My 2 Wives™

Today I want to challenge once and for all the notion of the “right” kind of family.  When asked to describe a family, most people reply: one mom, one dad and two kids.  But is that really what happens in our society?

I want everyone to point to the family which has one mom, one dad, two kids and no divorce any place in the lineage.  There can be no premature deaths either because that introduces additional marriages and step children.

Now that you have identified those people, point to those people who are untouched by divorce.  By that I mean, who in that pure family group has no cousins, aunts, uncles without the stain of divorce or remarriage.

My point is that on every family tree the branches get pretty fuzzy on the ends.  The so called pure family is a fantasy.  Former President Bill Clinton is a child of divorce.  Heck 3/4 of Queen Elizabeth’s children have divorced.  Striving for the Right or Pure Family is an exercise in foolishness and yet so very common by those people with the microphone in society.

So any of you guys out there wanting to put down, discriminate against or otherwise besmirch expanded families, I suggest you get your own house in order and not cast stones until you do.

Happy July 4^th.  I hope you and your family are enjoying our national holiday.  We are working on moving.  Today we are getting everything ready before the move.  What a job!

I am not sure at what point I bought into the American idea of commercialism but when you go through your closets and garage you begin to realize you’ve been hoodwinked.  That special zip up foldable blanket for picnics is just collecting dust because a regular blanket works just fine and doesn’t take a PhD to put back together.

I am so guilty of telling people to examine theirs lives and yet, here I am, with out of control spending and way, way, way too much stuff.  Talk about being insincere.

I think that my attack on social ideals needs to be tempered with a solid understanding of how quickly and seemingly innocently  a person can loose control.  It is amazing how often we are all just on auto-pilot.  Whether it’s a belief against expanded marriage or too much junk in our garage, I think we could all do with a good cleaning and reexamination of how we live and what we believe to be true.

What a busy summer.  I know that I just keep harping on this but everyday is filled to the rim with activities.  #1 and I are moving in 5 days and have not even started backing.  The good news is that in an expanded marriage there are frequently lots of hands when the work is to be done.  Not all of it is that reliable but the kids do what they can.

I noticed that our overall numbers have been down since the start of the summer.  I hope the decline has more to do with the time of year and the successful resolution of the Texas stuff.  I’d hate to think that I had become more boring but you never know.

We still have a nice ranking and more than 1000 people a month read the blog regularly.

I know I have asked before bt if there are any topics you’d like to see discussed here just submit a comment.  I have been pretty good about getting around to responding—if I do say so myself.

Our new house is going to be very nice.  It’s much smaller but sits on a nice location with huge shade trees, crowing roosters and a train whistle in the distance.  We are moving to a small town for the first time.  I am a little bit worried about the reaction to our expanded marriage but will see how it goes.

The lot is actually large enough to ultimately build another house for #2 and there is already a guest house nearly complete.  I hope to make this the last stop on our tour of homes.  We have been in 6 houses in the past 3 years between the two families—that’s a lot of moving.

Every move until now has been to something bigger and pricier but not this time.  I think they call it downsizing and it feels great.

Expanded instead of Complex marriage?  I like it!  Way to go Joe! 

I officially will change from this point forward. Polygamy will be replaced with expanded marriage and monogamy will be replaced with simple marriage.

It’s great having super intelligent readers.

Mr. X

Here is a very interesting article I found about marriage.  It gives equal treatment to simple and complex marriages and I wondered what you thought.  The author is basically proposing the idea that we do away with legal marriages.

What?  Why would we want that?  When you do away with legal marriages, you allow adults to organize themselves through religious and spiritual unions and contractual agreement for all property.

In essence, you could form a marriage through a simple decree.  It could involve a church and family or a camp fire and a full moon.  You, as an adult, would decide the direction for your life and the government would not be in a position to tell you that you are WRONG!

I will have to think about this for a bit but at first blush, I like the idea.  It’s people making decisions for themselves, directing their own lives and minimal governmental intervention.  What do you think?

As you know, I am involved in a long term complex marriage with two women.  I must love it because I stay but does that mean I am in favor of someone else living the same lifestyle?  Absolutely not!

That may shock you, but alas, it’s true.  I am NOT in favor of complex marriages as a lifestyle because they are so darned hard to keep together.  In a world where more than 60% of simple marriages end in divorce, what’s the chance one involving more people will succeed? Slim to none in my estimation.  I am the exception and not the rule?

There are just so many moving parts.  There is built in jealousy, time is more scarce, money can be tighter.  Feelings can get hurt at the drop of a hat—trust me on this because I know.

If you ask me if getting involved in a complex marriage is a good idea—I’d have to answer no.  There are some tremendous benefits.  For one, if you do it right you will NEVER take your wives for granted—you’re working too hard.  OK that was a joke, but I find that I do value each women completely for what she contributes to my life. 

People in simple marriages often are just going through the motions–before a divorce. I have found that in my complex marriage there is no time for coasting like that—emotionally, financially or productively.  I am going all the time—and loving it—but I never take the time I spend with anyone in my family for granted.

I firmly believe that you should have the opportunity to be as busy as I am–but–I would not suggest it.  It may seem like a contradiction but I want you to be free to marry more than one person but smart enough not too.