[She wasn't going to correct him either way, it's not exactly a big secret that Masaomi doesn't think highly of marriage as a concept. Yet another benefit of their trip was finally realizing exactly how thoroughly Masaomi relied on his viewpoints, the foundation that they made for his mentality and ultimately most all of his decisions. It's kind of funny to realize that the man you love so much is so incredibly different from yourself on a fundamental level.]
It's the chicken or the egg, though, and that's probably because I had parents who lived monogamously and were married, but were also mates. It's incredibly specific to me, and not the grander picture.[After all, Vincent was just as intense about pack life as Masaomi was, and her mother came from a staunchly monogamous, old family line.] I wouldn't get married to someone that I didn't think was my mate, and that's probably the most valuable thing to have learned from all of this.
[Then again this is also deeply influenced by the fact that Nariko would openly admit that a marriage ceremony was more a personal thing - if you went down to the bare bones of it, she leaned more towards pack life than monogamy, there'd just been some oddly timed growing pains.] If you're speaking about society as a whole, then marriage and mateship serve different functions for different, vocal groups, and what's 'better' is going to depend on your worldview.
[She tilts her palm, as if to somehow signify the tricky nature of it.] If you're talking about us, specifically, then it's just two different mateships with two completely different lifestyle's and emotional goals. It's a biological instinct either way. One instinct satisfies the need for an active decision, the other instinct submits entirely.
[Because, let's not forget: She had been tempted to leave Masaomi, mate or not. Which meant that the primal instincts he was relying on for his argument could fail in real life, and almost had. So it's probably better to say that it's more a complete picture with the three of them as a unit with separate moving parts.]
I'm enjoying this meta conversation of theirs far too much
It's the chicken or the egg, though, and that's probably because I had parents who lived monogamously and were married, but were also mates. It's incredibly specific to me, and not the grander picture.[After all, Vincent was just as intense about pack life as Masaomi was, and her mother came from a staunchly monogamous, old family line.] I wouldn't get married to someone that I didn't think was my mate, and that's probably the most valuable thing to have learned from all of this.
[Then again this is also deeply influenced by the fact that Nariko would openly admit that a marriage ceremony was more a personal thing - if you went down to the bare bones of it, she leaned more towards pack life than monogamy, there'd just been some oddly timed growing pains.] If you're speaking about society as a whole, then marriage and mateship serve different functions for different, vocal groups, and what's 'better' is going to depend on your worldview.
[She tilts her palm, as if to somehow signify the tricky nature of it.] If you're talking about us, specifically, then it's just two different mateships with two completely different lifestyle's and emotional goals. It's a biological instinct either way. One instinct satisfies the need for an active decision, the other instinct submits entirely.
[Because, let's not forget: She had been tempted to leave Masaomi, mate or not. Which meant that the primal instincts he was relying on for his argument could fail in real life, and almost had. So it's probably better to say that it's more a complete picture with the three of them as a unit with separate moving parts.]