I think it’d be better to be married at 18. It’d give some direction to your life.

Boomer advice warns against it, but a lot of that advice implies sleeping around. “Don’t get married, go to parties.” “Don’t get married, travel the world.”

Which is frustrating. Boomers have written 10 million songs about their long-lost teenage fling, but none about marrying them. “Those were the beeeest daaaays of my liiiiife,” “and then I never saw her again ☹️.”

It’s as though it’s an inevitable tragedy, as sad as death, but something we just have to go through. No we don’t! We can experience love and hold onto it for the rest of our lives! Write songs about that!

The boomer is in love with conflict, tragedy, and death. It rubbed off on Gen X and created their cynicism. That in turn rubbed off on Millenials and created their irony. That in turn rubbed off on us and will, hopefully, create our sincerity about life. We CAN marry the girl we love and form a happy life together. We don’t have to kiss and bang at 19 and then never see each other again.

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Discussion

A lot of commercialised Boomer advice is knowingly bad advice for no better reason than "breaking middleclass taboos".

My older cousin and her husband got together at age 14. They didn't get legally married until their late 20s, but they're still together after three decades, with three kids and now a grandchild.

Interpersonal skills, self-discipline and shared goals are my takeaways from that. The ring is a good tradition but counts for little if the relationship doesn't have those first.