"Let's have a moratorium on marriage," I suggested to my boyfriend. We were in bed in my bedroom, the only room in my apartment with real air conditioning, and we weren't touching. It was hot, still, even with air conditioning; the heat wave was expected to break any day.
Not that he and I are or ever were engaged. But at some point, past the getting-to-know-you point but before the we-may-as-well-make-this-official point, someone brings up marriage, in cute ways, usually: suggestions for possible honeymoon locations or who will perform at the ceremony, or laments that your parents will never get a chance to meet unless you get married, or any number of ways you tiptoe around the idea of forever-and-always without using the words "forever" and "always." The idea of marriage phases into the reality of marriage.
