Dear DVLA,

I decided I was going to wait until I calmed down to write this, but now I realise I wasn't angry or upset, I'm just annoyed. 

Now, I am in the lucky position of having got married when off on my maternity leave and the reason I say lucky is because at least all the silly crap that I have to do like re-registering my son's birth - still not over it, still think it's stupid - can be done pretty easily because I have plenty of time off to do admin tasks. The only problem is I, of course, need to cart my poor little lad around with me whilst doing them and he can be bored as hell.

Given the number of people who get married each year and the number of people who then change their names as a result of that marriage, and I'm also going to add in that given how this disproportionately affects women (there's nothing political in that or anything, it's just the truth), you would think that changing things like your documents to have the 'correct' name wouldn't be so difficult. So, the DVLA would have an online form where you can provide the change of address details, digital copies of your marriage certificate and just send over your old license, right? WRONG!

If you are changing your name post marriage, you have to get a form from the Post Office - it might not even be your local one because your local branch might be too small to deal with these types of forms, even though all they do is hand them out... - and then send it with your marriage certificate (no certified copies allowed!) and your old license to the DVLA and they will get back to you with a changed license. I believe it is similar for a passport.

I understand that these things are official documents and that appropriate checks need to be done, but it's crazy to me that it takes this much effort, especially as the majority of people will be navigating this whilst also working. It seems insane that it's not easier, given that hundreds of people get married every day, and it's not uncommon to want to share a surname with your spouse and your children. It's enough that you have to go through the motions of changing your name with every company you have previously interacted with, and it's a long old process, without making it overly complicated to get your ID changed so the rest can follow.

I May Have Mentioned This Before,

 But I'm tired and I'm trying so let's just go with it.

One of the "fun" things about getting married is that it changes the way that you register the birth or births of any future children. When our son was born it was assumed that I was his mother, but because my partner and I weren't married at the time, until we went and formally registered his birth and put my partner's name on the birth certificate, he didn't have any legal parental responsibility for him. How that would have worked had something gone wrong I don't really know, but thankfully one of the things that happens following a marriage is that a child is assumed to belong to both the birthing parent and their spouse. (As far as I am aware it is the same for non-binary or same sex couples.)

I'm just going to note that I'm saying I was assumed to be his mother because there are a few legal sticky bits if there's been surrogacy involved or any mix ups at fertility clinics, though I believe they are thankfully very few and far between!

Naturally, that only impacts any future children we have as opposed to the little guy we have now, so what happens with him? Well, we have to re-register his birth as a child of our marriage. Before you say, well he's not, I know. Before you say it's stupid, I know, it is. But it is a legal requirement and what gets even more ridiculous is that it's not even because he's under a certain age. No matter - as I understand it - the age of the child (even if they're an adult) their birth has to be re-registered. And yes, legally you have to do it, even though there is no specific timeline on which you have to do it. (Or a penalty for not doing, as far as I understand.)

And as with a lot of things, I had a bit of an emotional reaction to this, because it feels a bit like re-writing history as though I'm embarrassed that my partner and I weren't married at the time that we had my son and as though that means something about my son. I know in the past it has and there have been some names which people use to describe children born outside of a marriage, and the reason is - at least in part - the inheritance law which was why this appointment existed, but the really stupid thing is, that has been changed! But the marriage law or the registration part wasn't and I don't understand why. To me, it seems like it's just giving the registry office something more to do, as though they're not actually busy (which they are) and stopping these appointments, which are done for free, would free up time to do other things like marriage notice appointments (which are paid for) or marriages (which are paid for) or register births. When we registered little man's birth we registered him in the local authority he was born in (which you have to) and we were able to do that when he was 3 days old, but in the one we live in, you couldn't get an appointment for a few weeks, and there are certain things you need the birth certificate to do, like open a bank account or get a passport, so it seems crazy to have to offer needless appointments which take time away from very important ones!

Even if you're not a big believer in marriage or it's not something you are particularly fussed about, there are things which make it sensible, like thinking about inheritance if something happened to one of you, or for ensuring that if something bad happens, you are the legal next of kin. I realise that all seems to be for planning "if something bad happens" but in those situations, marriage becomes important and not being married is just another stress on top of an already stressful situation. For some, it's the protection of if you split, assets are divided and there is the ability to have the situation looked at from the outside, because if there are kids involved, one of you likely had to pause your career in order to look after them, even if it was for a short time, and financial contributions wouldn't look 50/50, but that's not all there is to family life. 

