The Sieve of Love

Three interesting articles on love Sunday and Monday, all of which touch on the fact that people are marrying later and later.

1 Here in the Post magazine a Washington Post editor describes the "Rules of Engagement" imposed in the very businesslike marriage counseling sessions in the suburban church she and her fiance belong to. Very realistic, very strict (almost like Bob Jones University rules for dating) and very different from the 1 day session my wife and I had in the Catholic Church 20+ years ago. The church appears to be one of the growing nondenominational evangelical churches that seem so common these days.

2 Here in the NY Times magazine is an article on three different modern matchmakers, two doing it for money. All seem to be working in the professional classes, professors, lawyers, stockbrokers and such. (One charges $20K for her services.!) They seem to function as screeners, winnowing out the unsuitable, nudging along the process, convincing people to be realistic and not unrealistically choosy.

3 Finally, William Raspberry, a columnist I like very much, in today's Post discusses the decline of romance on the Duke campus, where he's teaching. Dating is out, "hooking up" is in. I thought the key was in this quote: "Several young women said -- sadly, I thought -- that they don't really expect to find their future husbands in such encounters [hooking up]. They see it, they told me, as a college thing, a phase. Grad school is soon enough to start taking relationships seriously."

I think that's the key, with the emphasis on degrees and success, people don't plan to find their spouse in college, but after college. That means they have the world to choose from, but narrowing down the choices is hard, there's no convenient way to sieve the grain from the chaff. (See the Paradox of Choice, a book I mean to read, for discussion of problems resulting from having too many choices.) Some may do it by joining churches, others may invest in dating services, or if they have lots of money, a matchmaker.