"Mummy, why do people get married?"
A little voice perks up from the back seat.
When my pre-schooler isn't probing me about his next snack, or why alpacas are white, he's asking the big questions. He's still in night nappies and learning how to roll his R's. I get it; it's hard being four.
It doesn't help that we're driving home from a few days away with the kids. There's not a lot of fuel left in the tank.
This seemingly innocent question had me stumped. Not only because I felt I had to break it down into a kid-friendly explanation; but because all of a sudden, after being married 12 years myself, I wasn't actually sure how to answer it myself.
Eventually, some words tumbled out.
"If you have a best, best, friend and you want to see them every single day, you might want to marry them."
"But for how long mama?"
He pressed on.
I paused.
"Well...the idea is that it's for ever."
__________
My parents' marriage was 'arranged'.
My mother was 18 and my father was 20.
'Forced' would be too strong a word, but she cried for the weeks and months that followed. She would remind me every so often (usually when she was mad at my dad) that she never wanted to marry him.
Their marriage was a union under obligation; an arrangement in the pursuit of alliance and financial benefit between families in lieu of love. It wasn't her decision to make.
In 1970s Vietnam, it wasn't uncommon. Back then, you didn't always marry for love. Marriage was transactional. It was just the way things were.
40 years on, my parents are still married. Through it all I've seen before my eyes what their marriage represents: sacrifice and compromise; determination and dedication; a slow simmered love that's kept its tinder over an extraordinary amount of time. I've seen what it takes to learn to love someone.
If there was any great lesson from my parents' marital fate, it was this: that love is not a feeling but a choice that we make every single day.
__________
Conformity and duty is in my bloodline.
But it didn't stop me from growing up in Australia with a glint in my eye and an appetite for rebellion.
Determined to carve my marital destiny on my own terms, I fell in love willingly and freely. I was 16 when I met my first boyfriend. My parents thought he was good for me. I believed it for a time, too. A third of my life, to be exact. We were high school sweethearts and lovestruck teens together for eight years, and while I didn't realise it at the time, most of the relationship was incredibly toxic.
He spent enough time with me to realise he didn't want to spend the rest of his life with me. It was all at once confusing and infuriating. I was shattered; blinded by the naivety of first love.
Hindsight's 20/20 and looking back, he did the both of us a favour.
After we broke up, I was determined that would be the last time I confused a lesson for a soulmate.
And so, when I was 25 I threw myself into marriage. I met my now-husband two months after my ex and I parted ways. I was young and I thought I had love on a string. I guess being with the 'wrong' person for a third of my life made me so damn sure of who was 'right'. When you know, you know. And this felt so right.
I was swept up in a love tornado that felt all conquering and the meaning of everything. It was romance and rainbows. Homecooked meals and I love yous. It was breakfast in bed and late night rendezvous.
It made marriage seem a logical, noble and courageous thing to shoot for. So I went all in.
I believed in The One; that there was only one person on this planet who could rock my world; that forsaking all others and going to bed with the same person every day and every night until we're 89 was as easy as saying 'I do'.
After all, I've seen my parents walk this tightrope for 40 years. How hard could it be?
___________
For various reasons I don't have time to go into, I grew up having a fractious relationship with my dad.
So on my wedding day, I gave myself away. There I was at the top of the aisle: in my op shopped veil, a leopard print dress off the rack and an aforementioned rebellion that saw me move out of home months before I walked down the aisle.
I was at my fairytale wedding and I couldn't have been happier.
A decade has passed and of all the things I've learnt about marriage, it's that forever is a damn long time to be with the same person. Especially when you're deep in the trenches raising babies.
I have this theory: kids can make or break your marriage.
I think it's the longing for your old life; nostalgia for your old self; and a yearning for things to not be this hard. It's the distractions outside of the marital home that tempt you with a fantasy life devoid of dirty dishes, mealtime battles and endless piles of laundry.
You convince yourself you've fallen out of love, or that monogamy's a myth; or that you deserve more, better; a connection that will never fade.
Yes, there's more than one person in this world for us and, by the same token, there is not one person who can give us everything. It's impossible for someone to fulfil all our social, intellectual, emotional and physical needs all at the same time.
But 12 years since that day I walked myself down the aisle, marriage has taught me the grass is greener where we water it.
And that's the thing isn't it? Realising it might not always be a perfect ending but staying the course. Playing the hand we're dealt. Maybe it's having the courage to look within, and making a choice that reflects love, not your fears.
Someone once said the only thing harder than being a good parent is being a good spouse and I've never believed anything more.
____________
Back to that day in the car with Otis.
I can only describe being a parent to an inquisitive and precocious four year old as a mixed bag of cuteness, wholesomeness and hard truths.
Not satisfied with the answers I gave him moments earlier, he pressed on with the big questions.
"Mumma, why are you and dada mariweeed?' he asks with a genuine curiosity (bless his heart).
"Well, I guess me and dada are best friends. People marry their best friends because they want to spend forever with them."
Answering this felt a little easier but there was still a sense of hesitation and pensiveness in my reply; albeit imperceptible to everyone in the car but me.
We finally pull into the driveway, and his little voice perks up again.
"Mumma, can you marry me?"
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