went on my 12 mile run with friends at 9:00, but it was clouded by the negativity I experienced that morning. I felt sickened and sad, crippled with worry that either or both of today’s foes were sitting at home alone, severely wounded. What I hated most was that there was nothing I could do to stop it and had no real way to fix it.

Why is family such a pain in the ass? I remember when I was little and my Mom would tuck me into bed, she’d always tell me to be grateful for my brothers. Some nights I agreed with her, others I stuck my tongue out and wished they were sisters. You can borrow sister’s clothes. There are only so many options when it comes to your brother’s clothes, and a lot of those clothes are jerseys, and most jerseys are never washed. And that’s just gross, so I was shit out of luck and had to fend for myself with my own wardrobe. Regardless, she always said, “The best gift that I could give to my children was each other.”

Oh brother [cheap pun, sorry, couldn’t help myself].

I figured that every family must be this way. Family = fight, fun, football, being funny, folk music. My immediate world was comprised of us four siblings, my three brothers and myself. I have a half sister as well but she is a bit older and tends to stay out of the drama, probably because she knows the rest of us are morons. So between the remaining 4 of us, we definitely have the most fun together I have ever had in my life, but that’s when we are all getting along. There is unfortunately always a pair in our group who are either not speaking, pulling each other’s eyebrows out, or talking shooby behind another’s back. It’s absolutely ridiculous, and you would think we were the cast of Mean Girls thrown in a martini glass with the Real Housewives.

This is because my brothers and I have a real gift. We have earth-shattering tempers, not measurable by the Richter scale but will likely be responsible when California finally breaks from the main land and drifts off to sea. Through the same vein we also love each other with the same intensity. We didn’t have the easiest collective childhood, and often times all we had were each other. I have distinct memories with each of them individually, holding each other sobbing to get through the latest of round life’s nonsense. So when I moved out of the house and went on to college, I carried with me this love, the temper, the ability to hold my own in a house of 3 boys, and a pretty good sense of humor. These were the ingredients required to survive as an Erdmann.

I came to find out that the temper doesn’t go over well in the real world. Apparently people don’t like it when you yell at them. Shouldn’t they just yell right back and you both hug later and then get some ice cream? Guess not. I got in trouble those early years for behaving like a pugilist, and learned fairly quickly that whoever yells the loudest is not the one who necessarily wins the battles.

For some reason, gosh I have no idea how it became an interest of mine, I got into rhetorical studies and focused on argumentation strategies. I was really into learning karate for words, and have spent most of my years in formal study honing how to craft a logical argument and effectively express my ideas.  I wanted to be able to communicate better with my brothers and create a more conducive environment to healthy discussion.

Some of the first times that I would come home, I’d take my suitcase of words and try them out on my family. Surely this new briefcase of tools would help us communicate better. I outgrew my Mother’s vocabulary by the time I was 15, but I was excited that my brothers would be proud of how calm I was and had tactful ways for us to get along with each other.

Yeah, no.

Apparently when you go back home, you resume the same position you always had. I’ve come to realize that no matter where I go in life, no matter what I’ve learned or how ever-so-wise I’ve become, I am always the baby sister to my two older brothers. To my younger brother, I will always be his bossy big sister, and he will always be my best friend (it’s not that I play favorites, it’s just that he’s my favorite).

I realize also now that not every family is like mine. My last few boyfriends all, oddly enough, had probably the sweetest families that exist on this whole fucking planet. They never EVER fight, cry every time they leave each other, and have deep bonds with each other built on a solid foundation of cotton candy, pillow fights and Lucky Charms cereal.  I love them all dearly to this day but come on…not ONE argument? Suspicious.

But I used to get jealous when I met families like that. And I would really wish I had a sister a lot of times growing up. But, I have my three goofy brothers, and I guess my Ma is right…they are a blessing.  I don’t think any quadra-sibling unit has ever been through as much as we have together, and I wouldn’t trade those silly monsters for anyone else on earth. It would be nice though if one of them were a cross-dresser and happened to be my size, it really would be lovely to share a closet with a sibling and double my wardrobe.

