Marriage & Money

I used to hear people saying "I don't need to be married.  Marriage is just a piece of paper.", etc... And I always thought they were just saying that because they weren't in a place where they really wanted to spend the rest of their life with someone - or that the someone they were with was making "no-marriage" a condition of being with that person.  Either way, I looked down my nose at them...

But isn't life funny.  Here I am 2+ years into a relationship with a man that I think I can spend the rest of my life with. 

On his best days, he is kind and loving.  He is generous to a fault.  He looks at the future with all the awe of a child. 

On his worst days he is self centered & so selfish that one would think he was raised as an only child (but he wasn't - in fact he is the oldest of 3 & lived in a "we can't afford ____" or a "only rich white people do _____" house).  (I HATE PREJUIDICE & ALL IT DOES TO EVERYONE IT TOUCHES- BUT THAT'S ANOTHER POST)  And while he looks at the future with 'awe', he never learned the financial skills to make his future come true.

But his best self is are slowly, steadily outweighing his bad self.  And I find myself wondering where we will be in the future, what we will be together in the future.

As emotional of a person as I am, I am also a logical person.  Things need to "make sense" to me.  And as I think about our future, I think about marriage & then I think "I can not marry him - because 'marriage' for us does not make sense." 

I'm not worried about his love - I know he loves me.  I am worried that for the 30+ years he has been an adult he has made many bad choices.  Sometimes those choices were a result of a lack of knowledge, sometimes they were because of the limiting environment he grew up in, sometimes those choices were a result of selfishness (the hardest situation for me to deal with).  So the reality of his bad choices is he has job hopped because when he got mad (or didn't get his way) he simply left one job & got another job.  And while that didn't seem to be a bad thing to do back then, today it makes him look like a bad risk to an employer so it is much more difficult to find a 'good' job now.  He has bad credit - resulting in vehicle payments being much higher than what they need to be.  He has bills that have went to collections - and that means eventually bill collectors will be calling.  The bottom line is that if he and I were married, I would become responsible for some of his bills - and even if I wasn't responsible, my credit would be effected. 

So because of finances, marriage is not for me.

Now all this said, I do want to say that he is moving forward with his financial & job responsibility.  He has never asked me for a dollar and he knows that "my money is my money".  He knows I am putting my last child through school.  He knows what is important to me.  I think if we were in our 20's or even early 30's I would feel like there is time for him to turn himself around financially - but he is 50, I am 49 & the time has run out.  By the time he would be able to climb out of the hole he dug himself in we would be retirement age.

I've built a home for my sons and me.  And when I die, I want them to take the house, sell it & split the money 3 ways & live a happy life.  They know that.  But if I marry, the house will go to D & I don't want that.  Now that said, I could always tell the kids to sell the house & split the money with D.  My boys would do that (I think).  The only way I would feel differently is if D miraculously was able to take out a loan to buy 1/2 of the house from me.  Then I would leave 1/2 to him & have the kids split the rest of it.

But for now - marriage is out - because of this house.  Because I am not willing to loose what I have built for my kids and myself all because I love someone who made bad choices before I met him (regardless of the reason for the bad choices).

Does that make me terrible???????  Or just overly logical??????

PLUS---why am I worried about this?  He hasn't asked me to marry him! 

Lord Have Mercy, I'm borrowing trouble!