Dear ESB,
I'm pretty sure that my boyfriend of 6 years is going to propose within the next few weeks, he sucks at hiding his excitement and wants to tell me everything but that's not why I'm writing you.
We want to start house shopping once we are engaged, and are unsure what to do about our living arrangements between buying a house and the wedding. We currently don't live together and our parents have made very clear their expectations. His parents and some of our friends don't think we should live together until we get married, due to religious beliefs. We do go to church every week and some of our friends choose to believe that we have never slept together but come on we have been dating for 6 years!
On the other hand my mom has made it very clear that she believes anyone planning to get married should live together before making a life time commitment to anyone. I agree I want to live with my boyfriend when we are engaged but I don't want to be judged or dis-owned by our church community.
Do you have any suggestions on how to make both families happy?
-Stuck in the Middle
*****
LISTEN TO YOUR MOM.
And maybe consider joining a new church.
(I'm not joking.)
There's no magical fairy dust way to make everyone happy here, so you might as well focus on making yourself happy.
Photo: Yohji Yamamoto Fall/Winter 1999 by Inez & Vinoodh via I Saw A Film Today, Oh Boy
