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Didn't the husband support her financially all those years? Or doesn't that count for anything?
The great female/male divide at work here. Or here's my take on it anyway -
Most men view financially supporting a family through the years as a way of showing his love and respect for them, and women are looking for affection and attention as proof. Neither sex is looking at the other in order to interpret each other correctly. You hear it all the time in cases of female infidelity. She says, "I cheated because I felt neglected - if you loved me, you'd be home more!" And he says, "I'm never home because I have to work 12 hours a day to put a roof over your head!" She has no idea that he's doing it because he loves her.
Men and women misinterpret each other all the time, because many of us believe we think and act the same.
For me, words are cheap. She can say she loves me all day long, but forgets my birthday? I have only had two women, out of ten, make me a cake for my birthday. It was appreciated--even the one that didn't turn out, it was the THOUGHT that counted to me.
What, like buying the food she cooked, paying for the soap she did the family's laundry with, and the cleaning supplies she used to scrub up after them?
Keeping her fed, with a roof over her head. I'm sure she didn't sleep out in the barn. She probably had a bed to sleep in, and anything else her heart desired, in the way of material things. Probably wasn't a thing he wouldn't have gotten for her if she asked him for it.
None of my girlfriends ever worked. When one of them wanted a pedicure, do you know who paid for it? And then, while there, she decided she wanted a manicure too. I had to go to the bank and get more money out for that.
That is just a business arrangement. Anyhow, she gave up a teaching career, raised their kids and took care of the home - a full time job. She owes him nothing in return for his working for money. Plus, a fulfilling marriage normally entails a deep and reciprocal emotional relationship.
I have known women over the years just chomping at the bit for the kids to leave home in order to make their escape from emotionally vacant partner. It's their last chance at some kind of life for themselves, and one might as well be alone rather than lonely with someone else.
No--it's NOT. It's the way a real MAN shows he loves a woman! He takes care of her!
Yes, only financially. She supported him in every other way. That doesn't that count for anything? (My ex husband took care of me financially for almost 18 years. I loved him for it. It wasn't enough though. The bad outweighed that.)
Well, from what is described, he never cheated on her, or beat her. He just wasn't able to express his love in the way that she wanted.
No--it's NOT. It's the way a real MAN shows he loves a woman! He takes care of her!
Sorry but most women can support themselves these days and don't need to be taken care of financially. If you only date women who don't work so that you can feel like a man taking care of them, I think the word for that is codependent.
I don't know why she stuck around with her husband at all -- clearly, he was a worthless git!
He NEVER listened to her when she tried to talk to him about her lack of fulfillment, not once!
(We are, of course, assuming she tried several times to sit down with him and discuss these things like rational adults, letting him know that while she appreciated his personal views and the inherent hardships of earning a living in day-to-day life, all the while she needed to know that he was seeking communication between marital partners and figuring out ways to enrich their mutual lives.)
He was completely self-absorbed!
(We are, of course, factoring in his UTTER and disgusting self-absorbed approach to financing their livelihood -- how DARE he choose a FARM over a DIFFERENT life? That rotten SOT! Also, we're factoring in the selfish way he didn't cater to her desire for a better life -- see "never listened" above.)
He COMPLETELY took her for granted!
(Factoring in the OH-so-typical way in which men take women for granted, possibly best-illustrated in the song Where Have All the Cowboys Gone? when she sings the line "I will do the dishes if you pay all the bills". I mean seriously, where do these kinds of men get off, trying to pretend that earning a living means more than disappearing out the door in the morning and magically coming home with a paycheck at night? Stupid ingrates, one and all! And expecting DINNER on top of it? Oh, they're lucky women don't rise up and kill them in their sleep!)
He never REALLY cared about her happiness!
(It's entirely clear when he's dying and says he knows what she gave up for them he's being selfish, not letting her go, instead holding back his private shame at being cuckolded and forgiving her. What that selfish so-and-so SHOULD have done was to let her go, accepting his selfish fate for what it was, looking over at her as the truck sat there in the rain and saying "It's okay, I understand, a woman's got to do what she's got to do. GO, go now! RUN, darling, I love you enough to set you free -- and don't worry about the farm or the family, your individual happiness is more than the so-called greater good. Run, my love, RUN to the man you cheated on our marriage with. My shame is my own, you're blameless.")
Yeah, if this movie was real life -- hey, wait a minute, it IS real life! What are we waiting for? Get your torches and pitchforks, folks! KILL the monster! Sure, that one was a movie, but there's this kind of beast waiting inside EVERY man, just lurking like a shark, hoping to ruin the life of some delicate flower (sorry, "delicate flower" was sexist, indicating an inherent weakness)... I mean some "strong, able, capable, wise, nurturing, caring, inherently emotionally mature, empowered, self-sacrificing, omni-benevolent WOMAN".
My gosh, it's like saying "weasel stoat"; all those things are engendered in the very word itself.
Let me say it once more to feel the sun-kissed dew on my tongue:
WOMAN.
Aaaaah.....
Men, we're such pigs, cowards, self-serving prats with no knowledge of how the world works OR SHOULD work.
Quite frankly, I've no idea whatsoever how we ever came to "oppress" womankind, since we're that bloody incompetent and have been throughout history (except for the other thread where we no longer pursue women -- apparently until 1964 we were warriors and now we're wimps).
Of course, it's only my vast male ignorance speaking, but since women are collectively that superior to males I UTTERLY FAIL TO SEE WHAT THE BIG HOLDUP IS!
Oh, wait -- I forgot. We men are the ultimate stumbling block, troglodytes underfoot to hamper the progress of the Athenians in the march to glory.
It's about a woman in the 50's, unhappy in her marriage and life, who has two children with a farmer.
The farmer and the kids leave to go to a State Fair and she stays home, meeting a handsome guy who's a photographer for National Geographic.
The two of them have a romantic fling, he leaves, asks her to come with him, and she decides to stay with her family instead.
Everything else in this thread is just reading between the lines and interpreting it according to your own weltanschauung.
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(My ex husband took care of me financially for almost 18 years. I loved him for it. It wasn't enough though. The bad outweighed that.)
