Note:  My apologies to subscribers and readers alike.  I Inadvertently published a draft version of this musing and withdrew it, I think, followed by a not quite corrected version.  I have now republished the final, final copy, I think. - John

One of the friends with whom I had the conversation with regarding my previous musings, When is old antique?, is Whit.  He subsequently wrote to suggest that divorce and the division of property also played a big part in children not having or wanting the antiques many of us have/had.  He wrote about the higher divorce rates today as compared to the rates during our parents' day.  At the mention of divorce rates, as is often the case my mind went off on a tangent - from antiques to divorce.

It seems we now have a whole industry dealing with divorce.  You read about it in news articles, in magazines and on web sites.  Some tell you how to avoid it and the rest tell you the best way to go through one.  It is a topic for ministers and lawyers alike.  But that had me wondering - when did the change in numbers occur?  When did we go from a society where divorce was not only frowned on but actually was a stigma, a blemish on peoples’ reputations, to where we are today?

Where better to find the answers than on the inter net.  I finally found what I was looking for after visiting several sites that deal with the various aspects of divorce.  That source is the web site www.cdcgov.gov.  I found a graph that showed divorce numbers from about 1950 until 1990.  It appears that the numbers from about 1950 to 1960, and probably prior, remained nearly constant.  The rates after 1990 did as well since they seem to level off after that year.  In fact I’ve read that the rate of divorce has actually gone down in the past decade or so.

Anyway, the chart indicates that the lower divorce numbers were fairly steady until about 1960 when it started its climb.  The steep climb took place from 1965 until 1980 when it went from 400,000 to 1,200,000.  Assuming that the age people who were getting divorced was 30, it means those born in 1935 and later contributed most to the increasing rate.  Those who were born in the 1935-1940 years are now 70 to 75.  Whoa!

Being 73, I found that startling but sadly revealing.  To paraphrase what Pogo said, we have met the divorcees and they is us.  I am one of those who contributed to those statistics - I have been divorced.  For all of the good things we think about when those my age reminisce, we fail to realize that we were the vanguard to the growing tidal wave of divorces. 

I need to take care here and not paint everyone of my generation with this broad paint brush.  Most of my classmates are still married to their first and only spouse.  They have or are going to soon celebrate their golden anniversaries.  My heartfelt congratulations to them.  They are the ones who remained true to our parents beliefs.  But too many of us took the easy way out of what can be at times a difficult relationship and got divorced.  That is also true for those who came after us.  Too many kept seeing greener grass on the other side of the fence.  Regardless of who is thought to be the blame for the divorce, we know it takes two to get married and two to get a divorce, and that includes those of my generation.  The blame can be spread around.

As for our children, why should we think they will be any different?  Children often model their own lives after their parents’ lives and conduct.  We are their role models.  The words to Harry Chapin's song, The Cats in the Cradle, are so appropriate (they apply equally to women/girls) -

He'd grown up just like me
My boy was just like me

So as we wax poetic about the good old days, it doesn't hurt to keep the fact of those divorce numbers in mind.