Marriage Wasn’t Built to Survive Quarantine

Stress isn’t a reflection of your relationship — your relationship is a reflection of unprecedented stress

David Dennis, Jr.
LEVEL

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Photo source: Peopleimages/Getty Images

Update 6/7/22: Level has a new home. You can read this article and other new articles by visiting LEVELMAN.com.

The standard wedding vows are so often repeated in popular culture — TV shows, commercials, Tyler Perry movies — that it’s easy to disregard the meaning behind the recitation. It wasn’t until I was actually standing at the altar, in front of my soon-to-be wife, that it dawned on me just how morbid and absolute those words are.

In sickness and health.
Till death do you part.
Sickness.
Death.

The words are so heavy that it’s amazing they reach our ears instead of tumbling directly to the floor. Their weight only gets more daunting with the final affirmation: “I do.” After I got married, I found myself thinking about my mortality; other than student loans, it was the first decision I’d ever made that I knew I’d live with for the rest of my life.

Like so many other people, mortality has been on my mind a lot over the past couple months. Certainly more than any time since my wedding day almost a decade ago. In the…

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David Dennis, Jr.
LEVEL

Level Sr. Writer covering Race, Culture, Politics, TV, Music. Previously: The Undefeated, The Atlantic, Washington Post. Forthcoming book: The Movement Made Us