I think this went in a different direction than I was originally intending, but that happens when you write a blog in two halves. 

Romance Isn't Dead, But Maybe It Should Be,

What a strange thought for a writer who finds writing about romance somewhat inevitable, but alas, onwards we must charge. 

I was watching a video this morning that was some news channel and they were talking about what has changed in the year since the Metoo Oscars (can't find a hashtag on my American laptop right now). One of the journalists, not sure if he was acting dense or being dense, but I'm trying to give him the benefit of the doubt, asked the question of 'if she doesn't kiss the man, what's the point of her being in the movie?' And if it weren't for the fact I was on a train full of people drinking my soul mate in coffee form (Starbucks Blonde Roast Soya Flat White has officially dethroned the AMT Organic Oat Milk Flat White because the coffee is less bitter) I would have probably flipped.

Explaining why is probably going to sound like a tangent, but bear with me.

A few years ago, one of my "great aunts" died. She wasn't actually my great aunt, but it was shorthand for my grandad's cousin or some other obscure relationship. She lived alone, had never married and had never had children. We found a few letters from an American military man whom she had been involved with whilst he was stationed in England (to what extent they were involved, I do not know, cannot know and really, do not want to know) and the last struck me as infinitely sad. There was a line in it that said something about he cared for her more than she for him. It was a fleeting romance and ended when he returned home by the seems of it. The romantically inclined part of my brain imagined all sorts of scenarios which prevented her from being with her love, making her lack of a husband be because she never got over him and there was a desperate loneliness to it, but then I realised something - not getting married does not mean that you lack a husband. The word 'lack' is completely wrong, especially when viewed with a wide-angle lens and looking at the photos of the travels that she enjoyed alone. There's a photo I love of her T posing in front of the pyramids, a cheesy grin blasted across her face. Her love of life could not be more apparent. It's not as though she spent her years looking with heartache at the space on the sofa beside her, sighing wistfully at 'what could have been.' 

For some, the idea of a life with no partner is daunting. The purpose of life is to find someone, get married and have babies, or that is what is in the minds of many anyway. It's an idea that seems to me like an old sweater that shrunk a little in the wash. There are a few options on what to do with it. 

First off, you could do what many career women do. You can soak the sweater in a water and fabric conditioner solution, pin it out back to its original size and let to dry and your sweater has been amended to fit you. Marriage and motherhood no longer has to mean a woman is banished back into her kitchen to make dinner for the brood and all that comes along with it. 

Second, you can give the sweater to someone it does fit. Some people WANT a wedding and babies. For some people, that is their aim in life, and it is the job of the rest of the world to remember that that is valid. Have the romance, have the babies, have your happy. Happiness is not one size fits all, so you do you. 

Another option is to do what my "great aunt" did. Throw caution to the wind, throw out the sweater and find a life that fits. Maybe you get tared with the brush of being a lonely spinster who is to be pitied, but as long as that isn't true and you know you're finding your happy, that is all that matters. 

The second to last one I would say is never give up. There are precious few good films about finding love in later life, and those that there are seem to get limited attention, or they focus on this being the second love of a person's life. They've already been married, and they outgrew that marriage or something awful happened (cheating, divorce, a death of a spouse, anything really) but the idea of finding your first love at an older age seems like an unattractive concept. If you want a romantic love, never give up on that. 

The very last is remembering that not all love is romantic. It is possible to be aromantic and asexual or just go through a spell where the idea of dating is far too cumbersome and instead enjoy spending time with your friends. Maybe one of your friends is really great at people watching with you and the two of you can love that together, but that friend hates art, so you go to galleries and exhibitions with another friend. And you love them. You do the things you want to do and enjoy your life and nobody has to kiss each other or be holding a torch to someone who is blind to it. Maybe you do those things alone. 

Maybe you dedicate your life to coding a game or writing a book or tending your garden and you have love for those things and something that's almost contempt towards all other humans because they are rubbish and planet ruining. Romance is not intrinsically necessary for a happy and fulfilled life. Sexual love isn't intrinsically necessary either, so maybe ladies, gentlemen, humans of whatever gender, no gender or whatever descriptive word you prefer, we should pick up out pitchforks and tridents and slay the beast that is romance, or maybe tell it that it has no home with us. 

Just a thought; catch you later.