I’m playing catchup! I wasn’t able to get to Maryanne Comaroto’s guest post last week so I will make up for it by giving you four Maryanne posts in a row! This post concerns the breaking wedding of Lamar Odom and Khloe Kardashian after only dating for four weeks. Maryanne, like myself, is suspect that their love will last.

Dating should be the time when a couple gets to know each other. Odom and Kardashian will never get that special time back.

And yet, I can’t help but pull for them. My parents were only dating 12 weeks when they got married and they are still married today. I had another friend in college who proposed to his girlfriend his freshman year and they are still married. It can be done

Here’s the deal; the facts are in. At least 50% of marriages don’t make it—which, if you’re a gambler, is slightly better than a crap shoot – this is what I told RadarOnline.com, when asked for a comment about Khloe Kardashian and Lamar Odom’s marriage.

And it would seem obvious to many people that marrying someone you have only been dating a few weeks would increase your odds of failure…among other things. So perhaps a better question to ask is not what are the downsides, but rather…why? Why get married? So you can have a party? Show up your sister on TV because you are profoundly insecure or desperate for ratings? What’s the rush? It’s not like love has a shelf life. Unless one is deeply religious, which is not evident in this case (correct me if I am wrong; I don’t think so), there are so few reasons to rush into nuptials before we have taken time to do a minimum of due diligence.

What I do know about these two people is they know something about success. It takes discipline, skill and focus (and perhaps a little luck) to turn your desire into reality. Hence my concern, again, about their haste. I am not convinced that these two people understand the game they are in – it’s more than a dating game! I feel whatever their motivations for wedlock—“looks good, feels good,” ratings, or whatever—they would benefit by focusing on the fact that the same commitment, discipline and skill that supported their success is needed to enjoy a successful relationship; particularly a healthy, fulfilling, sustainable one.

With all due respect, if these two people love each other, or feel a strong connection and want to jump into marriage (which I likened to jumping out of a plane, considering, well…that they have just barely met), they should strap on a parachute. Which is to say, they should strongly consider checking under the hood to make sure they have what it takes to make the journey before Sunday. Many things are very difficult, if not nearly impossible, to re-negotiate after they say “I do.”

While celebrity marriages may seem qualitatively different than the average boy-meets-girl dating scenario, all relationships thrive best when they rest on a solid foundation. In some ways, the celebrity relationship needs to pay even greater mind to this, as their relationship is subject to stresses, pressure and scrutiny that on a good day most of us cannot even fathom.

More to come from Maryanne tomorrow!

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