For unmarried people - by what age would you like to be married?

[Supersonic]

30s. Definitely not my 20s, rather not surrender my freedom so soon.

[Simfan34]

Somewhere between 30 and 35... my dad was 45 when I was born, which I've never been entirely enthusiastic about. But if end up going into the field I'd like to (that is, academia), I won't be seeing real money (or the real world, in a way) until I'm 29-30.

I mean I can recognise oakvale's incomprehension but it's something most of us are going to do, and it does factor into my consideration of how I'm going to be planning my life after I graduate. Like I mentioned, my dad is relatively old, albeit perfectly healthy, and it's somewhat strange seeing most of my cousins getting married and having children while that's something at least a decade off for me... I mean, if I get married at 35 my dad would be 80 (!) then. My "vision" of the future quite usually assumes some breakthrough in medicine that allows everyone to live past 100.

So there's a desire to do it sooner rather than later, which is working against the general need to be secure in terms of your career as well as the desire to make the most of your single years, however one might choose to interpret that.

[Mordecai]

By age thirty, possibly early thirties (31, 32). No later than 35.

[7,052,770]

I was 25, which seems just about ideal. Gives time for several years of just me and the wife, and still have all of kids out of the house while I'm still in my 40s.

[traininthedistance]

I would have to get really cracking to be married before 30.  Right now I'm comfortably cohabitating though, so once I finally sort through the utter tire fire that is my lack of any financial or career stability and get on more solid ground, that sort of thing will be a real possibility.

Kids?  Probably not, though I'm more conflicted about that than my SO is.

[MASHED POTATOES. VOTE!]

Anyway, I don't believe creating your road map, like "I'll get married at 25, have first kid at 26..." makes much sense. Life just doesn't work this way.

[HagridOfTheDeep]

I want to fall in love, not decide to be in love due to other constraints. Unfortunately I'm kind of realizing that a lot of the relationships around me are ones of convenience. "The guy asked me out, so I felt obliged to give him a chance. I learned to love him."

You can imagine that the friend zone is a bit of a problem for me. But asking someone out randomly when I know nothing about the person just seems so incomprehensible.

[free my dawg]

I'm 23. I don't think about such things (not clinically insane).

e: I voted 30-40 because the younger options seem disturbing to me in 2014 and if that dark day should ever come that seems like a reasonable age range. Someone voted 23? What.

Yep it's me.
I would like to have kids relatively early!

The idea of thinking about having children in your twenties (I don't know what age you are but I'm assuming it's under 23) is literally incomprehensible to me but whatever floats your particular boat.

Re: above - surely celibate priests defeat half the purpose of being a liberal christian?

The idea of thinking about having children in your twenties (I don't know what age you are but I'm assuming it's under 23) is literally incomprehensible to me but whatever floats your particular boat.

QFT.

But why? Having children is probably the best thing that can happen to someone. And if you have children early, you will have grandchildren early as well. And having grandchildren is probably awesome as well.

(and I'm 19)

Not when your friend's mother's a grandmother at 32 it isn't.

[Snowstalker Mk. II]

This is a dumb poll (normal).

Also, staying unmarried for life does not mean celibacy, Scott.

[free my dawg]

Who else is celibate?

Anyway, re: the above, I don't want to have children (sane) and plan to leave the world a smoking, ruined husk for the next generation (sane).

>implying the reaganites aren't leaving it a husk for us

[windjammer]

I'm 23. I don't think about such things (not clinically insane).

e: I voted 30-40 because the younger options seem disturbing to me in 2014 and if that dark day should ever come that seems like a reasonable age range. Someone voted 23? What.

Yep it's me.
I would like to have kids relatively early!

The idea of thinking about having children in your twenties (I don't know what age you are but I'm assuming it's under 23) is literally incomprehensible to me but whatever floats your particular boat.

Re: above - surely celibate priests defeat half the purpose of being a liberal christian?

The idea of thinking about having children in your twenties (I don't know what age you are but I'm assuming it's under 23) is literally incomprehensible to me but whatever floats your particular boat.

QFT.

But why? Having children is probably the best thing that can happen to someone. And if you have children early, you will have grandchildren early as well. And having grandchildren is probably awesome as well.

(and I'm 19)

Not when your friend's a grandmother at 32 it isn't.

32, this is excessive. Not 50

[ElectionsGuy]

I have no idea (normal)

[TDAS04]

I don't plan on getting married.  Didn't vote, since that option isn't in the poll.

[Atlas Has Shrugged]

I'd like to be married by the time I'm 26 but as Afleitch noted, we don't plan these things. They just happen.

[DC Al Fine]

You don't plan anything like this; marriage happens when it happens (and unhappens when it needs to happen too) To think otherwise, or to try and plan it out is a bit strange.

I'm a bit mixed on this. Yes you are entirely right that we can't force marriage to happen, but there are also a lot of things one can do to create conditions favourable to marriage. The sort of people we date at 21 often aren't the same sort of people we date at 27.

[HagridOfTheDeep]

You don't plan anything like this; marriage happens when it happens (and unhappens when it needs to happen too) To think otherwise, or to try and plan it out is a bit strange.

I'm a bit mixed on this. Yes you are entirely right that we can't force marriage to happen, but there are also a lot of things one can do to create conditions favourable to marriage. The sort of people we date at 21 often aren't the same sort of people we date at 27.

Isn't that why marriage at 21 isn't always the best idea?

[The world will shine with light in our nightmare]

The poll is just asking what age you prefer to be married by.  That doesn't mean it's going to happen.

[Oakvale]

The poll is just asking what age you prefer to be married by.  That doesn't mean it's going to happen.

What if someone doesn't want to get married, though? Why isn't that an option.

[The world will shine with light in our nightmare]

Yeah, this thread was a bad idea.