I wrote this one for a friend who, believe it or not, said she actually enjoys my weird humor! So naturally, I had no choice but to write something specifically for her. Kinda funny, she got married months ago and I don't think I've given her a copy yet. :-D
Dear _____ and ____, (names have been removed due to the fact that you are reading this)
As every newly-wed couple should be given at least one gift which they will always hold dear and never forget I decided to write a letter dedicated to the both of you. I decided to dedicate it to you because, well this is for you. I wouldn't want to dedicate it to someone else. That would be rude, don't you think? I think. Some people worry about that, but I don't. Thinking has become a critical part of my existence. Or maybe it always was. Oh who cares. On with the letter dedicated to the newly-wed happy couple! I don't know if you've ever noticed, but REM sings a song called "Shiny Happy People". The chorus goes like this (please imagine me singing it): "Shiny happy people holding hands, Shiny happy people laughing" My point is that if you take out the word shiny you get "happy people holding hands, happy people laughing". Notice that by so doing the first letter of each line is no longer capitalized as it should be, but that's not the point I was originally going to make. The point is that you are happy people holding hands AND laughing. Isn't that amazing! How REM knew that their song would apply to you I don't know.
What is another thing every newly-wed couple should receive? A comprehensive list of suggestions and advice from someone with lots and lots of marriage experience. I therefore take it upon myself to provide you with all of the pointers you could ever use in the already ever so useful letter that every newly-wed couple should get. Almost as exciting as winning a double jeopardy, I know. The fact that I'm not married has little to nothing to do with the content of this letter in any way at all. So don't you worry, it's all pretty original and extremely useful. I say pretty original because some of the concepts have been covered before, but not in the exact context that they are within this letter. Enjoy.
1. This one is by far the most important, which is why I have chosen to use the number one slot for this ever so important advice. Are you ready for it? That's funny, neither am I. Just kidding, I am ready regardless of the fact that you probably aren't. I don't really care either because I'm writing this and you are just reading. Anyway, every married couple should... hold on for a second. I would like to point out the fact that I did not say "every newly-wed couple", but instead said "every married couple". What this means to you: this letter will not only benefit your marriage now, but forever. It will apply tomorrow, three weeks, 4 years, or even 78 years from now when you are old and gray. If you go back to the days when our parents were young you could probably say old, gray, and gay. Gay meaning happy of course... because you are happy people holding hands. It's a good thing REM didn't say gay people holding hands. I don't think people would have understood it in the same way. Anyway, I suggest you frame this letter in an air-tight frame so that it won't corrode. Every married couple should have a copy of this letter. This is by far the most important suggestion I could give to you.
2. In case you haven't caught on yet, number one was a joke. Wasn't it funny? I thought so. Not that I don't think you should keep this letter safe and refer to it for years to come, but did you seriously expect that to be my best suggestion? Yes, I hear you say. Shoot. I just listened to a song by Oasis that kept repeating the following question: "Where were you while we were getting high?" to which I would respond: I was out getting down with my bad self (also known as dancing). I once bought a birthday card for my girlfriend (the amazing part is that it was actually for her birthday). On the front it had a picture of 4 people (2 girls and 2 boys) dancing (it was very clean and was meant to be humorous). On the inside of the card it said "birthdays are a perfect time to get down with your bad self" or something like that. Isn't that funny? Or maybe just disturbing? Anyway... suggestion number two is to never get high so that when someone asks you "where were you while we were getting high?" you can say "out buying a life-size poster of Bill Clinton" with a clear conscience (then again maybe not).