For those of you that don’t have siblings, I’m sure you have friends that pretty much are. And for those that do have siblings, you likely have some crazy-ass stories that likely directed what you studied in school and who you are today.  I think we should all be grateful for whatever situation we happen to be in. So in conclusion of last Saturday and many of the wars of our past, this song makes me think of my beloved brothers today. “So brother, raise another pint!…I still look out for you no matter what you’ve heard…I know there [are] better brother[s] but you’re the only one[s] that [are] mine.”

Love you all, Choey

Tying the Knot…then Sometimes Untying It

The Internet is a pretty incredible thing. You can easily get the traffic, clicks, and hits to your blog and other social media sites with simple reporting tools like WordPress stats or Google Analytics. As a budding writer, I’m quickly and neurotically learning the ropes to find and use this important data.  It helps me understand what topics people like to hear about, and what only me in my nerd queendom seem to care about.

Most of the time it’s fairly predictable. People like topics about life, sex and surviving work. But to my surprise I discovered the other day that the top search that included my name was “joni erdmann divorce.”

Yikes.

Y’alls just loves the sticky stuff, don’t ya? That’s ok. I don’t hide it and it’s not a secret. I’ve just never been one of those people who fancied bringing it up. I mean how fun is it, you’re out having a good time, and then after someone playfully makes fun of the divorced horse in the room about a totally unrelated topic they quip, “Yeah I do that, haha, that’s probably why I’m divorced!” All laughter stops.

And they never miss an opportunity to bring up the ex-husband or ex-wife, “Oh yeah, I’d come to happy hour but I need to meet with my ex-husband to pick up my mail.” I dunno, I just don’t care to label my ex that way. I call him my friend because I think that’s the most appropriate label for him now.  I get that it’s rare, but we are friends, and that’s where our relationship is right now. So shit, I’m going to opt for a kinder term that doesn’t bear harsh connotation and questioning.

Divorcees bring up their D-word because often times they think they have to. They assume people are wondering and choose to bring it up to show that they are OK with it. I’m more than ok, but I don’t think I have to walk around with a label on my status, no matter how much society wants me to. I personally avoid labels for everything, but especially on this subject.

I always check the “Single” box instead of “Divorced.” It is so hilarious that the form gods have created this useless box just to make fun us. No, there aren’t tax breaks for divorce, we treat you just like a single person…but we want to know about it and make you check our arbitrary box.  Dicks.

I never straight up lie about it, but I’m not going out of my way to bum others out by bringing up that little detail about me. And besides, if it all happened in your early to mid-20’s I don’t think it counts.  Ok it absolutely counts, but I’m 29 now and most of my friends are just now getting married, so I think it’s almost inappropriate for me to bring it up. “Yeah I’m divorced and am living proof that sometimes marriages end…but good luck with yours, here’s a gravy boat!”

If you were in my shoes, which you very well might be, you[‘d] understand.  It’s not a badge of honor like a degree or a track medal.  It’s a title akin to a scarlet letter, begging to shame you, like you did something wrong. Which is weird because we loooove marriage so much and there’s a lot of pressure to do it. Every time Americans hear about a couple getting married, we rejoice, “Congratulations!!” followed by a plea for every detail thus far. I’m totally one of those people, partially because I know the game pretty well and mostly because I absolutely believe in love and commitment.

And because we are so in love with marriage, we don’t rejoice when people announce their divorce. Which I’m not suggesting.  But when we hear the news of departure, we always respond sadly and slap our hands to our faces, “Ooooh, wow, they have been together for [insert years of adhesive glue], that’s really sad.”

A couple years ago, however, a friend of mine was telling me that she and her aunts were throwing her Mom a party.  I naturally asked what kind of party it was.  “A ‘Happy Divorce’ party!” she squealed.  My brain couldn’t process that information, and my silence requested that she go on. “Well, my mom was with this total loser for the last 7 years, and nobody liked him.  But we never could say anything to her as she just changed to conform to his lazy son-of-a-slut ass. Finally she is leaving him and we couldn’t be happier!”

She’s absolutely right. Comedian Louis CK also puts it well:

“Divorce is always good news. I know that sounds weird, but it’s true because no good marriage has ever ended in divorce … That would be sad. If two people were married and they were really happy and they just had a great thing and then they got divorced, that would be really sad. But that has happened zero times.” [Louis C.K.: Hilarious, 2011]

Right?? So why the hell are we automatically crazy sad for people when they announce their divorce?  Maybe it’s not so sad. They made a, yes very difficult and thought out, decision to move on with their lives without the other person. Good for them?

