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Long tenured married couples know that over the years there will be something done by one or both them that is serious enough to cause their marriage to disintegrate. Hence, the longevity of the marriage is related to how well the hurt spouse manages the forthcoming marital crisis.
In 1993, my wife Gwynelle and I were doing ethnographic research on a book, “Wedlock … The Common Sense Marriage” where we chatted with people of varying races, religions, and ethnicities who said they were happily married 25 years or more. A key question in our discussions was how long it takes to do something bad enough to destroy the marriage. The average time the interviewees offered was five minutes.
If someone is beating you for five minutes, that is a very long time. In this five minute time period, you or your spouse can copulate in an infidelity rendezvous, start a drug habit, gamble away the family savings, murder someone, start a life of crime, and so on. My wife and I looked holistically at our data and we wrote, “Dividing a year into five minutes increments, you offer each spouse over 100,000 opportunities to do something foolish enough to destroy the marriage.”
In 25 years, each spouse gets 2.5 million opportunities to do something dumb enough to destroy the marriage meaning there are 5 million chances between the two of them. My guess is, if you chat confidentially with most long tenured married couples you will find tomfoolery by one or both spouses over the years accompanied with methods for managing this crisis.
US Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton is a national role model in managing a marital crisis in full view of the world. She had to keep her wherewithal as she watched her husband, Bill Clinton, then a sitting President of the United States of America undergoing impeachment by a Republican Control US House of Representatives. Hillary Rodham Clinton knew her husband was at the brink of being ousted from office when Monica Lewinsky’s semen stained dress showed up for a DNA test result would separate facts from deception forcing the President to admit to lying.
Reading the CNN chronology of President Bill Clinton’s media nightmare suggests that Hillary Rodham Clinton had enough reason to pack up and move out of The White House with plans to hire a good divorce attorney. That would have allowed groupie Monica Lewinsky to successfully destroy her marriage.
One need only be reminded of the sexual exploit of former South Carolina Governor Mark Sanford who was caught thinking with his small head to appreciate marital tomfoolery. The Sun News highlights this Governor Sanford story as to where things stand today.
“In June 2009, the Republican left the state for five days and told his staff he was hiking the Appalachian Trail, but he was really in Argentina visiting Maria Belen Chapur. He held a news conference to confess infidelity to his wife and later declared his lover his "soul mate" in lengthy interviews with The Associated Press.
“Weeks later, Jenny Sanford moved out of the governor's mansion in Columbia with their sons.
“The governor did not contest the divorce that followed.”
Although Jenny Sanford underwent severe embarrassment, the concubine won. The marriage disintegrated.
When we look at the Clinton marital crisis today we see that they are still together. What makes me shake my head in wonderment is Newt Gingrich, Former Speaker of the US House of Representatives that impeached President Bill Clinton, shows up with Christian Broadcasting Network’s David Brody spinning infidelity positively. Gingrich contends great passion for the United States of America helped to blind him in his indiscretions. Surely, if infidelity helped to impeach a sitting President, then Newt Gingrich ought to allow his great passion to tell him to get out of the Presidential Republican candidate selection process for his win would become a tabloid media circus.
I think a key to Hillary Rodham Clinton’s successful strategy to save her marriage was she made a conscious decision that it will not fail regardless of the public embarrassment that was forthcoming on a daily basis. Long tenured married people know that marriage cycles between good times and hard times. Hence, the marital longevity key is holding your house together until the fortune pendulum turns back in the positive socioeconomic direction.