3. Number four brings me to a topic that has always bothered myself and many ____ philosophers (where ____ is should be the word Martian, but has been removed to protect the decency of the Martians). The topic is the remote control and who controls it. We all know that remote controls have been, and continue to be, responsible for the declining number of 47 year old ____ (Martian) philosophers (which is why it bothers them), but I'm not gonna worry about them. I'm worried about you... that's just the kind of guy I am. This brings me to the important part of this suggestion which I have chosen to title "How this works and what it means to YOU (not your cow, chicken, or frog)": Some men argue that they should control the remote. Some women argue that they should control it. This simply means that you should not let some man or some woman control your remote. It sounds simple, I know, but the advantages of this are not completely obvious. Imagine having some random man or woman in your house trying to control your remote. The problems this could cause are seemingly endless, but not hopeless. Here's what you can do (this really works). Set up a fake TV, fake remote control, and (this is my favorite) a life-size poster of Bill Clinton in front of your house or apartment. This will not only keep some man and/or some woman away, but probably everyone else as well. Is this starting to make sense? Maybe now you can see why there seems to be less and less 47 year old _____ (Martian) philosophers... don't worry if you don't understand it yet, it'll come with time.
4. True love isn't like a forest fire. It's just like a fire. You have to feed it. Forest fires feed themselves until it rains enough to put it out, it burns itself out, or they're stopped. It's kinda like goldfish. If you don't feed the goldfish the goldfish will die (unless they're in some kind of natural habitat where there is food naturally available but we aren't talking about those goldfish). A lot of things are like that actually. You don't want to burn only until it rains enough so the goldfish can jump out of the bowl... or maybe I'm getting my examples mixed up. Actually, you usually don't want to burn, but true love is like a fire and fires do burn. True love could be likened unto a fire IN a forest where wood is abundant and the fire can be fed for an eternity with some work (ie. cutting wood), but not really a forest fire. Or maybe it could, but that is outside of the scope of this letter. Or maybe it is in the scope of this letter. True love has the rage of a forest fire burning up canyon walls creating winds up to 150+ MPH. Of course, with love, that would be a good rage, not a bad rage. Bad rages are usually considered to be bad by even the most corrupt politicians.
5. Love is service. Do you remember doing service projects when you were younger? Or maybe last week? Have you ever hated service projects? Don't worry, love isn't the kind of service project one hates (unless one of you is sadistic). Remember the service projects you enjoyed? No? Shoot. So much for this suggestion.
6. Suggestion number six (that's this one) is an important suggestion. You may wonder why it's important, but I'm not going to tell you just yet. You have to read the suggestion first. I bet you're thinking "I'm trying!" to which I would say: a penny earned is not much, but two pennies is still not much. Several thousand pennies is dedication. Which brings me to my point. Dedication. Dedication to each other is more important than many other things that may seem to take precedence. It's kind of like math. People who stink at math might try to calculate the stuff out of the curvy lines we call parenthesis before the stuff inside of the parenthesis. Doing this is almost as dangerous as putting precedence on cows instead of each other. So be careful. Cows are considered to be dangerous by people and animals who have been in a stampede of cattle (just ask Mufasa from the Lion King, oh wait, he's dead). Just to clear that up a bit I wish to point out that the word cattle means (I'm not making this up) a bunch of any of the various chiefly domesticated mammals of the genus Bos, including cows, steers, bulls, oxen, wildebeest (I added this one since it's what killed Mufasa), and humans (although not in the genus Bos). So don't wait until the cows come home to dedicate yourselves to each other. The cows may eventually come home, but it may be in a stampede. And then it'd be too late (to eat the hamburger you were cooking because eating hamburger around cows is considered rude). It might be useful (to no one in particular) to point out that people over the centuries have noted that when a wildebeest bull (genus Connochaetes) mates with a domestic cow (genus Bos), the cow is rendered sterile and is subsequently killed by the herders. I wonder what they do with the meat.
Well, that concludes my comprehensive list of things that every married couple should know. Now, as you go throughout your life hand in hand as a newly-wed happily married couple, then a happily married couple, then a pretty old happily married couple, and then two old farts happily married just remember one thing: whatever you do or wherever you go beware of the cows. You never know who they've been watching, where they've been, or who they'll see next (or who they won't see next).
Copyright 2004 Ryan Martinsen
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