The first year of marriage brings...

***There are qualifications for the following list to apply to you and your significant other (SO):

1. At least one of you must be under 25
2. Both of you must be in some way shape or form beginning, about to begin, ending or trudging through some type of higher education
3. Neither you or your SO (significant other) can be an heir/heiress/oil tycoon/royalty/professional athlete/celebrity/hedge funder/trust fund baby/etc.

So, back to the list. The first year of marriage (for all of those who qualify) brings:

1. NO money, because even the few thou you racked up at the wedding is gone. Admit it!
2. Unexpected things that cost lots and lots of money (like car repair, or tonsillectomies, or a replacement laptop, etc.--and no, this is not a personal list--these are generalized observations that might be based off of my own experience--might be!)
3. Lots of fun, guilt-free time spent with the SO, because you're newlyweds and its expected.
4. Lots of free meals from family members who either remember those moneyless days or use food to bribe you out of doing #3.
5. Crazy ideas about drastically changing everything you've ever known to save a little money (like selling your or you SO's car and becoming a one car family = problems).
6. Justification of hating certain chores (like, your disgust for washing dishes and doing laundry is because your SO LOVES to do those two things. Duh! I should've known that! I mean, you or your SO should have known that, because this list is not specific to me at all. At all.)
[Weird.]
7. Fights over which side of the couch you prefer (LEFT!).
8. The pout face when you or your SO ignores the other for other distracting and frivolous things (like facebook, or the student doctor forums, or blogs, etc.).
9. Satisfaction, because it all just feels so right.
10. Lots of unnecessary purchases and gifts (some that you will feel bad returning, but YOU MUST!) because you're young and carefree and immature and don't know any better.
11. Lots and lots and lots of the best, heartbreaking-because-its-too-much-for-one-heart-to-contain LOVE!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

I hope that this helps someone out there. These are definitely pertinent things that I wish someone would have shared with me before taking that ultimate dive into the freezing and bottomless depths of marriage.