h2g2 The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy: Earth Edition

Of course, men are willing to commit to a relationship. I once knew a guy who committed to a relationship with a friend of mine! So there!!!


By the way, great page!

Thanks!
I'm committed now, but I'm 31 so I guess that's excusable...

Yeah, the bachelor thing eventually wears out and you want to "settle down." In fact, I'm only 23 years old and I'm considering "settling down" myself -- although the issue is really that I don't have anyone handy to "settle down" with.

I put "settle down" in quotes because in fact once one is married or otherwise in a comitted relationship, it becomes more difficult to settle down infront of the TV with a bag of popcorn or settle down in your bed on a Sunday morning after breakfast or in fact to settle down and relax in any one of a variety of ways. Now, this isn't meant to be a criticism of being committed, in fact it's probably not good to waste away your Sunday mornings in bed or your life in front of the TV. What is your experience on this weighty and important topic?

In this issue I have a lot of experience. As you say, the old sofa, the old TV and the old can of beer are not so free at will anymore. I believe this is due to the fact that I now have "responsabilities", a word that means that the things you used to like to do and enjoy have to step back for things you don't enjoy all that much. This is achieved after lots of "compromising", another word used in relationships, which means being told which of the things you liked to do that you can't do anymore.
Obviously, I'm exaggerating. But there is a flash of truth in it, and it goes for both parties in the relationship. But there are ways of getting what you want. My wife told me I moved to little, I should start jogging or some such. So I said, "Well, I certainly would fancy to start playing golf, how about that? Lot's of walking about, lot's of fresh air and things." She said that was fine, but she didn't realize that a round of golf takes like 4 hours. Since then, however, she has retaliated by starting playing soccer and floorbandy two nights a week, so again, compromising is the keyword...

That doesn't sound like compromising, it sounds like tricking your wife into letting you do things that she would not have if she knew the results. Is that the way to deal with the "compromise" issue? Or is there an actual real fair way to go about compromise?

I need to know... you neve know when that someone will show up and I aim to be prepared.

Compromise is not about meeting half way it's about apologising when you have done nothing wrong. Yesterday myself, my partner and our offspring (boy and girl 4 & 8 respectively) went on a day trip armed with a picnic. As normal the weather forced us to have our picnic in the car. I thought it would be safer if I sat in the back and utilised the rear parcel shelf as a makeshift kitchen, for the preperation of drinks and soft cheese Ryvita. Everything went well until my partner went round the back of the car and opened the boot ,which of course is connected to the parcel shelf, launching the aforementioned drinks and Ryvita onto yours truely. I muttered some sort of obscenity at her which of course immediatly put me in the wrong. After driving home in silence telling the kids to stop laughing and be as miserable as your parents, I apologised for being stupid enough to have been in the way of the flying picnic and calling her a 'stupid cow'. We made up and shared a pizza and a bottle of wine which all thankfully stayed on the plate until eaten.

The moral of the story beware of commitment and compromise and be prepared to be wrong at all times, and keep plenty of frozen pizza and your loved ones favourite kind of wine to hand for peace offerings.

Well, that sort of killed this conversation, didn't it?

No, actually -- my server lost all my settings and i had to figure out how to get my H2G2 account back. I couldn't even read your last two messages until a few minutes ago. Sorry

"Stupid cow"?!?!? Ouch! That must have taken a bit of apologising -- but I'll admit that you didn't _do_ anything wrong, but you sure _said_ something you shouldn't have.

Guess I have a lot of pointers for the next time I'm involved with someone and call her a stupid cow or whatever. I assume there are some good things about the whole relationshíp-marriage thing, though. If you just watch out and not have too big an ego and are "prepared to be wrong," there must still be some really rewarding aspects of it.

One problem, though -- I don't drink and the nearest good pizza is hundreds of miles away. I live in a small town in India. Maybe if i need to make up we can have a chicken biryani and a glass of Lassi

P.G Wodehouse once said something like, if a man wnats to fully go about the wooing of a girl, he will simply HAVE to gather his forces by aid of alcohol. If not, the wooing will be half measured and lead to no satisfactory result. Or something to that effect.

Relationships are a minefield, and you have to tread very carefully on occassion. For the most part (99% of the time) my partner and I have a good loving relationship we love each other and our kids more than anything, but every once and while we (like all couples) we seem to need to clear the air and get the little annoying things sorted out. Right now our lives and relationship are under great strain becuase we are in the process of selling our House and she has just graduated and not having much success on the job hunting front it is times like these that we both need to support each other and bide our time until our relationship settles back down to normality again - what ever that is?.

As you say, strains in relationships seem to occur at times when you need to support each other. There must be some sort of bug in the human psyche that makes us automatically misinterperate the signals a partner launches when he/she feels depressed or worried without actually saying so. Perhaps it's a biological Y2K?

I think it is impossible to be everything to one person, I know because I have tried, both people in a relationship need their own room to be themselves. There has to be a time or a place where you can just do what pleases yourself and no one else. I totally believe external friendships are a must and not necessarily mutual friends of both. I have friends who my partner niether likes or wishes to spend any time with, and she has friends I find uninteresting and dull but their her friends and I respect them and her relationship with them. We do of course have mutual friends and for the most part it is them we tend to see. I've always found the best part of a relationship is coming home to someone who is special and is happy to see me.
But you are right there is a built in defence mechanism that makes us defend our independance, we all have to be ourselves even in the context of a relationship and these are the times that the 'bug' is at it's strongest and you have to comprimse for the sake of the relationship and everyone in it's happiness.