Change is Good?

As I was sitting at my desk today thinking about Meggan, Amelia, work, life, etc. I came to the realization that in many cases there is a bitter irony between the relationship of being a father and a husband. The irony lies in the fact that some people will have to change the type of husband they are in order to become the type of father they need to be. Now, this certainly isn't the case for everyone. I would even say it isn't really the case for me. That said, I am at a stage of life where the majority of the people I know are either starting a family or are squarely entrenched in parenthood. So, this is a situation I may see in action.

My view of marriage and the obligations that come with it is probably slightly different from most. I know several people feel marriage comes with a great responsibility to your spouse. I actually feel like dating comes with all the responsibility. First, there is the responsibility to be honest with the people you date. And secondly, there is the responsibility to be honest with yourself in terms of what you want out of a spouse. If you do both of those things while finding a compatible mate, the marriage is easy. To illustrate this, I will use my own courtship of Meggan. I essentially said "I'm not great looking, don't make a lot of money, am far closer to nerdy than cool, but I'm persistent, fairly pleasant most of the time, and am willing to stalk you if I have to." and she basically went with "I'm very pretty, predominantly out of your league in every way, but I'm feeling generous and you didn't turn up on the sexual offender registry. So, ehhh, you'll do." ... I'm paraphrasing a bit, but as you can see, honesty is what made us the happy couple we are today. Since we were honest in the beginning, we never had to change to keep the marriage great. All we have to do is act like ourselves and all is well.

Acting like ourselves brings me to my original point in the post - what happens to people whose marital style doesn't gel with their parental style. Luckily, in my case, Meggan and Amelia seem to want the same thing from me... to let them watch what they want on TV, to kill all the bugs, and to bake them cookies occasionally. So, I haven't had to make any alterations and my house is a happy home. However, I am genuinely intrigued by the wild party animals or world adventurers that have to settle down and stay home because they Baby Bjorn doesn't fit under the bungee harness. What happens to the aspiring nightclub DJ who has to switch to a day job because well, no kid deserves the embarrassment of having an aspiring nightclub DJ as a dad? The biker who can't jam the car seat in his sidecar? You get the point. What happens to these guys and more importantly, how do the changes they have to make affect their marriage? I would assume they lose a big portion of their identity and the identity their spouse fell in love with. To put it in perspective, I'm not sure Meggan would view me the same way if I came home with "Amelia" tattooed on my neck. That's just not the guy she signed up for. I would imagine this phenomenon is partially offset by the credit given for him actually being a good father. I'm just not sure, as with anything in life, you can serve two distinct masters at once. Thus, I could see a situation where being a good father makes you a bad husband...and that just doesn't seem right.