Recently, I decided to move in with my boyfriend of three years. Friends and family:

A) congratulated me on the big move;

B) questioned why I’d give up independence;

C) prayed for my salvation, or

D) asked “when’s the wedding?”

Let’s just say that making a home with the person you love leaves people wanting and waiting for you to take the “real” big step: marriage.

There’s no question marriage is popular. Gays and lesbians are entrenched in a legal battle for the right, and recently won the right in Argentina. The institution of marriage is so ingrained in the East Indian culture that a child who is gay is not as much of an issue for parents as one who is unmarried. The divorce rate in India is a mere 1 percent, so it’s perhaps understandable to wish this for your children.

Less understandable is our society’s “relationship” with marriage, despite the discouraging statistic that nearly half of all marriages here end in divorce. We engage in and encourage in others the logical fallacy that a relationship doesn’t have creds unless there’s is a license involved.

I know of plenty successful, long-term marriages, and I don’t begrudge anyone who wants to get or stay married. And it’s none of my business if the likes of Larry King want to make a mockery of the institution. I understand that religion and children play a part in the decision. I’ll even grant that there are some evolutionary imperatives for getting married. Women are hard-wired to find a protector/provider. Men are hard-wired to...well...find a woman.

But I’m not religious nor am I planning a family. I’m relatively secure thanks to technology and law enforcement. My partner and I are committed in words and deed.

So what does marriage get me? Especially in California — where domestic partners have nearly the same legal rights as a married couples — it’s easier to list reasons why not to get married:
• Marriage can serve to make one or both partners lazy.

• Marriage can make you feel you are captive or a captor.

• There is so much dishonor associated with leaving a spouse that many remain in an unhappy relationship at all costs.

• Marriage vows consist of big promises — “to love, honor and obey till death due us part” — that most of us can’t realistically keep.

Therefore, I propose a larger and, in some ways, more challenging definition of marriage — one that does not rely on enslavement, false pride, or the threat of divorce to survive: Marriage is when two worlds become linked as one. It is when two people come to resonate with one another. The whole they create together is larger than their individual identities. They feel this resonance as a palpable sense of connection and aliveness.

This definition also allows for more realistic vows I promise to bring my best creative, productive, and collaborative self to the success of our mutual endeavor and encourage and appreciate this in each other. I promise to foster an atmosphere of trust, mutual respect and support. I promise to honor the whole that we have created and foster an ethic of commitment, hard work, and excellence toward preserving that whole. I promise to act with good intent and assume good intent and respectfully search for solutions when there is conflict or differences of opinion. I promise to stay in touch with the joy and excitement of our mutual adventure.

Adapting this definition and these vows would likely be an affront to societal expectations, but so is everything that is on the cutting edge of change. If you agree it’s time for a change, then I invite you to join me in a knitting circle so we can figure out what the hell to do with all the thread resulting from the unraveling of our social fabric.

Sandberg is in the book publishing business. Reach her at sandberg8462@yahoo.com.