ALMOST THERE! 

Luna status: couch related comfort a few feet away. One of my other cats is helping me with this one. Proof! (He's enjoying the warm generator today)

Wine: not at the moment, but mimosas later maybe?

Today, we are going to learn how to gain oneness. It seems to me that oneness is being used as a euphemism for compatibility, but it's too early to tell yet. 

Salesman Headship and Nosy Busybody are sitting at the kitchen table. Too bad. I was sorta hoping that Salesman Headship would have kicked Nosy Busybody out on his ass and told him to stay the actual fuck away from his daughter, but it was not to be. Salesman Headship wants to know how the couple can achieve oneness in this system. 

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Pat: One of the most important things I have been reading about in the whole courtship issue is the idea of oneness. Most everything that I’ve read talks about how the couple needs to start becoming one during the courtship period. Some people talk about mental oneness, some about spiritual oneness. 

So, I guess I was right in assuming that oneness was sorta a euphemism for compatibility, but maybe a little more than that? I'm going to call it compatibility with a side of actually knowing each other. Salesman Headship seems to actually care about his daughter, so he has that going for him. Too bad he's going to end up selling The Good Girl anyway (SPOILER!).

They are dragging out the tired pieces of the heart being lost if the relationship doesn't work out bullshit. Yay! I LOVE the shit out of that argument. Apparently, since courtships can be broken, they are susceptible to the same heart bits losses as the dating model. I guess I can't argue the logic too strongly, horrifying as I find it. Arranged marriages with no choice in the matter DO prevent pieces of the heart being lost. Too bad they can also ruin lives, especially if she's forced to marry a "fornicator". I completely think the base premise is flawed, because love is infinite, so giving away pieces of your heart is utter bullshit, but the logic sort of tracks. Unfortunately, that's probably how people end up getting pulled into this bullshit.

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Sakal: Yes. Now the ‘oneness’ of these stages is important, but I think there is something much more serious that we must look at. In each of these stages the individuals concerned make a sort of commitment, no?

Pat: What do you mean?

Sakal: Well, let us say that a young man, George, is thinking it is time for him to marry. So he looks around the church, among his friends, or whatever, and says, “I wonder who I should court?” He looks at a series of girls and says, “Should I court her?”

Well, even if he thinks about her for a minute or two, he has thought about her, as a possible wife.

Pat: And you’re worried about his thought life?

Sakal: Well, that is an issue, but that isn’t what I’m talking about now. Right now I’m talking about his ‘commitment life’. For those few seconds, he has made a very small, very light, commitment to that girl. 

You know how I said earlier that the logic sort of tracked? This one? WHAT THE SHIT FUCK did I just read? Sigh. So contemplating courting someone is now giving away, I don't know, pieces of your commitment I guess? Interestingly, Mr. Ohlman (is a creeper) does not even attempt to give any scriptural support for this bit. I'm going to guess that's because there's no chance of doing so, he's just gonna be pretentious and just talk a lot? Disclosure: if we are including brief fantasies of being married to someone, I am the world's worst, because there are no pieces of my commitment left for my husband, and we've been together for nearly 20 years. 

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Pat: Oh, my. I see where you are going. This is awful. From the time of pre-friendship, through courting, he has gotten used to making commitments and then, when the girl on the other end doesn't turn out to be what he was thinking, he drops her, he breaks that commitment. Then, when he comes to marry a girl, he has gotten into the horrible habit of making, then breaking commitments. But surely he will understand that the marriage commitment is one that can’t be broken just because he finds a fault in the girl!

Sakal: Hopefully; but even if he does, what of his heart? Will he not, in his heart, carry about seeds of dissatisfaction; a hidden thought that it ‘isn’t fair’ and 'I should be able to drop her'? Isn’t that what all his previous experience has taught him?

Pat: Wow!... and our daughters as well, although in a different fashion. She would get used to having, and then losing... or even dropping... various boys. So even when she commits to marriage, she retains her old habits. 

Is this real life? There's so much wrong with this I don't even know where to START. So the fact that I've fantasized about being married to various random men means that I will dump mister destiny at the first opportunity because it's easy or something? This argument makes no sense and I hate it. 

Thank god this was a short chapter - it seems like all the ones left are.... less than three pages.