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Home > Blogs > Women's Life > Archives > 2011 > April > 01
Friday, April 1, 2011
No wedding ring for Prince William
According to the Associated Press, Prince William has opted not to wear a wedding band, while his lovely fiancee Kate Middleton will wear one made of Welsh gold. Welsh gold is very rare and has been used in royal wedding rings for most of the past century.
My father’s side of the family is English, and while I’ve never been to Britain myself, I have an enduring curiosity about the royal family. I don’t really follow them closely as far as the tabloid gossip goes, but I still find myself peeking at the headlines when something major is going on. And for the record, I always preferred Harry over William. But maybe that’s just my ginger solidarity showing.
This announcement, if you can even call such a trivial detail an announcement, has sparked all sorts of discussion around the internet about the importance of men wearing wedding bands. It’s actually a rather recent tradition - according to Wikipedia, it’s only been within the past century that men started wearing rings as well as women.
A lot of single women seem to prefer that men wear a ring just so they know that man is off the market and not eligible. To some, a married man who chooses not to wear his ring is a man facing marital troubles or doubts, or someone seeking a little something on the side.
Others forgo the jewelry in favor of tattooed rings - they’re less expensive, impossible to lose or have stolen, and (theoretically) permanent. Still others will wear a different type of jewelry, like a necklace, especially if they do a lot of work with their hands and don’t want to risk damaging a ring or being injured. Not all women want to wear rings, either - for some, it makes them feel like property, as if they are somehow “branded” as belonging to a man, or like their love can be bought for the price of a diamond.
My husband’s band is made of titanium. We had looked at a lot of different kinds, but he has very thick fingers, and most of the bands he liked did not come in the size he needed - at least, not without paying another couple hundred bucks for the extra material. Titanium is dirt cheap - his ring cost all of $45. It’s also super lightweight. It looks heavy, but in your hand it feels almost like it’s made of plastic (leading to many jokes about having gotten it out of the gumball machine). It has one major disadvantage, though: titanium cannot be cut, so if he were ever to get his ring caught on something, he’d likely lose the whole finger. Luckily for both of us, he works in IT and is at less risk of snagging himself than a construction worker, a machinist or a landscaper, for example.
I wear both my rings all the time. I only take them off when I’m exercising. I lift weights and use the rowing machine a lot, and I’ve just recently taken up pole dancing as a form of exercise. All three activities involve gripping, and when rings are on, that usually means a lot of pinching. And occasionally I’ll take them off if I’m doing something really messy like kneading dough, gardening or painting. But when I’m out in public, they’re always on. I’m not too concerned about advertising my marital status; I’m just used to wearing them and feel weird without them on.
To my knowledge, Hubby always wears his, too. But I don’t think I’d be offended if he didn’t. I trust him not to be dishonest about being married if some woman starts hitting on him. I’m actually pretty tolerant of casual flirting. Flirting is fun; a lot of people do it without having any particular goal or motive in mind. My husband is very charismatic and flirtatious himself, so I don’t blame other women for falling for his charm. At the end of the night, ring or no ring, he’s coming home with/to me, and that’s what matters. If anything, I think he would be upset if I chose not to wear my rings.
How do you feel about men wearing wedding rings? Does your husband wear one (if you’re the husband, you can answer for yourself), or if you’re unmarried, would you care if your hubby-to-be wanted to go ringless?
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TweetDo men actually care about romance?
One of my latest guilty pleasures is reading relationship advice columns. Call it schadenfreude or simply morbid curiosity, but sometimes all I have to do is read about other people’s problems to put my own problems in perspective. Sure, my hubby still leaves his undershirts inside his shirts when he throws them in the laundry after years of being asked not to, but at least I don’t have to ask myself if I can still stay friends with someone if their stepfather sexually assaulted me when we were younger. (Real example from DearWendy.com)
Besides the write-in kinds of columns, I always find myself sucked into articles about “How to add more romance to your relationship” or “How to spice up your love life” etc. etc. Not really because I want that sort of advice for myself, but because I am curious to see what other people find romantic, or “spicy,” as it were.
Most of the time, these articles are written with a female audience in mind. I’ve read Maxim, FHM magazine and AskMen.com and haven’t seen nearly as much attention paid to the topic of romance. And I’ve noticed a lot of the tips given in these articles are somewhat female-centric; that is, the articles tell women to do romantic things for their significant others that most women would find romantic if the guy did it for her.
For example, one idea that I’ve seen in multiple forms is to leave little love notes around the house, in his car, in his lunch bag, written in the fog on the mirror after a shower … you get the picture. I can’t speak for all women, but that’s the kind of thing that would make me melt a little inside if my husband did it for me.
But would there be any melting at all if I did it for him? Do men actually get something out of romantic gestures? Is romance something they crave when it’s missing or has gone stale? When they do something romantic, is it really out of love, or are there ulterior motives at work?
I’m sure this is one of those questions where it really depends on the guy. Not all men will value romance equally, obviously, and those who do will have different ways of showing it. But if magazines are allowed to talk about men and women in sweeping generalizations and imply that the same worn-out romance tips will work for every couple, then darn it, so am I.
I posed this question to my Facebook friends to see what they came up with. Here are some of the reactions…
The Latin Professor: “I do, but I’m completely weird, and I’ve never been in a relationship where anyone but me did any of the romancing.”
Grandma: “Opi was very romantic and wrote many love poems to me over our 38 years together.”
The Dancer: “I would have to say no about my hubby. He asked me what the word meant a few months ago and I knew then that romance was out of the question. LOL!”
Sister-in-Law: “[My husband] is very romantic. He finds sappy cards and remembers I don’t like roses and makes a bouquet of flowers for me himself of my favorite flowers and other such romantic stuff.”
Mother-in-Law: “I do think it does make them feel good. They see the excitement of bringing happiness to a person.”
The Foodie: “Without a doubt. After almost 32 years together, I still look for things to do for [my wife]. Romance to me means what I can do for [her] to let her know how much I love her, not what she does for me.”
I will say that I wasn’t all that surprised by those men who replied that they do care about romance. The Latin Professor is a very sweet guy, a dear friend and a real gentleman. My Opi was a creative soul who had a real love for language, so poetry is right up his alley. The Foodie is a generous man in all aspects of his life (including his food - delicious!).
And to defend my poor husband’s honor in case anyone thinks this is about him: he is a nontraditional romantic. Along the same veins as his older brother, he bought me a bouquet of flowers for Valentine’s Day this year - not roses, but painted daisies in a variety of wild colors, which speaks much more to my personality. He also keeps a black-and-white photo of me that he took some five or six years ago when he was going through an amateur photographer phase, tucked into the rim of his overhead visor in his car. We don’t get to spend a lot of time together right now because we work opposite shifts, so it makes me a little melty to know he still “sees me” every day on his way to and from work. He may not hold doors open for me or surprise me with candlelit dinners or even tell a merciful lie when I’m wearing something unflattering, but he does make an effort in his own way.
Anyway, back to the question: Does romance have any importance or meaning to men, or could they live happily without it?
As always, keep it clean!
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