I've been begrudgingly married (common law) almost 16 years. I HATE HATE HATE the Mrs form of address, as I find it to be an offensive "matronly" type word.

And like someone above, I too consider the term "Miss" to be too degrading an association with spinsters, and the low status "girls" and "ladies."

You may, however, bow before me, and refer to me as either The Empress or The Queen! :-) I always told my daughter & her girlfriends when they were little "The hell with being the princess--go for the power girls, and *always* be the queen!"

I'm also not the least bit proud to be married. I find the institution to be quite offensive, actually--like indentured servitude, only worse. I conform to the social standard only for practical reasons (taxes, insurance, kids, etc) not for romantic ones. Any woman who seeks fulfillment and happiness in the company of one man in this day and age needs therapy (and probably some powerful painkillers) IMO.

Being common law, I thnakfully never had to endure the princess bride thing either--I find the middle class Barbie Wedding syndrome to be a wretched waste of resources, people's time and energy.

We eventually had a helluva party to celebrate our union, but it was very traditional...drinking and dancing and playing merry pranks until well past dawn, the third or so day after the event. For us, the Big Event was birth of kids, a much more precarious and difficult thing to accomplish than getting married fer chrissake. I mean really, it just isn't that hard to get a man--the planet is crawling with men looking for a woman to play mama to them, after all.

And I will never understand what seems to me to be a desperate need of some women to wear their marital status as a badge of honor. Which is probably why I have so few married female friends at age 44.

Love the one you're with, I say!