Now I must insert the mandatory caveat. Some divorces are very heavy, very tragic, and absolutely terrible.  Sometimes it is someone who was perfectly happy, they come home, and their spouse announces they are getting divorced. That’s sad. I don’t really want to play the blame game in hypothetical situations, but I have a very hard time believing someone could be entirely oblivious in a marriage where the other person was totally unhappy.  I might suggest that the person living in the lie of bliss may not be tending to the needs of the unhappy partner…and the unhappy partner needs to get a backbone and fucking say they are considering packing their Pruis before it’s too late.

There are certainly those situations, but we decide to apply them to every case of divorce.  We automatically assume it’s the most absolute tragic scenario and with heavy hearts we mourn.  We do the same thing with marriages, assume that it’s the most romantic fairy tale of a union, and that rainbows are going to shoot out of their eyeballs for the rest of their lives.

These assumptions are stupid and we need to knock it off. You can keep the happy rainbow assumption about marriage, but when people get divorced, it’s not always a terrible thing.  Sometimes it really is a fantastic decision for everyone, and life is going to be a lot better for the two after they stop killing each other trying to make it work.

I know that there are the religious people out there who completely disagree with me. I know that all too well because they are the ones who begged me to stay in my marriage for so long. I knew the marriage was over fairly early on, but because I made the commitment to God, I stayed. I made a lot of mistakes during that time – getting caught up in a legalistic church, drinking the Kool-Aid, marrying the first guy that asked, and waking up one morning married to someone I hadn’t even known for a full year.

Whoops. I don’t mean to sum up the seriousness of those 4 years and pretend it didn’t matter to me, because it did, but I don’t think I have to feel bad about it for the rest of my life. I spent 3 out of those 4 years in and out of counseling, Bible studies, reading relationship books, studying healthy marriages, doing everything I could to make it work. But I was still unhappy. It wasn’t my time to be married yet, and that’s completely my fault. Then I invested everything I had into trying to make something work that never had a chance in the first place.

That’s a little bit of my story.  I realize it’s less tragic than some, but it does give me some authority to speak on the subject of marriage and divorce.  I will never write a book on how to have a perfect marriage, just like I will never write a book about how-to-not-fear-spiders. But what I can say is how important it is to love who you are with, and that includes yourself.  When I was in that silly church that loved to call me a horrible sinner for even considering divorce, I told them I was miserable and unhappy. They replied, “Marriage is about holiness, not happiness.”

My best friend at the time said this, and I didn’t believe it then but I’ll say it now. “That’s a bunch of BULL SHIT.”

Marriage is about a lot of things, and I don’t think you can sum it up in a trite little phrase like that. I don’t want to go into the depths of my misery, but what I can say is that one of the best decisions in my life was my divorce.  And I know I’m not alone on that one. There are a lot of very difficult decisions to make in life, and divorce is one of them…but sometimes it’s the right one.

And while society thinks that they can label us who believed enough in marriage to try it, sometimes hastily, we absolutely do not have to bear the damning titles they want to give us.  I’m single, not divorced. I’m a woman, not a divorcee. Once we can shed these sad and miserable titles, we are free to dream again.  Sure, we need some time to lick our wounds and put ourselves back together again so that we can be a whole, single person. But once we do, there is hope again.

Just because you may have been in a bad marriage, doesn’t mean all marriages are bad. Just because you may have been divorced, doesn’t mean you fail at life. If you fall in love again, you shouldn’t have to be afraid of wearing a yellow dress because you aren’t pure enough for a white one. Fuck that.

Life is too short to get caught up in meaningless labels and shaming each other.  I for one am excited about my future in love. And maybe marriage.  I believe deeply in commitment, and love the institution of marriage. I also believe everyone should get a fresh shot at marriage, even if you’ve tried before. Marriage is a celebration of love. I think of all things to focus on, I think it should be love, not labels.

Now go on, you can change your search to “joni erdmann blissfully happy.” 😉